Good responses! I'll try to hit the main points of contention or interest...
Newer gas V8 engines are posting similar stats as diesel engines available in the same vehicle. The Ford Godzilla V8 is a work engine designed for Ford trucks all the way up to the F550.
Exactly. And especially one who's traveling unladened more often than loaded, and never seeing more than a 7k# trailer, the gasser is always going to win out on 1) performance, 2) convenience, and 3) cost.
I've had my stock Chevy K1500 in several parking garages with 7' limits; kinda makes me nervous but never scraped the roof yet. All parking garages have a height bar prior to the entrance anyway.
Philly is a very old city, and has a very large fraction of old garges with 6' 0" to 6' 6" max clearance. The two worst are PHL airport and CHOP, both of which I've hit my 1500 roof in. CHOP is labeled higher than it really is, with a roof clearance test pipe that must be hung 4" higher than the signage inside the garage.
PHL is actually marked at the right height, I hit my roof on the pipe that told me I was too tall. But it's a "no abort" situation, once you do hit your roof on their "if you hit this you're too tall" pipe. You can't back out, must only go forward, already knowing you're too tall.
I think the garage was originally laid out to allow too-tall vehicles to exit striaght thru the first floor, no problem, but the traffic pattern was subsequently changed to eliminate that abort path. Only airport service trucks are allowed to use that path, now.
re: manual... yes, I probably am! It seemed they kept the Richmond 6sp manual option on the HD trucks longer than the 1/2 tons, but now even those are gone.
Even high-outputs?
I would think you’d get crushed by any of the high outputs.
For you, pulling your heavy trailers, yes... diesel wins. But not for the guy driving the thing unladened most of the time, or with much lighter trailers.
I pull 1500# trailers every weekend, and I barely even feel them behind my 400hp/400ft-lb gasser. When I hook on my 7k# trailer, I obviously know it's there, but I still have plenty of power for as fast as I want to go with that thing.
If stepping up from 6500 lb. 1/2 ton to 8500 lb. 3/4 ton, I'd want an increase in horsepower and torque commensurate with that increase in weight, to maintain similar unladened performance. But I don't see much use in having 1600 ft-lb of torque from an HO diesel, for what I'm doing.
I realize that, I'm curios about how the steel frame holds up to the salt for those who don't always rinse it off.
I've never had a frame rust out on any pickup, it's only ever the body that fails. Frames are much thicker, coated on all sides, exposed to air that dries them out quickly after bad weather... all factors that make them much less susceptible to the rust that eats holes in the body after 10 - 12 years.
A lot of poeple swear by spraying product under the truck, but I don't think that would help at all, for the type of rust I see. The rust that eats my trucks always starts inside of doors, inside of tailgate, or between the walls of the bed. Nothing sprayed under the truck would ever reach any of these areas.
I grew to really hate the Ford trucks in the early 2000's, and wasn't very impressed with the interior of a friend's ca.2018 F150 (backup cam screen was quality and size of a ca.1993 graphing calculator
), but I'll admit the aluminum body is probably what I should be considering first.
Bronco has a 7 spd manual, no clue what the tow rating is or engine options are.
Listening...
I had a 1978 Bronco, which was basically an F150 with a bed-integrated cab. F150 and Bronco shared nearly everything in 1978 and 1979. I used to tow a lot with that vehicle, but would not want to tow an 88" wide trailer with any modern/narrowbody Bronco, due to visibility alone.
Let’s get technical for a second. The Bronco’s manual is a seven-speed Getrag MTI550, and it’s paired exclusively with the 2.3-liter EcoBoost turbocharged four-cylinder. That’s 300 horsepower and 325 lb-ft of torque on premium fuel — plenty of grunt to make a stick shift fun again.
Lovin the manual transmission option, but that's pretty low on horsepower and torque, a huge step down from the 400/410 I'm driving today.
I have to smile when I see people talking about "wimpy" 6 cylinder engines.
You know if you buy an F150 with the max tow package you'll be getting the 3.5 Ecoboost V6? It puts out much more torque than the 5.0 V8, and it does it at a lower rpm.
Yeah... I know the 3.5L EcoBoost is a good option. I have a budy who traded his old Ford 351 cid v8 for a 3.5 EcoBoost, and can't say enough good stuff about it, pulling his 13k# camper trailer all over the country.
Likewise with the Hurricane, assuming it proves as reliable in HO configurations.
But if looking at F250's, the standard engine is a 6.8L V8, and I can upgrade that to a 7.3L for a mere $1500. You just
know that's what I would be buying, if I went Ford. "Go big or go home," has always been my guiding principle, sometimes to my own detriment.
But again, if you want extended cab only Ford makes one.
Sorry, I was using "extended" in the most generic term... anything with a back seat. Having owned every combination of extended, quad, and crew cabs, I see the pros and cons in each, and will probably end up waffling on this decision awhile. I know I could get everything if I stepped up to the 160" wheelbase, but damn... that's awful tough for getting around tight city parking, etc.
My current truck is 150" wheelbase, with Crew Cab and shortie (5.6 ft.) bed, and that suits me really well about 364 days out of every year. For the odd time it doesn't, I just settle for hooking up my 16' landscape trailer, and hauling long stuff in that. A 6.6 ft or even 8 ft bed would be great, but not at the expense of giving up cab space or having to park a 175" wheelbase truck the rest of the year.
I frequently use my back seat space for cargo, hauling boxes of parts to/from vendors and customers, it's not just about making passengers comfortable. For this, the Crew Cab has been ideal, but I could make Quad Cab work if needed.
Godzilla puts out 485 lb-ft of torque at 4000 rpm. The diesel puts out 1200 lb-ft of torque at 1600 rpm, and is rated to tow nearly twice as much as the gas engine. PLUS it has an engine brake so you're not riding the brakes on the way back down the hill.
Only matters to those pulling heavy trailers. Both are 500 hp and both will deliver a similar unladened or lightly-loaded experience, but the gasser will do it for $12k less, and minus the headache of finding gas stations that carry diesel. The diesel will win when towing Hay Dude's hay wagon, but I'm not that guy.
I have a Eaton twin stick 5 and 4 transmission ready for you! If your interested, out of my log truck. Only 1,500 miles on it after a rebuild. LOL!!!
There was a time in my life when I'd have actually considered this, Dean.
But I don't have that sort of free time, anymore!
However, the optional diesel engine is $10K, the HO version is over $12K.
source:
The Main Differences Between Ford's 7.3 Gas & 6.7 Diesel Engines - SlashGear
Exactly. And that's what several here seem to be ignoring. Why would anyone recommend a $12k option to someone who would derive zero benefit from it?
