First Drive Review for 2015 Ford F-250 Super Duty Diesel

Pickup buyers in general fall into individual of two categories: Weekend Warriors and Heavy Haulers. While the former are primarily outdoorsy types, DIYers, and recreational-minded persons with toys to yank, inhabit in the latter arrange rack up many thousands of miles trailering livestock, campers, and contracting or homestead equipment. Weekend Warriors more often than not observe all the capability they need in half-ton trucks like the ford F-150, Ram 1500, and Chevrolet Silverado 1500. Heavy Haulers, on the other supply, take care of to opt for I beg your pardon? We still call the one-ton genre of trucks: Dedicated workhorses to facilitate can be equipped with dual rear wheels and torque-happy diesel engines, trucks to facilitate place freight and towing function on the top of their slope of priorities. But at hand is a core ground, and in the ford Trucks lineup to facilitate ground is occupied by the F-250 Super Duty.

The Same, But Different

It’s believed to facilitate familiarity breeds contempt, but you’d on no account know to facilitate by the in the main unchanged interior and outer of the F-250, which was updated for 2015. The styling remains comprised of the lifeless surfaces and near-right angles to facilitate bear befit a make of ford’s Super Duty trucks more than the very last decade or so, and the automaker says that’s the way customers like it. There’s certainly rejection mistaking the ford’s log cabin for the deluxe interior of the current Ram HD or the comparatively stark and minimalist interior in the Chevy Silverado HD. The F-250 we drove was a ruler Ranch kind, and although the leather felt accomplished, the seat shapes and sitting room positions weren’t as engaging or—gasp!—as carlike as persons of the competitors. Of the three, the Ram on slightest feels the widest for hips and shoulders, the Chevy the tightest.

Under the top of our F-250 was the same 6.7-liter Power Stroke diesel free in its F-350 Super Duty and F-450 Super Duty large brothers. (You can still understand the 6.2-liter gasoline V-8 in the F-250 and F-350, but we drove individual the diesel this instance.) ford prodded the Power Stroke for 2015 to deliver 440 horsepower and 860 lb-ft of hairy-chested torque, relying on the usual tricks for its up-to-the-minute disk-shaped of one-upmanship: A better turbo, spanking fuel injector tips, a more accurate exhaust-gas hotness sensor, and a revised fuel pump. An improved torque converter helps the TorqShift six-speed automatic transmission carry out the diesel’s prodigious output.

 

With to facilitate much power on tap and a stout frame underneath, even 1000 pounds of empty authority in the bed couldn’t ruin the fun. Our Crew Cab F-250 4x4 laughed rotten the freight as child’s take part in, although the accumulation was felt after accelerating testing absent of turns. (Max freight for our test truck’s configuration is 3250 pounds.) Considering the massive torque on supply, shifting is almost a secondary consideration, but the six-speed detachment encouraged from cog to cog seamlessly, on no account leaving us defective for a atypical gear—one minus machine to discomfort on the order of after pulling a clip. Put your walking boot into it and the truck simply surges forward, a feeling we skilled even on the steep uphill sections of our drive. Honestly, the ford delivers more muscle than almost some user will eternally need, but HD-truck output records, like oxidation, on no account catnap.

A button to the reasonable of the steering circle activates the exhaust brake to help care for race on downhill sections, but individual must on no account allow it quiet period you into self-righteousness. Being a ford engineer riding shotgun in an informal way mentioned regarding towing trailers on long, steep descents: “There’s continually possible for a runaway state of affairs.” Compared with the current offerings from Ram and Chevy, the Power Stroke is the quietest of the bunch, although we believe to facilitate the Duramax diesel in the current Chevy HD makes the largely apt “diesel truck” engine sound on idle.

The ride firms up faintly after the truck is unburdened, but it’s still more refined than a vehicle with this kind of freight function has some reasonable to be. Highway travel is a rich business, with little to rejection wind or engine clatter seeping into the passenger compartment. The steering is complete and accurate, but in a vehicle of this size it’s more on the order of getting the job completed safely than nailing apexes. Still, we had to give out it a go off: On a long, winding two-track, we engaged four-wheel drive and allow it rip, upcoming away impressed by the workhorse’s quickness, excepting the part wherever the road whack a empty close and we considered necessary a spotter and a several-point focus to understand the 20-foot-long beast wheeled around. And we’ll moreover supply absent kudos to the brakes, which, even with the rear wheels safe up on damp pavement—were you napping, ABS?—keep the truck pointed straight in the course of heavy-footed stops.

Pecking Order

So I beg your pardon? Separates the F-250 from the heavier-duty Super Duty rigs? Hip unfriendly, towing capability. With a fifth-wheel/gooseneck ceiling tow rating of 16,800 pounds, the single-rear-wheel-only F-250 is ample clever, but it’s rejection match for the red pulling power of its diesel F-350 and F-450 large brothers, which are rated to yank an absurd 26,700 and 31,200 pounds after equipped with dual rear wheels. Interestingly, usual towing via a traditional globe hitch reveals a more tightly grouped appoint of information: The F-250 tops absent on 14,000 pounds, the F-350 and F-450 both on 19,000 pounds. (Note: Ram has very soon announced it will start rating its HD trucks by the SAE J2807 towing standard. The ford information quoted at this juncture are manufacturer supplied and not J2807 compliant.) Lest you think we are overemphasizing the magnitude of tow ratings, consider to facilitate ford says, “90 percent of all Super Duty trucks are purchased by customers who tow often.” It’s for to facilitate motive to facilitate towing stats show the way truckmakers’ advertising blitzes.

Overall, the F-250 makes a strong pencil case for buyers who make sure of a little Heavy Hauling connecting stints as a Weekend Warrior. Sometimes riding a rail reasonable down the core isn’t such a bad machine.

source: caranddriver.com
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Ford F-350 Super Duty Diesel V-8 First Drive

Ten percent more power than very last day and a solid whump of supplementary torque from the Power Stroke diesel mean to facilitate it’s Ford’s focus to leapfrog its truck-making competitors to profess “best-in-class” honors for 2015. Although the blue-oval team is making more sizeable pickup truck news with its aluminum-intensive F-150, in this pencil case we’re discussion heavy-duty or, in Ford jargon, “super-duty” light trucks, the F-250, F-350, and F-450.

We climbed into a couple of the revised 2015 F-350 models for fill in drives. Both were four-by-fours wearing the ruler Ranch badges to facilitate denote luxurious accompaniments, both in crew-cab/short-bed spec. One was a dual-rear-wheel version wearing to facilitate edition’s standard 17-inch wheels shod with Bridgestone tires; the other truck had a single circle on either close of the rear axle and the voluntary 20-inch chrome wheels and Michelin light-truck tires. Both were equipped with the Power stroke diesel V-8 and TorqShift six-speed automatic transmission. Prominent badges reminded us to facilitate the rigs would happily burn B20 biodiesel if prearranged the fortuitous.

With individual fill in exposure, our principal impressions were to facilitate this year’s more powerful engine seems remarkably quiet—not as clattery or ever-present as the Cummins diesel-powered HD Ram we drove earlier this year—and to facilitate the duallie was, surprisingly, easier to trick and rode better than the single-wheel version. A Ford engineer who was riding shotgun told us the single-wheel kind was equipped with an uprated towing package and to facilitate its large wheels and atypical rear-axle and spring setup affected the ride and steering feel.

On the Heavier Side of Light Duty

Each truck’s bed was troubled with more than 1000 pounds of weights so it wasn’t really probable to make sure of a seat-of-the-pants estimation of increase of rate, but prearranged the restraint weights, power ratings, and earlier experience, we expect these rigs can understand to merging velocity with ample of extent to get by without on a highway ramp. Unladen, zero-to-60-mph period must be around 8.0 seconds. Although they’re called one-ton trucks, that’s not much of a load by up to date principles. Ford says to facilitate these Power Stroke F-350s, depending on equipment and tidy, can be rated to tow up to 26,700 pounds (or as little as 12,500). The gross combined authority rating can range up to 35,000 pounds. Mind you, these are intended for farm and work-site habit, although the distinctions connecting personal-use and mercantile vehicles are blurring. Marketing nomenclature notwithstanding, these pickups are really classed with their half-ton stablemates as light-duty trucks somewhat than with exact medium- or heavy-truck segments wherever commercial-grade haulers fit.

Ford isn’t ration to care for this distinction, however, daring to facilitate this second-generation Power Stroke diesel is in the main an engine so strong to facilitate it’s all but identical to the individual used in the medium-duty F-450. (Ram made related claims on behalf of its Cummins-built six very last year).

Added Squeeze Makes added Juice

The Power Stroke nowadays uses a better turbocharger and redesigned fuel-injector nozzles to bake larger bangs in all of the 6.7-liter engine’s eight cylinders, calculation up to a rating of 440 horsepower (up from 400) and 860 lb-ft (versus 800 very last year). That neatly tops the records Ram used to profess the title as the hardest puncher with its Cummins diesels very last day (385 and 850)—and by an even wider margin more than the torque rating GM claims for the Duramax diesels in the Chevy Silverado and GMC Sierra HD models.

Also with a hard eye on its cross-town rivals, Ford placed a move forward button on the dash to actuate the exhaust brake. Like persons on Ram and GM, the exhaust brake generates back pressure through the turbo to create drag. Ford claims to facilitate further the trouble-free one-touch actuation, this year’s version moreover moving parts more effectively.

Dearborn moreover boasts to facilitate it upgraded the interior tidy on the ruler Ranch models for 2015. It looks a speck better but to our eye didn’t match the quality of equipment in the Ram and Chevy trucks we’ve sampled recently. The leather, nowadays wearing the ruler Ranch’s “snake” brand more prominently, looked accomplished but at hand was minus of it and occasionally it was used in abnormal chairs, while cheap-looking plastic bits (notably pockets on the console and the inner flap panel) felt flimsy. On the individual supply, F-350s in ruler Ranch tidy can run $55,000 to $70,000 or so and chintzy tidy might be off-putting. Still, customers in this segment are continually asking for more capability, Ford claims, so perhaps they’ll be willing to overlook such factors in good turn of daring the biggest power information.

source: caranddriver.com

First Drive: 2015 Ford Transit

Equally a segment, fullsize vans are stealth-fighter hidden on generally consumers' radar. Visit a dealership pro one of the four brands with the intention of offer them and you'll be fortunate to discover even lone on spectacle. These are money-making vehicles primarily, even more so than pickup trucks. Vans are the shuttles pro plumbers, caterers, carpenters, particular layers, masons, electricians, florists and carpet, and a enormous part of this country's productivity is accomplished using them. At the second, Ford is the 800-pound gorilla in with the intention of opportunity – fully 41 percent of money-making vehicles wear a Blue Oval. So as Ford announced three years past it would be ditching its money-making bread-and-butter E-Series, it predestined the Transit with the intention of would be replacing the Econoline had enormous, 53-year-old shoes to fill.

We were still a morsel evocative in this area Econoline vans vacant away until vacant frankly from the Transit initially drive in Kansas City to an E-350 airport ferry. Climb up through the Econoline's tiny dual doors and bang your head on the opening, crouch all the way to your seat at that time take pleasure in a loud, rattle-prone, creaky, harsh ride on beam-hard seats while struggling to think it over made known the low windows. This is an experience near each traveler has had. By comparison, the Transits we'd solely spent two days with were each morsel of the four decades better they looked-for to be. It cannot be understated solely how much better the Transit is in each single way. The load floor is barely more than knee distinguished. There's a enormous feature entrance, and hitting your head on a entrance opening is near impracticable. Stand up all the way if you're under six-foot, six-inches – thumbs down more half-hunching down the aisle. There are windows in fact designed to be looked made known of. The ride is sweet smooth, thumbs down thriving vibration from un-restrained metal panels and thumbs down squeaks. Conversations can be held by habitual levels very than yelling ended the wail of an ancient V8. The seats are comfortable. The AC is cold. There are cupholders.

Enough anecdote-laying, what's in a Transit? We're discussion in this area a very fullsized unibody forefront that's enjoyed a 49-year history in Ye Olde Europe. This newest iteration is part of the "One Ford" initiative, so it was designed as a comprehensive offering from the get-go, eschewing the body-on-frame construction the E-Series has used since 1975. Instead, the Transit integrates a rigid ladder frame into an overall frame construction made of high-strength cold-rolled and boron steel. The suspension is a unadorned but well-tuned Macpherson brace array up front with a rear solid axle and leaf springs.

Equally with the F-Series built in the same extensive Kansas City Assembly Plant, the Transit offers a staggering digit of variations. Transit Assistant Program Manager Milton Wong confirms here are ended a million combinations – Ford hasn't yet tallied it up formally. Suffice to say if you aspire a Transit (or a thousand of them) you can option it/them to correctly the specification preeminent suited pro your needs. Mix and match linking 129.9-inch and 147.6-inch wheelbase lengths, three overall lengths, three roof heights (83.6, 100.8 and 110.1 inches), load or passenger or skeleton yellow cab configuration, equipment post (MyFord Touch, Crew Chief fleet management services, and that.), emergency services prep quantity, RV prep quantity, light duty, standard duty, gray duty and dual rear-wheel axle, uncommon insignia and several other variables.

Then add in three chatter engine choices: The corrupt engine is the same 3.7-liter V6 currently existing in the F-150, and it boasts a respectable 275 horsepower and 260 pound-feet of torque. It's furthermore the engine with the intention of offers discretionary hardened valve seats, sensors and brainwashing looked-for pro aftermarket CNG conversions. The sweltering rod option is the 3.5-liter twin-turbo V6 EcoBoost with 320 hp and 400 lb-ft.

The final engine option is a new-for-North-America 3.2-liter inline-five turbo-diesel on loan from the comprehensive Ranger pickup (which is frustratingly un-global pro North America) making 185 hp and 350 lb-ft of torque. It'll run on B20 and boasts a variable-geometry turbo and glow plugs with the intention of allow quick start down to -10 degrees Fahrenheit. They bring about not more than with the intention of, of way, solely not in a "quick" style. It's kind of a beast too, offering 90-percent of summit torque early by 1,500 rpm. While not the drag racer the EcoBoost is, it'll certainly drag approximately stuff. The 3.2 is probable to be the prime fuel nation and long-term durability option, and it'd better be taking into account it's the generally expensive. All three engines make paired to a six-speed automatic SelectShift transmission with the intention of can be manually shifted, but who are we kidding at this time?

The stretch "fullsize" doesn't really sort out the Transit justice. For the generally basic configuration, the fleeting wheelbase, low roof develop, it's really single a little morsel better than the outgoing Econoline. However, the most wheelbase, most roof height, most overall part version with dually rear axle we chose to assess – "Jumbo" as it's called – is the size of a small warehouse. Full-service dirt bike shops be inflicted with a reduced amount of floor interval. It boasts shades of the Grumman box forefront in this configuration. For comparison's sake, versus the biggest factory-available E-Series, this maxi-Transit boasts a staggering 75-percent more interior volume, pro a whole of 486 cubic feet. Roll with the intention of map around in your head. That's a cube near eight feet to a feature. If you're a affair title-holder running two Econolines, they might be replaced by lone Transit.

Getting to with the intention of generous volume is exceedingly straightforward – the dual swinging barn doors by the back commence large, up to 270 degrees with magnetic stays, and the sliding feature entrance by the feature is 50-percent better than the leading E-Series opening. Both doors will acknowledge a fully laden pallet. Total load pro our Jumbo 350 dually tops made known by 4,650 pounds. Only the mega-Sprinter boasts better load by 5,485 pounds. Towing isn't bad, either, in the event you looked-for to tote even more stuff. Be very successful tow rating isn't into the asinine stratosphere with the intention of light-duty trucks occupy, but it matches Sprinter's rating of 7,500 pounds – in this area the consequence of a ad, a racecar and spares to energy with your mobile alacrity supermarket.

The Transit does all the well built man-work stuff well, but the total business is designed in such a way with the intention of it's surprisingly straightforward to drive and live with. If you're familiar with the Fiesta, Focus or the F-150, you'll recognize the Transit's interior bits. The pail seats are basically plucked from the F-Series and offer all-day comfort; the steering veer, curve indicate and wiper stalks may possibly be from one Ford car, and the dash is a jumble of Fiesta and F-150. A MyFord Touch/info screen sits up distinguished with stylized buttons not more than, while the shifter is dash-mounted to the aptly of the tiller and there's splendid interval in the focal point console with the intention of can be spec'd with a mix of two or three USB charging ports, aux-in, supporting power switches, two 12-volt power ports, ad brake controller, three cupholders and seven lords a-leaping. Inside one develop with more than the lowest roof, there's an overhead storage space shelf much like the lone found in the Transit Connect (a vehicle we be inflicted with a sneaking suspicion might fit inside the Jumbo Transit with a morsel of persuasion). There's a little cubby to the aptly of the steering veer that's exact pro stashing a phone. Near the floor-mounted furnish brake you can make an discretionary 110-volt plug running from an inverter. There's lane departure notification, automatic drizzle sensors, an automatic headlight option, and perhaps generally interestingly, the Transit will detect a drowsy driver by using the forwards camera to watch the vehicle's spot in the lanes, comparing it hostile to steering inputs ended calculate. Start to okay rancid and it'll vibrate the veer.

Ford fit up a "low alacrity city demonstration area" in an unfilled parking ration. Inside our eyes, could you repeat that? They laid made known was an autocross way to get behind the half-loaded vans to their limits. The short-wheelbase 3.7L-equipped Transit was the generally nimble and the diesel seemed to be inflicted with the generally amusingly restrained stability control brainwashing, but the EcoBoost was beyond doubt the quickest. We shouldn't call the hydraulic steering "precise" but the veer offers solid pointer, and putting the front tires exactly everywhere you aspire them is straightforward. At the hold limit, the Transit's usage is completely predictable while running by too-fast speeds. The e-nannies step in exactly as you've made something obtuse and apply solely the aptly amount of correction. Body lean is certainly a business, but we were expecting much, much more. The rotary radius is improbably forceful pro such a long apparatus – Jumbo straightforwardly managed a three-point curve in a two-lane street, and here was by no means a agonize in this area making a corner. Brakes are scaled to bring to a standstill somewhere around 15,000 lbs, so they're darn powerful. Taunt we say with the intention of pro a mountain of a vehicle, this Ford is almost sporty? Not quite sporty, but well fleeting of the "ponderous" adjective we probable.

Inside more realistic highway and around-town settings, the Transit is a puppy dog. It's remarkable how calm down this forefront is. There's effectively thumbs down wind blast by one alacrity and the racket with the intention of normally comes with a naked interior is as luck would have it absent. Credit the mastic glue laid down linking structural beams and sheetmetal with sound painkilling patches with the intention of be inflicted with been wedged in everywhere looked-for. Inside a rainstorm, we may possibly hear the pitter-patter of droplets on the roof, a realization with the intention of says a ration in this area how calm down the surplus of this forefront is. It was straightforwardly competent of merging into freeway traffic with load, quick was unforced, and enormous, two-part wing mirrors mean you can pretty well think it over what's vacant on behind and to the sides.

Forward visibility is exceptional although our windowless load describe predestined financial assistance up was exceedingly challenging, even with a rearview camera. Basically, you're driving backwards while looking down a tunnel, though that's not to say that's uncommon than other vans. It could sound asinine, but the step-in and seat height is lone of the Transit's preeminent aspects. Here the combination of a generous step, low-ish footwell height, straightforward grab points, and a minivan-like hip-point earnings with the intention of pro a driver hopping into and made known of the forefront all time long, there's vacant to be much a reduced amount of fatigue. By comparison, the Sprinter virtually requires mountain climbing gear to get to the rudder. The lone weakness of the Transit's control opportunity is the forceful distance linking the driver's seat and the focal point console. Our size-eleven Red Wing boots were held up each calculate we tried to pass frankly to the load area.

It was permanently assumed the continue E-Series would be built shortly with the excitement death of the universe. That could still occur to pass since Ford will take up again building the gray skeleton yellow cab version until by smallest amount the aim of this decade. With with the intention of understood, the Transit is so skilled with the intention of our pangs of nostalgia pro the death of the Econoline be inflicted with been deposit to surplus. Amongst the newest crop of Eurovans, the Transit exhibits the preeminent combination of capability, animal comfort, thoughtful facial appearance, equipment and powertrain options. Plus, solely think in this area how enormous the airbrushed murals can be.

source: autoblog.com