Ford F-150 crash tests gets mixed results
The 2015 model F-150 SuperCrew earned a Top Safety Pick designation from the IIHS while the extended cab version of the F-150 “turned in a good performance in 4 of 5 assessments, but stumbled in the small overlap front test”, according to the IIHS review.
The latter is apparently missing some key chassis braces which are only fitted to the crew cab. He added, “In a small overlap front crash like this, there’s no question you’d rather be driving the crew cab than the extended cab F-150”.
The F-150 crew cab did very well qualifying for a “2015 Top Safety Pick” award.
2015 Ford F-150 Extended cab. The toepan, parking brake and brake pedal pushed 10 to 13 inches toward the dummy, and the dashboard was jammed against its lower legs.
There has been great interest in the extensive use of aluminum in the Ford F-150, an engineering breakthrough that helped the truck to shave about 500 lbs. of weight.
The new truck has done well in tests by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
“Consumers who wondered whether the aluminum-body F-150 would be as crashworthy as its steel-body predecessor can consider the question answered,” said David Zuby, IIHS chief research officer. It concentrates crash forces over just 25-percent of the vehicle front when the test auto strikes a rigid pole-like barrier at 40 miles per hour.
Ford’s new, all-aluminum body F-150 possibly has safety concerns, depending on which model you buy.
Recently, GM released web ads that pokes fun at F-150s aluminum body, inferring its less strong than steel.
“Ford added structural elements to the crew cab’s front frame to earn a good small overlap rating and a Top Safety Pick award, but didn’t do the same for the extended cab”. It’s just a replacement for North America’s best-selling vehicle the last 32 years – one widely believed to be the most profitable model…
However, even with the new results, Ford will not be retroactively outfitting the 2015 F-150 SuperCab or RegularCab variants with the name bars found in the SuperCrew.
Whether 2015 F-150 repair costs will continue to trend low throughout the rest of the year remains to be seen (from what we’re told, repair costs typically jump a bit during winter months), but it looks like preliminary reports from the repair industry about the new half-ton’s modular construction and advanced materials are saving Ford buyers money.
“Real-world fix expenses for the 2015 F-150 are comparable or less than other full-size pickups and average $869 less than last year’s F-150s”, Levine said.
In the IIHS test for the extended cab, the intruding structure after the crash “seriously compromised a driver’s survival space, resulting in a poor structural rating”, IIHS said. “While it always depends on what the damage is, in many cases the aluminum parts were not any more expensive than the steel parts for earlier F-150s”, Fisher said. These costs are being tracked by Assured Performance, an independent body shop certification company that works with leading automakers.
“I think a lot of people are cautious about it, which they should be”, he said.