I was away gallivanting through the Netherlands this past week or so. Decided to hire something special, as a part of the holiday. Turns out i know a guy who knows a guy who specialises in this sort of thing and cut me a deal on his Ford F-150 SVT Raptor, which is a souped up version of a popular American oversize pickup truck we don't get here.
First thing that strikes you is the shock absorbers, they've made all the undercarriage stand out. Looks kinda cool. Twin shocks, designed specifically for high speed off road running. The wheels are pretty big too and the whole thing is jacked up pretty high.
The rear wheel's positioned perfectly for taking a running jump up into the load bay, instant 5 year old feeling :-) Strapped in some luggage, when you're thumping about in the tub it sounds solid, good first impression. The tailgate folds down and there's a cage structure lifts up / self assembles from the rear door cavity to form a new rear end to the load bay with the proper rear door acting as a longer bed. Pretty nifty. You can also use just that bit for your shopping / small loads.
Climbed into the cab, was expecting loud coloured interior (had only ever seen these on the web before) but it was a totally plain affair inside, probably indistinguishable from the normal f-150 i'd reckon. Bit underwhelming if anything.
The seats are pretty comfy, mostly leather & fake leather with a wee swatch of perforated cloth. Feels ok but the leather feels so soft that even the bits that are supposed to be real leather are probably 50% fake. Seat adjustments are from a previous century, very limited, thankfully they're fairly comfy (for me anyways) by default.
Driver and passenger doors are full size, rear bench doors are half size and open backwards, like a mazda rx-8 in some ways. Doors feel heavy but still quite cheap somehow, they don't thud, more like clang.
Getting settled in you're aware this thing is massive, it's jacked right up, it's very very wide and rear visibility isn't great. The door mirrors are a good size but not convex which kinda sucks.
Moving off the engine sounds great, first gear was slightly louder than the rest but in general the cab is pretty quiet -- surprising given the knobbly tyres, they're only ~17 inch wheels but the tyres are mahoosive.
It feels ok in traffic drive wise, but not size wise. Got out onto the ring road and it felt a lot better, the motorways are pretty wide there so the f-150 was fine.
The gearbox was a bit less than perfect and was frequently indecisive, i guess ford's UK auto box boffins and the USA auto transmission boffins don't talk to each other, because this thing is crying out for the software that runs the ford slushbox autos over here since at least the 90's, really the gearbox is a bit of a turd, it could be worse but i don't think i'm being too harsh.
For all i'd read about the massive horsepower & torque of the engine, it only felt pretty average. Probably because the thing weighs nearly 3 tons. It can still get a shift on but it's not going to harass a Ferrari anytime before the 2nd coming. Maybe it's not supposed to but that was definitely the tone i picked up when researching this motor before i booked it.
The ride is too soft, in fact if you can stomach the lean, and turn hard left then immediately right, you can detect the cab being left behind in the turn separate from the chassis. That's a weird feeling. It's a bit easy to wander about the lane which really got my goat. Turns out the dutch drive like that anyway (they're never off the rumble strips on the motorway!) so i probably didn't even stand out.
We were at a party and one of the farmers from just outside the village was really interested in it, he invited us over the next day to play in one of his fields on condition he could get a shot, seemed fair :-) 85mph over fairly rough terrain is pretty easy, non event even. The most fun is at slower speeds though, turning tight with the foot down kicking up lumps of turf 15ft in the air is cool. The dutch were all super nice (except in amsterdam, wont go there again in a hurry!) he even power washed it with a hot water, petrol powered job, and seemed to enjoy doing it!
Probably worth the american price tag but definitely not the euro price tag. The engine's not that special but it's hailed as being immense, it's really not. It's probably as tough as it says it is right enough. Under the bonnet it's not like a Mitsubishi Shogun Warrior all cramped in, it's fairly spacious really.
Filed it under "been there, done that, probably wont bother again".
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..."been there, done that, probably wont bother again"...
it's a Ford, so it will have rusted away before you get the chance.
www.car4play.com/forum/post/index.htm?f=2&t=2911
Last edited by: Iffy on Tue 28 Sep 10 at 06:30
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>> it's a Ford, so it will have rusted away before you get the chance.
You could hang a washing out on that petted lip ;-)
Chin up, Ford still needs you (in this forum of Kia Ceed drivers! -- www.car4play.com/forum/post/index.htm?t=2264 )
P.s. also drove a Volvo C30 which shares with the Focus i think, liked it quite a bit, except for steering wheel position (too big and too low), great seats and excellent climate control system.
Last edited by: Skoda on Tue 28 Sep 10 at 20:28
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Drove a mate's new F150 (dunno what sub model it was red) a few years ago, sounded wonderful and went very well....in a straight line, even then it felt light on the road.
Not a vehicle i'd want to be pressing on in the wet.
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>> Not a vehicle i'd want to be pressing on in the wet.
Oh I dunno, might be alright if you just looked at it as a natural form of laxative I suppose.
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Reminds me of my trip last winter visiting friends in N. California. The 4WD I requested from SF turned out to be a 2WD Chevy Tahoe, and in the ensuing two weeks I managed to spend a lot of time behind the wheel of my friends Toyota Tundra 5.7L V8. When it was time to move on we asked for a Rav4 or CRV, and were given 'free'upgrades to both a Dodge Ram BigHorn 5.7L V8 Hemi and the following week a F150 5.4L. Both would be enormously embarassing her in the UK but over there they were more than adequate forms of transport. Just throw your skis in the back and off you go.
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'Raptor' Wow.
Now there's a name to make you feel like a great big American hero...Not.
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"When it was time to move on we asked for a Rav4 or CRV, and were given 'free'upgrades to both a Dodge Ram BigHorn 5.7L V8 Hemi and the following week a F150 5.4L"
And we are worried about the impact the UK car population has on climate change? !!
Last edited by: madf on Wed 29 Sep 10 at 10:28
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Ford - Ford F-150 SVT Raptor Review - Iffy
