Car Gazing
New Ford has chiseled body, refined cabin
By Derek Price
How do you improve on a legend?
That's the question Ford had to answer before redesigning the 2004 F-150 pickup, the most popular vehicle in the history of the automobile. Ford has sold 27.5 million F-series trucks since their introduction in 1948, including over 800,000 last year alone – a higher sales volume than many companies have for their entire lineup. By any measure, it's been a success.
When you sell a pickup every 40 seconds, like Ford did last year, you don't want to mess up the winning formula with a radically different product. At the same time, you don't want the truck to become stale while competitors begin to eat your lunch with improved designs and slick advertising.
So, you do exactly what Ford did with the new F-150: keep the best stuff and beat the competition at their own game.
The new F-150 feels awfully similar to its predecessor – big, tough, roomy, and rugged – while adding a wild new interior that looks as nice as those in the new Dodges, Chevys, Toyotas, and Nissans. Its body is a subtle evolution of the jellybean look it replaces, and its workhorse performance is more muscular than ever.
To other drivers, the most obvious change to the F-150 is its body, which is blockier and more industrial looking than last year's model. Its grille is taut and powerful, and its sheetmetal draws on design elements from the past with a chiseled, fresh look that adds creases, jagged edges, and subtly aggressive fender flares. Like the rest of the truck, the tailgate is now flat and vertical, not curvy and smooth, giving it an overall look that is harsher than the 2003 truck.
Inside, though, Ford took the opposite approach. Instead of making it sterile and truck-like, designers took cues from modern luxury cars to give it a smooth, pleasant, comfortable appearance with muted colors and well-placed controls. In fact, it is the most car-like of any truck interior available today.
Each version of the truck, from the sporty FX4 to the luxurious Lariat, has a different interior look with individual materials, colors, and styles. All of them have bold vertical bands with a two-tone instrument panel. An innovative powered rail lets owners customize the cabin with a first-aid kit, flashlights, two-way radio holder, and other options from Ford dealers and aftermarket suppliers.
The only real weakness in the interior, at least in our XLT test truck, was the amount of hard, cheap-feeling plastic covering everything in sight. It looks like Ford is following GM's lead in this respect – and that's not a good thing. Construction seems top-notch, though.
For many truck buyers, performance is vital, and the new F-150 doesn't skimp. It can tow up to 9,500 pounds and has a payload capacity of 2,900 pounds – impressive, indeed.
Key to this performance is a new version of Ford's 5.4-liter Triton engine, which now makes a mountain-conquering 300 horsepower – a 15-percent improvement over Ford's previous engine with the same displacement. Smooth and quiet under most circumstances, it contributes to the cabin's stunning silence.
Despite Ford's claims of major improvements to the suspension, driving the new truck feels surprisingly similar to the model it replaces. The ride is still fairly bouncy and harsh – as any hard-working truck must feel – and its steering system and brakes both feel more than competent. A wide turning radius makes it fairly difficult to park, so it could definitely benefit from copying GM's miraculous four-wheel steering.
All in all, the new F-150 has exactly what it takes to beat the competition in terms of interior refinement and rugged performance, yet it isn't radical enough to alienate its loyal buyers. With a formula like that, we could easily call this truck legendary in another 50 years.
(Derek Price is a newspaper editor and freelance writer living in Texas.
Contact him at dprice@cargazingonline.com)
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