Blog Posts
Ford Raptor calls enthusiasts from afar
Jeffrey Zygmont Motor Mouth
Mar 12, 2018
A certain Texan can tell us a lot about the Ford F-150 Raptor pickup truck.
The Raptor is an on- and off-road, over-the-top derivation of the Ford F-Series pickup. The Texan, this particular Texan that I have in mind, recently purchased one from Portsmouth Ford.
That’s right, I mean our own Portsmouth Ford in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, some 2,000 miles away from the customer’s home in Texas. He used the internet to locate the new Raptor for sale at the Portsmouth dealership. After closing the deal from afar, he purchased a plane ticket and arranged some ground transportation to get to the dealer. From there he drove his new Raptor those 2,000 miles back home.
In Texas he may have garaged his brash and brawny new truck, preserving it as a collector’s item. Or he may drive his Raptor regularly, parading around his Texas town in the sneering and snarling, high-performance pickup truck – and maybe occasionally enjoying some off-road mudding as well.
Truck enthusiasts treat the Raptor both ways, explained Chris Sawyer, sales manager at Portsmouth Ford. Some owners drive it for everyday thrills. Others put it away for safe keeping and some special-occasion cruising, Sawyer said.
However our friend from Texas decides to handle his Raptor, the extraordinary measures he took to purchase it tell us a lot about the high stature the pickup enjoys among truck followers.
“It can get you from zero to 60 miles per hour in 5.1 seconds, which is pretty cool,” said Sawyer to help explain the model’s mystique.
Most models purchased at Portsmouth are pre-orders, he explained. After customers cut a deal in advance, they may wait for about six months for their Raptor to arrive from the Ford factory.
The Raptor is a special edition pickup designed to look imposing and to perform with unrivaled authority. The current model is a second-generation version that Ford began selling in the autumn of 2016 as a 2017 model. This year’s 2018 version carries over from then. Its starting list price is $51,510, which includes four-wheel drive and a five-passenger cabin. Also available is a long-cab version with four doors and a full rear seat.
Using elements of the aluminum body that adorns the contemporary Ford F-150 pickup, supported on a frame of high-strength steel that’s derived from the F-150’s substructure, the Raptor adds unique equipment to make it “a no-compromise off-road performance machine,” in the words of the Ford engineering supervisor responsible for the truck.
That unique equipment includes a specially tuned, advanced, aluminum V6 engine with two turbochargers. The motor produces 450 horsepower, while it makes available a substantial, 510 pound-feet of torque for quick launches and significant load handling.
The equipment includes a new 10-speed automatic transmission that permits drivers to select six operating modes that tailor performance to surface conditions. Its choices include settings for rough weather, mud and sand, rock crawling, and a “Baja” selection meant to provide optimum off-road performance.
To enhance its off-road credentials still more, the Raptor rides on a special suspension that elevates the model higher than a conventional pickup, for better clearance over rocks and ruts. The suspension includes high-performance, off-road-racing shock absorbers, special springs, and linkage components like control arms and tie rods that are designed for greater articulation – so the Raptor’s undercarriage can step over imposing obstacles. The pickup has a skid plate under its engine to protect its oil pan during such maneuvers.
“The Raptor has really turned a lot of heads, of gear heads who love the horsepower, the torque, the suspension technology,” said Sawyer of Portsmouth Ford. “We’re seeing customers, ranging from their 30s to their 70s, buying one.”
As a special-edition, the Raptor is built in limited quantities. Ford schedules its factory to make a set number each year, and when they’re gone, that’s it.
It turns out that they go pretty fast, because go-fast truck enthusiasts think so highly of the Raptor that they line up to buy one. In a lot of places, dealers charge very hefty premiums over the the truck’s sticker price, because demand for the limited quantity brawny pickup is so great.
Ford gives each dealer only a set allotment of Raptors to sell. When that allotment is gone, that’s it for a particular dealer. Therefore many dealers charge as much as they possibly can for the few Raptors they receive from Ford to sell.
Each dealer’s allotment depends on how many regular F-150 pickup trucks it sells. That’s where Portsmouth Ford gains an advantage. Portsmouth is a regional dealership with reach down into the Merrimack Valley and North Shore, and upward into New Hampshire. What’s more, it pursues a value-pricing policy. Therefore a lot of people visit Portsmouth Ford to purchase Ford pickup trucks.
“We get more Raptors than most dealers, because we sell a lot of F-150s,” said Sawyer.
Portsmouth doesn’t get outrageous about marking up the price of the sought-after Raptor, following the spirit of its value-pricing policy. Therefore the guy living in Texas, looking at mark ups of $20,000 over sticker prices in his region, found it more economical to purchase his Raptor at Portsmouth Ford, fly here, and drive the new prize 2,000 miles to his home.
Sawyer noted that Portsmouth Ford has made similar sales to enthusiasts from California and Florida.
He explained that some people add options “that can turn it into a luxury off-road pickup.” The add-ons include advanced technology like lane-keeping aids, rain-sensing wipers, blind spot and cross-traffic monitors, and adaptive cruise control with crash prevention. They include orange-accented leather seats, touchscreen voice-controlled navigation, heated seats and steering wheel, and hard or soft rear box covers.
In any configuration, for Sawyer the Raptor symbolizes the leadership Ford exhibits across its pickup line.
“No one else makes a vehicle that can touch a Raptor in terms of capability, technology and looks,” he said.
Jeffrey Zygmont is an author of fiction, non-fiction and poetry books, and a long-time auto writer. Contact him at www.jeffreyzygmont.com.
2018 Ford F-150 Raptor
Vehicle type: 2- and 4-door, 5-passenger, four-wheel-drive high-performance pickup truck
Starting list price: $51,510 (plus options)
Warranty: 3 years/36,000 miles basic warranty; 5 years/60,000 miles powertrain warranty; 5 years/unlimited miles corrosion warranty; 5 years/60,000 miles roadside assistance
Engine: 3.5-liter twin turbocharged V6
Power: 450 horsepower at 5,000 rpm; 510 lb.-ft. torque at 3,500 rpm
Transmission: 10-speed automatic
Fuel economy: 15 mpg city; 18 mpg highway
Wheelbase: 145 inches
Length: 232 inches
Width: 80 inches
Height: 77 inches
Weight: 5,525 pounds
Fuel capacity: 23.0 gallons
