Okay, brand wars are expected to be at least as fervent in trucks as they are in tractors. I’m sure all you guys have been salting the responses in the above discussion with perhaps more than a grain or two, just as you should season my contribution to this discussion. Perhaps you love jumping in on a “brand scrum” just like me. The greatest thing about a discussion about which is the “greatest thing,” is that we all get to walk away still feeling like we bought the greatest thing.
Bullet point: My truck = 2003 Tundra SR5, 4.7L V8 w/ LSD, towing package, TRD off-road package (Bilstein shocks, etc), and a bunch of “showy” stuff I’ve added since I bought it.
Grab the salt shaker….
I’m going to maintain that the Ford truck line is perhaps the premier, legacy truck line of all. Still staying in touch with its core users by maintaining the toughest specs in the business. Trying to reach the “emerging” buyer by adding what I will label as “street” or “sport” appointments that appeal to the buyers on the margin that don’t really need the extra 500 pounds of payload capacity, and won’t ever be concerned with adding a fifth-wheel enclosed trailer for construction equipment or live animals. The greatest thing about the F150 line is that it can do all of this and look great, too. For purposes of staying in touch with the title of the thread, I will couch the rest of my comments with only the F150 in mind, because it is the flagship of the Ford line and that is the only truck that Ford marketers will need to promote aggressively in the years to come (the rest will take care of themselves from brand loyalty and untouchable quality).
So why the heck did I buy a Tundra? For all the reasons that my partner-in-minority, J, a.k.a. Tres Crowes mentioned. It has some significant design advantages when I rule out all those things that the F150s have over the Tundra line. The advantages are quantifiable, provable (not really a word). I’ll drive my Tundra for 4 or 5 years, tow a trailer a dozen times a years, haul a couple of kids and landscaping loads around, and generally do what the Majority of the mainstream does with a truck. Ford and others, Toyota included, have done a great job of making the mainstream think they need a Super-duty vehicle. The majority of TBN’er might, but we are definately not representative of the majority of truck buyers these days.
Let’s face MY facts here. First, I drive a desk and steer a computer between 7 a.m. and 5 p.m. each day, all the while fantasizing about my free time, my tractor, my home property, my other property, my lovely wife, my dog, my hobbies, and my time with family. I’m no rancher or farmer. Nor am I an urban cowboy or carpenter. I’m not an off-road fanatic, or a millionaire who can buy the best-of-the-best on a whim. I’m just a guy with property and related work, and a pension for a great looking, safe, powerful, FAST, well-engineered truck to help fulfill my needs. Just want to be able to tow 5,000 pounds or haul 1,200 pounds of fertilizer home to spread on my fescue in September.
So the Tundra does all that, is more comfortable for my kids and me, gets gas mileage as good as any other V8, is FASTER than anything else close, and it’s a brand that has my allegiance. It didn’t take a squat when I threw my fertilizer in the bed on the way home last Friday. In fact the 1,200 lb softened the ride a bit when the Bilsteins actually began to work. I suppose I would add the stock helper spring leaf if I wanted to push the 1,500 pound payload (which, by my traditional education, is greater than a “half-ton”). The Tundra is only rated at 6,900 towing capacity in the 4WD version but that’s enough to me and is hardly meets the standard of an "exaggerated spec" as cast wantonly above in another post. Nice tranny cooler and class IV hitch included with 7-pin setup, ready for my brake controller. I think maybe there are a few pre-conceived notions amok as you guys think of the broken-down knuckle head owner with 2,000 pounds in the back of his Toyota Hi-Lux or Nissan four-banger. I promise I won’t laugh at the next quarter-ton S10 or Ranger owner I see in need of a trailer or funds for bulk delivery.
So on the FORD-SPONSORED frame test that Ford won. They should win. It’s a stronger frame. My money says that 99% of the owners of the new F150 will never have to be concerned about the difference. If I owned one, I would be glad it’s there and use that fact as part of my justification for buying the best-of-the-best. I admire you guys that will use the strength--that might have been a good reason to buy the truck---for a construction worker, rancher, etc. Even my Toyota dealer disclaimed HD use on the TOYO truck. He also told me that there is a legal challenge to the frame test by Toyota because there was (supposedly) a frame cross member removed in the Tundra and possible modification to another other truck involved. Just rumors and gossip, though, as you might expect when one company tests a competing brand against their brand under controlled circumstances. I would not have needed such a test to tell me that the F150 was likely to have the strongest frame out there. I saw that the 2003 model was beefier when I test drove one and kicked the tires. Too bad it was pooch on the road compared to the Tundra.
I suppose if I were a Toyota marketeer I’d be slamming competitor’s trucks into walls with smiling, lifelike crash dummies of spouse-in-business suit and junior-in-Osh-Kosh-B-Gosh strapped into their seats to show how a loved one would be ejected from a Chevy, Ford or Dodge. Also, I’d be squealing tires on a drag strip and asking portly middle-aged men to rate the comfort of the seats. On the other hand, if I were Ford I’d be showing the F150 comfortably pulling an 8,000 pound boat past a humming Tundra climbing Pike’s Peak (I’d buy that one without the ad as well….). If I were Dodge, I’d be showing how big and mean-looking my chrome grill is, because I think that’s the only competitive advantage there.
So guess who wins? Me, of course, and the next guy who buys the New F150, or Titan for that matter. If it’s a 23-year-old surfer or accountant living in an apartment, maybe he’s not the wiser of us all. But even he can win the argument. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif
What's my point, you ask? Ford is the "winner" work truck trying to win the appeal of people who don't work with their truck. IMO, they can't beat the Tundra Here. The Tundra is the "winner" sport/street truck (for now) trying to find a foothold in the work truck market. They can't beat Ford or Chevy here yet. I'm just leaving Dodge out of it because I'm tired of typing.
Oh, yeah. The Tundra is "made" in Indiana in it's entirety (with parts from around the world, I assume), with the exception of the Lexus V8. I understand that Toyota will be opening two engine plants in the South.
