Below, in case Craigslist pulls the original, is one man's ode to his machine. It's not perfect, and it's a bit long, but it's worth five minutes of your time. We've taken the liberty of bolding our favorite parts, if only to make sure that you don't miss them. For reference, this is the truck in question:

This guy is gifted. Someone — anyone — please buy his Ford. And tell him how much we love him. (Hat tip to Ben!)

[Craigslist]

Suffering a a fate worse than the 1906 earthquake, yesterday's custom '75 caprice convertible fell to a 78% Crack Pipe vote. Its pristine restoration was overcome by its questionable presentation, something today's candidate doesn't suffer from.

The Chevy S10 pickup truck- workhorse of gardeners nationwide- would not be the first choice of many for hot-rodding. While the engine bay is roomy enough for a pony-packing motor, the light rear end means putting the power down requires sandbags or a sextet of drunken frat boys in the bed to keep it from hopping around like a horny rabbit. But all that changes when you shift the center of mass to be more rear-weighted. That's the thinking (and apparently a lot of beers) that went into this 1987 S10 with a Cadillac 500-cid engine in the back. Looking at the pictures, you can see that not much thought has been given to practicality, but that's okay, this is more of a "watch this" than "help me with this" kind of truck.

The seller doesn't say, but we assume the original S10 motor and transmission have been yanked, which will change the driving dynamics from pickup truck oversteer to why won't it turn, doesn't it see that tree! understeer. But you get the impression that this truck was intended only to be turning at the end of a quarter mile run. The ad claims 500-bhp, and makes the recommendation of wheelie bars. Whether that's pure hyperbole or not, it's fun to imagine lighting it up and popping that nose in the air.

While it looks like a redneck special, and the seller's grasp of spelling and grammar indicates an unfamiliarity with anything higher than 6th grade, that's not to say it hasn't been well done, and possibly wouldn't try and kill you the first chance it gets. And Dr. Papstinstein is only asking $2,500 for his creation, which he says is crasy crasy

Would you also be crasy crasy to plunk down $2,500 for the opportunity to bed this pickup? Or, does that price make you pop a wheelie in your pants?

You decide!

Madison "crasy crasy" Craigslist or go here if the ad disappears. Hat tip to tempesjo!

Help me out with NPOCP. Click here to send a me a tip, and remember to include your commenter handle.

Like the AK-47 assault rifle and the RPG–7 bazooka, the Toyota pickup truck has become an icon of irregular armies worldwide. When mounted with an anti-aircraft cannon or a rocket laucher on its bed, it is called a technical and technicals have helped militas wage and win war against armies equipped with mechanized divisions. There was even a conflict in 1987 called the Toyota War, in which Chad’s Toyota-equipped troops defeated Muammar al-Gaddafi’s Libyan army.

The practice is not local to Africa. In Afghanistan, it was an influx of Toyota pickups from Pakistan’s ISI spy agency which transformed the Taliban from a Kandahar militia to a force which took over most of Afghanistan with remarkable speed, defeating established mujahideen commanders with decades of experience.

This has nothing to do with good guys, bad guys or tribal affiliations and all to do with the Toyota pickup’s extreme reliability on hostile terrain. You have no doubt seen the famous Top Gear episode where a Toyota Hilux is subjected to every manner of destructive testing short of a thermonuclear explosion yet it keeps on ticking—but you may not have seen this image from 2002, where US Special Forces soldiers ride in a quad cab Toyota identical to the ones used by their Taliban foes:

But all that may be about to change.

The only clue is a few pixels of an illustration which accompanies Seymour Hersh’s latest piece for The New Yorker, where he reports on the safety of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal—or its lack thereof. It was created by the acclaimed French illustrator Guy Billout and if you lean in close, the truck you see the Taliban soldiers riding in is rather striking:

It’s not a Toyota. It’s a quad cab Dodge—a Dakota to my untrained eye, but it could be a Ram as well. This might be an inconsequential detail if the magazine in question was not The New Yorker, famous for their fact checking team. And the truck is definitely not some sort of generic placeholder pickup: it has a Dodge grille.

Cooperation between American companies and the Taliban would not be without historical precedent. Back in 1995 before they conquered Kabul and became host to Al-Qaeda, Unocal executive Marty Miller was involved in negotiations with the Taliban leadership for a natural gas pipeline which was to run from Turkmenistan to Pakistan, straight through Taliban territory. While the deal eventually fell through, Miller visited Kandahar several times and at one point even had Taliban leaders flown to Houston for Christmas, of all holidays.

Perhaps Toyota, with its humbling losses and its exit from Formula One, has gone over the hill—while Chrysler has found itself a particularly lucrative market for trucks, where demand for new vehicles is guaranteed not by rebates but by American firepower. And nobody likes to stick with a loser. Least of all the Taliban.

Photo Credit: SAEED KHAN/AFP/Getty Images, TERENCE WHITE/AFP/Getty Images, Paula Bronstein/Getty Images, Guy Billout, EMMANUEL DUNAND/AFP/Getty Images, U.S. Air Force

And if you didn’t lose an eye and a limb just by looking at that procedure, here’s an equally frightening version sans the pickup truck:

Hat tip to scheerti.

Hakimullah Mehsud became the leader of Tehrik-e-Taliban—the Afghan Taliban’s Pakistani franchise—sometime this fall, after his predecessor Baitullah Mehsud got the Predator treatment from the United States.

Baitullah left office similarly to how he had acquired it: the Pakistani Taliban’s founder, Nek Mohammad, met his fate in a very similar manner in the spring of 2004, handing over the reins to Baitullah, who expanded the insurgency into the very heart of Pakistan.

In a recent profile, the BBC’s Syed Shoaib Hasan recalls meeting Hakimullah in South Waziristan—the Pakistani Taliban’s heartland—in October 2007. The 28-year-old commander had already had a reputation with cars and guns:

[Hakimullah Mehsud] was already famous within the Taliban for his skills in battle – his ability to handle a Kalashnikov and a Toyota pick-up were legendary. “He is the best after Nek Mohammad,” our Taliban driver told us during a hair-raising journey before the meeting in 2007.

Of said hair-raising journey, the author offers a vivid recollection:

He took us for a drive. To demonstrate his skill with the vehicle, he drove like a man possessed, manoeuvring around razor sharp bends at impossible speeds. He finished the demonstration by braking inches short of a several hundred foot drop. While the rest of us sat in stunned silence, he just laughed chillingly and stuck the car in reverse to smoothly continue the journey.

To imagine that cruising in blood-curdling detail, remember that mountainous South Waziristan is not exactly known for its road network. In that tribal borderland wedged between Afghanistan and Pakistan, this is where you do your driving:

Source: BBC, Photo Credit: A Majeed/AFP/Getty Images, John Moore/Getty Images

Let's be clear here — they're not entirely truck-centric. A majority of them also prefer their spouse to their truck, though apparently not enough to have sex with, and 64% of them think their truck is a reflection of their personality. We wonder if they'd say the same about their spouses? Full results at PickupTrucks.com]

Looking like a cross between an Ape, a Venturi Eclectic and something from the video game Half-Life, the CarGo can transform from a pickup truck to compact van, folding up its pickup bed into a vertical storage bin. It can also tuck in its wheels to fit into very narrow spaces. Plus, it banks into corners.

It is strictly a rendering at the moment but it would be quite lovely if someone took to manufacturing it.

Image Credit: Adam Schacter Design

That’s ape as in Italian for honeybee, so think Apis mellifera instead of the superfamily Hominoidea and pronounce it ah-PEH. And don’t look for a V8 engine: the one in the Ape has a single cylinder of 3 (three) cubic inches. Upgrades are available which up that to a whopping fifteen, good for high-speed pizza deliveries followed by burnouts in the piazza.

The Ape you see here is from 1969. Its current owner purchased it in Naples, where it was used to deliver salami and cheese, just as intended. And like every proper Italian machine which stirs the heart, this one is mid-engined. So mid-engined, in fact, that all three cubic inches of that rat-tat-tat two-stroke little wonder are right beneath the bench you sit on. Flip it up and you can get your fingers dirty right away.

By the time this Ape was manufactured in 1969, the design was already two decades old. Similar to every tiny post-war European vehicle, it was borne out of necessity and poverty: another cheap, no-frills construction to get the economic heart of Europe pumping. The idea was Corradino D’Ascanio’s, the man who’s had a hand in everything from the Vespa to the Lambretta to the Agusta helicopter. In fact, the Ape is nothing but a Vespa with two rear wheels and a cabin.

They are clearly workhorse machines, a bit rough in places, but this cappuccino-colored panel van transcends its utilitarian roots to become a three-wheeled cube of desire. Both the size and the dimensions hit the cuteness receptor in the human brain with a mighty thud. Kids, as you can see, cannot resist at all.

The Ape is probably as alien a solution to the American idea of trucking as the occasional Ford F-250 is to a European inner city. But for its natural environment, the Ape is as close to perfection as it gets. Plus, it’s a motor scooter in the eyes of the law! You can park it wherever you wish—for free. And absolutely nothing beats that in a car-choked city center.

Special thanks to Misi Szilágyi of Stipistop for loaning us his Ape. Photography by Natalie Polgar and the author. And if you really need to know: that statue of a pair of mosquito-mayfly hybrids in the pictures is located in a playground on the Vérmező in Budapest, which translates to: The Field of Blood. It was named so after Hungarian revolutionary Ignác Martinovics and his men were beheaded there on May 20, 1795.

Despite Chevy's overt inquiry into the sexuality of any man step-using Ford driver, a tailgate step sounds like a great idea to our admittedly feminine minds. Hopping in and out of the increasingly lofty beds of trucks while carrying heavy loads can be a difficult and dangerous task.

The step goes a long way to removing risk, all while providing easier access for pets, kids and little people. Bringing Ford F-150-like practicality to a small, more practical, efficient vehicle just sounds like a win/win situation to us. More info in the press release below.

Press Release: Step Up To The Truck 'N Buddy Pickup Step/Seat

The Truck 'N Buddy is a tailgate step that doubles as a seat. This 16-pound aircraft aluminum unit stores by hooking on the tailgate. When unfolded, the Truck 'N Buddy is a bed step for aging pets — and aging truck owners as heavy as 300 pounds. It also functions as a seat for tailgating, sporting clay shooting, camping and even for changing golf cleats. The platform is supported by 1,700-pound test cables and has traction ridges for sure footing. A handy grab-rail promotes safe stepping. Made in the USA, the Truck 'N Buddy is finished in durable black powder-coat enamel. MSRP is $179.

[source: Great Day Inc.]

Our pickup-truck-lovin' buddies at PickupTrucks.com just put together a full run-down on pickup truck sales for 2008. Taking a quick look at it, the most shocking statistic to us is Toyota is now the third largest seller of trucks in the U.S. market. how far down Dodge has dropped in truck sales. Toyota is now the third largest seller of trucks in the U.S. market with a 14.07% sales share. That's not just the Tundra of course, which saw a steep sales decline in the second half of the year, it also counts the Tacoma. Of course, Dodge's numbers also include the Dakota as well as the Ram.

Other than the Toyota shocker, the rest of the numbers seem to be what we expected — Ford's #1, Chevy's #2.

[via PickupTrucks.com]

Thanks to the huge spike in the price at the pump in the first half of the year, SUV sales are down more than 40% in 2008 from 2007. In response, the not-so-Big Three have closed many plants dedicated to making SUVs, a product that has come to symbolize their perceived inability to produce the vehicles American consumers want to buy.

Writing on his New York Times "Freakonomics" blog, Steven D. Levitt asks the question:

“The apparent cause of death for SUV’s was high gas prices. Doesn’t that mean that with low gas prices SUV sales should come back to life?”

Levitt goes on to suggest the reason SUV sales haven’t recovered is both a fear gas prices will rebound as well as a belief: “When gas prices got high, it became uncool to own an SUV.”

The SUV may be dead, but the humble pickup truck doesn’t appear to be suffering the same fate — because, for many buyers, trucks aren’t a fad, they’re actually a useful vehicle.

Keep in mind that in the current market problem of a lack of credit is being seen across the board — sales are down for every single vehicle in the marketplace. So the way to determine sales strength at the moment is to peg one vehicle's sales drop to another. So, while sales of the historically top-selling Ford F-Series pickup are down 25.4% for the first 11 months of 2008 compared to the same time period in 2007, they’re only down 18.4% when comparing November, 2008 to November, 2007. That's a lower drop in sales than that seen by the Toyota Camry, down 5.3% over the first 11 months of the year, but down 28.7% during the this past month.

So what does that potentially tell us? It would seem possible that the recovery in sales can be pegged to gas prices; as the economy collapsed in October, gas prices fell and consequently, pickup truck sales began to increase, and the sales of mid-size econo-sedans dropped. But, what we're also seeing is while some SUVs have recovered sales, for the most part, they haven't quite followed that same number, and appear to be continuing their decline.

Indeed, that trend can be tracked across other popular pickups and cars. The Chevy Silverado was only down 22.5% November to November while the Honda Accord was down 38.1% and the fuel-efficient Toyota Prius fell a staggering 48.3%.

What does this all mean? It appears that while people do stop buying pickups when gas prices spike, they’re more resilient long term than SUVs because they’re more useful. When gas prices drop, it looks like Americans still want to buy bigger vehicles, but now, they demand actually utility from their trucks, either by necessity or fashion.

The larger picture? Throughout the whole Carpocalypse, American automakers have always been building the vehicles Americans wanted to buy, it’s just they weren’t building the vehicles Americans thought they could afford to own.

[via The New York Times, data: Automotive News]

We just saw the following chart of Top 10 retail vehicle sales for October, 2008 showing the Ford F-150 and Chevy Silverado overtaking the Toyota Camry and Corolla. Looks like that drop in gas prices to under $2 per gallon due to a lack of economic growth have already made us forget about the summer pains of high gas prices. Back to the good ol' days of 2006 when 'merican automakers built the kinda vehicles 'mericans want to buy! Well, if they had access to credit. Yee-HAW! [via AIADA]

2009 Pickup Truck Comparison: Auto Cross

2009 Pickup Truck Comparison: Braking Challenge Results

2009 Pickup Truck Comparison: Drag Strip Acceleration Results

2009 Pickup Truck Comparison: Towing Results

The competitors represent some of the best engineering from the minds of both Detroit and Japan, entrants this year include the 2009 Chevy Silverado 1500, the 2009 Dodge Ram 1500, the 2009 Ford F-150, GMC Sierra 1500, 2009 Nissan Titan, and the 2008 Toyota Tundra. Competition has driven the capabilities of trucks forward in such a way that this modern crop will do more than their forebears could even conceive. However, this relentless march of capability has left us at a point where numbers no longer relate to real world usability and as such the competitors have begun to differentiate. The Ram with its new focus on ride and handling, the Titan is a bit more athletic, the F-150 is the heavy hauler, which leaves the GM twins as the remaining set of do-alls in a crowd of specialists.

Crowning A Champion>

We're going to come right out and say reviewing trucks is, in a way, a bit silly. Trucks, and specifically the half-ton truck segment, are frequented by some of the most loyal product buyers in the world. Magazines and websites opining passionately on the newest offerings don't really matter for these buyers. Reviews speak primarily in this segment to first-time truck buyers, and these days those are few and far between.

But, that being said, we must crown a winner. If we go by the numbers, it's the 2009 Ford F-150 that emerges as the winner when balancing capabilities against performance, finishing at or near the top in every category. But the absolutes of the statistics leaves out the subjective feel of these trucks and ignores that people buy them for different reasons.

But, saying the Ford is the best of the bunch is simply unfair. Is it the most well-rounded? Yes. But what about the most fun to drive? Certainly not. Is it the best styled? That's up to you. Does it have the best interior? Nope. So why is it the best? It just does everything well. The F-150 is, for lack of a better term, the working man's truck. The new F-series offers the greatest capabilities and the best long-term value resting on top of a long history of accolades. It really is a great pickup, but that's not to say it's everybody's cup of tea.

Then there's the Nissan Titan, which objectively scores in last place among the competition. If we were to build a truck for the person who occasionally needed the capabilities of a truck, wanted something incredibly entertaining on the street, offered reasonable fuel economy and a no-nonsense interior. We'd be hard pressed to build something more fitting than the Titan. Think Nissan Altima in truck form.

That's not to say that nobody wants a monstrously big pickup able to out-tow almost everything, rides like an old Cadillac and has an interior you can live with if you don't look too closely at the details. That would be a slot perfect for the Tundra. A truck so good at doing its job you actually overlook it as trying too hard and delivering where it almost doesn't count anymore.

And what of the Silverado and GMC Sierra? They run down the same assembly line, but have vastly different characters. The Silverado finishes a close second to the the F-150 by the numbers and, depending on what you're looking for, could be a better truck. The GMC feels better but somehow doesn't reflect so in the scoring. In fact, when pressed to make an overall choice, we'd be in a pickle to choose the Titan or the Sierra, the two "losers" in the field. Goes to show how much personal preference plays into the decision.

Anyway, if there's one thing we learned over our two day pickupgasm, it's this — there's a truck out there for everyone who wants one. Unfortunately, there's just not that many people who want them right now.

Ford Unveils the 2010 Raptor at SEMA 2008

I say appear because we only had a chance to ride in it, not drive it ourselves. However, even from the passenger seat we can tell you we've never seen a stock truck take bumps and dirt pits as well as the Raptor did today — especially while going full throttle up past 85 MPH along dirt trails we'd normally seen only well-accessorized Jeeps take at high speed.

But it's not just capable, it's also hot as hell. Ford designers took advantage of the 7-inch greater width over the stock F-150, incorporating distinctive marker lamps into the tough new grille. Hidden while turned off, those lamps switch on to make the Raptor’s imposing stance immediately recognizable. We look forward to spending some time behind the wheel, but for now, head below to see the full release from Ford or, for a more technical look at the new pickup package, hit up our friends at PickupTrucks.com.

FORD TAKES TRUCK LEADERSHIP OFF-ROAD WITH NEW F-150 SVT RAPTOR PERFORMANCE PICKUP TRUCK

• Ford’s Special Vehicle Team (SVT) taps into growing off-road enthusiast market and builds on the solid foundation of the new Ford F-150 to deliver the ultimate off-road performance truck – the 2010 Ford F-150 SVT Raptor

• Industry-first internal bypass shocks by Fox Racing Shox help provide smooth ride; lower, wider design key to desert racing and off-road performance

• The F-150 SVT Raptor launches with the proven 5.4-liter Triton V-8 with 310 horsepower and 365 lb.-ft of torque; a 6.2-liter V-8 engine will be available after launch

LAS VEGAS, Nov. 4, 2008 – Ford, the definitive leader in tough trucks, is further building on its solid foundation of the new F-150 to deliver the all-new 2010 F-150 SVT Raptor, a purpose-built, high-performance off-road truck versatile enough to take on the most challenging desert adventures as well as the everyday commute.

“Ford trucks have been a mainstay on the off-road racing scene for more that 20 years because of our long history of capability and durability,” said Derrick Kuzak, Ford’s group vice president for Global Product Development. “With the F-150 SVT Raptor, we are delivering a true off-road performance truck with the proven ‘Built Ford Tough’ capability and durability that is at the core of every F-150 and the best in performance thanks to the team at SVT.”

“Like its fighter jet and dinosaur namesakes, the F-150 SVT Raptor is tough, fast, aggressive, and built with the off-road enthusiast in mind,” he added.

Ford and off-road racing
Desert off-road racing is something Ford knows and does well, with eight championships in nine divisions in the 2007 “Best In The Desert” series and four more titles in CORR (Championship Off Road Racing). Ford has also shown its dominance at the Baja 1000 race – 12 Ford-powered vehicles have won the overall title for four-wheel vehicles, the most of any engine manufacturer.

With interest in off-road performance growing at a steady rate, the F-150 SVT Raptor was built to fulfill the desires of that highly demanding market. The high-performance off-road truck market is one that’s largely untapped, allowing the Ford F-150 SVT Raptor to set the bar for this type of vehicle.

“Most of the major manufacturers have focused on-road performance, so when we looked at what was available in off-road truck performance, it was somewhat limited,” said Mark Grueber, Ford product marketing manager for pickups and large SUVs. “This was the perfect opportunity for Ford to further differentiate the F-150 from other trucks on the market.”

Looks tough and fast
The tough, chiseled look of the new Ford F-150 has been taken to a new level with F-150 SVT Raptor. The agile, performance truck was designed to give the impression it is always on the move.

Noticeable differences between the Ford F-150 SVT Raptor and conventional F-150 include a distinctive grille that has the Ford name carved into it; front bumper, vented hood, front fascia and fenders, functional hood extractors, fender extractors with ‘SVT’ bored out, as well as visible FOX Racing Shox, the only internal bypass shocks available on a street truck.

Another key difference between the F-150 SVT Raptor and the base F-150 is it is more than seven inches wider. Ford designers took advantage of this difference and highlighted it with distinctive marker lamps. When turned off, the marker lamps are well-integrated into the F-150 SVT Raptor’s front end, as opposed to on top of the cab. When lit up, Raptor’s imposing stance is immediately recognizable.

While the exterior design of the F-150 SVT Raptor is about creating an image, the interior design is about creating the feel of the truck, and both must complement each other.

Design elements from the unique grille and front fascia have been carried through to the interior on the console and dashboard. The steering wheel is wrapped in black leather and features a molten-orange leather strip that serves as a centering sight line – which is especially useful in extreme driving maneuvers that can often cause the driver to lose perspective of the steering wheel’s center point.

Revved up and ready
The Ford F-150 SVT Raptor is powered by the F-150’s proven 5.4-liter Triton V-8 three-valve engine, which delivers 320 horsepower and 390 lb.-ft. of torque. A new open-valve fuel injection strategy improves the air/fuel charge conditions in the combustion chamber, allowing greater spark advance at higher loads and engine speeds. This delivers increased horsepower during towing and higher rpm operations, lower emissions and more efficient use of fuel.

A new 6.2-liter V-8 engine will be available after launch. The 6.2-liter engine features all-new architecture specifically designed for robustness in a truck application.

Given reliability and longevity under harsh conditions are key to truck customers, the Ford team performed extensive testing to ensure the 6.2-liter V-8 engine would live up to the ‘Built Ford Tough’ promise. Fifty 6.2-liter V-8 engines successfully endured more than a dozen of the toughest engine tests at Ford’s dynamometer lab during development.

SVT used a specially designed, 62-mile durability loop in the desert of Borrego Springs, Calif., to replicate the conditions of the Baja 1000 race, to further test the engines’ performance.

Take off and landing
Building a high-performance off-road truck is not about the horsepower – it’s about the suspension. The F-150 SVT Raptor doesn’t disappoint, with 13.4 inches of usable travel in the rear suspension and 11.2 in the front.

“With the F-150 SVT Raptor, we changed the axle, the whole front suspension is different – new upper A arm, new lower A arm, new tie rod, new half-shaft joints,” said Jamal Hameedi, Ford SVT chief engineer. “It’s well beyond what SVT has ever done with one of our vehicles.”

Raptor’s wider track and softer suspension mean it will comparatively glide over obstacles. And when it has to be “launched,” be prepared for a soft landing. “The suspension does all the work to keep the truck’s attitude stable,” Hameedi said.

In addition to a beefed up suspension, the F-150 SVT Raptor also boasts unique internal bypass Fox Racing Shox, the only internal bypass shocks on a street truck. The position sensitive dampening internal bypass feature allows the shock to become significantly stiffer as it travels, preventing the truck from bottoming out.

By working with Fox internal bypass technology and applying the Ford engineering methodology, there haven’t been trade-offs to assure extreme off-road handling over on-road ride comfort.

“This truck is also going to be a daily driver. We brought together a lot of experts to ensure the on-road steering precision and comfort was there, too,” said Hameedi. “That’s where Ford expertise really came to the table and complemented Fox’s off-road expertise.”

A tough truck needs tough tires, and a BF Goodrich All-Terrain TA/KO 315/70-17 tire does the job.

To help improve the tire in a variety of conditions, the compound of the tread was altered. Engineers made the rubber softer for better performance on and off-road and for precise and predictable steering in a variety of conditions while the interior of the tire was modified to improve lateral firmness.

The tall sidewall on the 35-inch tire can handle rocks and irregular surfaces commonly experienced in an off-road environment. A 17-inch cast aluminum wheel is designed to absorb the impact of objects the truck could encounter in some of the most extreme environments.

Specialized Technologies
The F-150 SVT Raptor provides the complete package for off-roaders, including state-of-the-art technologies to keep it at the top of capability.

“For many years, enthusiasts have been struggling with the performance of electronic technologies in the extreme off-road environment since that was not the environment they were designed for,” Hameedi said. “What SVT has done is tailor technology to function in both an on-road and an extreme off-road environment.”

Technologies include:
• AdvanceTrac® with RSC® (Roll Stability Control™) predicts the vehicle’s path using a sensor to detect and measure oversteer and yaw by monitoring the vehicle’s speed, throttle position and steering wheel angle. When the system senses wheel slip or the loss of traction, it applies braking where needed to keep the truck tracking safely on its intended path. If a significant roll rate is detected, the system applies additional countermeasures to enhance vehicle roll resistance.

The off-road enthusiast has the option to switch to two available settings – sport mode and full off-road mode depending on their driving situation. The sport mode shuts off traction control enabling the vehicle to have more yaw movement.

Full off-road mode shuts off all electronic stability programs and the ABS system switches to a special off-road setting. Widening the threshold of sport mode, the wheels will lock more which is helpful in off-road terrain. Also in full off-road mode, the locking rear differential is allowed to stay locked at elevated speeds to mimic a spool differential found on racing trucks.
• Trailer Sway Control works in conjunction with AdvanceTrac with RSC and can determine from the yaw motion of the truck if the trailer is swaying and take measures – such as applying precise braking or reduced engine torque – to bring both vehicle and trailer under control.
• Integrated Trailer Brake Controller is factory-installed and allows direct operation of the trailer’s electronic brakes by squeezing the control module on the instrument panel with more confidence than the typical aftermarket system.
• Electronic Locking Differential uses a true mechanical connection to lock the left and right axle shafts together so both turn at the same speed with the same amount of torque. This switch-controlled feature maximizes traction capability at the wheel with grip, without having to stop the truck.
• Hill Descent Control on the F-150 SVT Raptor is Ford’s first application of the technology. Utilizing ABS, the driver can control hill descent without applying the brakes. The speed is set for the truck to descend the hill by pushing a button and allows for the driver to concentrate on driving, rather than on how to modulate the brakes on a steep decline.
• Off-Road Mode engages a third throttle map and a third shift schedule for improved off-road performance. Third throttle map alters the throttle by changing the driver demand table so it is better suited to high and low-speed off-road driving conditions. A third shift schedule is a unique strategy for the off-road environment that holds the transmission in each gear for a longer period of time, allowing better engine throttle modulation to control the vehicle.
• Auxiliary Switch Board on the center console makes aftermarket customization easier, with four prewired switches attached to the power distribution box for electrical accessories. Also located on the auxiliary switch board are two switches for improved off-road performance – Hill Descent Control and Off-Road Mode.

The F-150 SVT Raptor will be built along side the new F-150 at Ford’s Dearborn Truck Plant at the historic Rouge Center in Dearborn, Mich.

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