Let me put this one together for you and you will see just how much this makes perfect sense. Why don’t we take the most popular truck on the market today and make it as efficient as possible while maintaining the power and strength of the vehicle? That seems to have been the goal for the new Ford F-150 lineup. First Ford introduced us to the F-150 with the aluminum body and high strength steel in the build all in an effort to save weight. This weight savings was significant enough that Ford felt comfortable using smaller engines to achieve similar power numbers to the larger engines which resulted in immediate fuel savings for those of us driving the most popular trucks on the road today.
If that was all Ford chose to do we might be disappointed by them, but this was not where the work stopped. Ford now gives you several engine choices for the F-150 including at least two turbocharged engines. These engines give improved power numbers with smaller builds, which saves weight and makes for more efficient engines as well. The two that are placed in the F-150 are a 2.7-liter V6 or a 3.5-liter with the same number of cylinders.
In the past the smaller of the two engines offered stop-start technology as a standard part of the package while not offering this on the larger one. The recent announcement from Ford is that all EcoBooost engines will receive the benefits of the stop-start technology, which is made to help save fuel. This does not just include the 3.5-liter size, but when the Raptor makes it way to the market for 2017 its engine will also have the benefit of stop-start technology which makes for a more efficient high output truck for us to enjoy.
Stop-start technology is made to shut the engine off when the vehicle is idling at a stop and then restart when the driver takes their foot off the brake. This typically results in a small improvement in overall fuel mileage for the vehicle and is found on many hybrid models on the market to help give them the most fuel mileage possible. The system designed by Ford could result in a small savings each month which can add up to a lot over time. This system also does not work when the truck is towing cargo or in the four-wheel drive mode.
Ford was able to keep their F-150 lineup powerful and strong while reducing the weight and working toward the use of smaller engines. You certainly can still buy an F-150 with the larger engines and use up more fuel, but with the addition of stop-start technology to all of the EcoBoost engines in the Ford lineup you can have a powerful truck that is ready to do a lot of work while retuning you the best fuel mileage possible for a truck. This seems to be one way that owning a truck makes a lot of sense and if you need your truck for work you will certainly be pleasantly surprised by the capability of the new F-150 lineup.
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