We like
Over-engineered from the wheels up, incredibly compliant ride both loaded and unladen, outperforms every likely competitor on- and off-road, standard work-focused inclusions unmatched

Room for improvement
More expensive than cab-chassis light truck alternatives, slightly less peak power than standard Ranger (although hardly noticeable)

Overview

 

FORD Australia has turned the ute market on its axis, merging the benefits of a mid-size ute, 1500-class pickup and light-duty truck in a segment-shattering package that equals far more than the sum of its parts.

 

The model was born out of a discussion in 2018, when now chief executive and president at Ford Australia, Andrew Birkic spoke to a major customer who outlined that the Ranger needed to be modified before being put to work – presumably in a severe-duty environment.

 

After mulling the comments over, Birkic made the call to special projects manager Jeremy Welch with an ambitious request for a mid-size ute that could carry two tonnes of payload, tow 4.5 tonnes, and remain a capable off-roader.

 

During 18 months of customer outreach, working closely with 50 major fleet customers across harsh industries like mining, agriculture, utilities, emergency services and construction, development kicked off – and the rest is history.

 

The Ranger Super Duty as it stands today is a showcase of what’s possible when Ford throws the full weight of its 1500 local staff - around 1000 of which are engineers and designers - behind a bold idea.

 

GoAuto had an early look at mockups – both digitally rendered and sculpted from clay (the old way) at the Ford Design Centre in Broadmeadows in late 2024, and at the time it sounded ambitious, perhaps not even possible, given the long list of customer requirements.

 

A GVM that eclipsed what had been possible in a mid-size ute, with a light truck rivalling GCM, and it’d have to blow 1500-class pickups out of the water with its nearly two-tonne payload.

 

Even if they could do it, we figured, it’d ride like a truck without offering the myriad GVMs (typically up to 8500kg) and fit-out flexibility of the light-duty segment.

 

Then there was the fact the Super Duty was also gunning to be Ford’s most capable off-roader, with an 850mm wading depth, GVM-rated underbody protection and mud-packing potential to put even the Raptor to shame.

 

But, somehow they’ve pulled off the impossible.

 

This is obviously good news for harsh industries like mining and utilities, but it also has serious recreational appeal because out of the box it blows away just about all of the competition for GVM.

 

The all-important numbers for the Ranger Super Duty are the GVM of 4500kg (the cutoff for a regular car licence), GCM of 8000kg, rated towing capacity of 4500kg and payload of up to 1982kg (single cab).

 

For the astute towing owners, the front gross axle weight rating (GAWR) is 1900kg and the rear is 2800kg.

 

It’s available as a single cab-chassis, super cab-chassis and double cab-chassis with an array of tray, accessory and fit out options, with the latter falling under Ford’s recently launched Pro Converter program that gives customers access to certified bodybuilders like Norweld and Hidrive from the comfort of a dealership.

Power comes courtesy of the 3.0-litre V6 diesel from the standard Ranger, but it’s been re-tuned to meet Euro 6 heavy-duty vehicle emissions requirements, now producing 154kW at 3250rpm and 600Nm from a low 1750rpm running through a 10-speed automatic transmission.

 

While down on peak power, Ford executives told GoAuto the priority when re-calibrating the engine was to offer a wide spread of torque, sacrificing top-end grunt in favour of low-down pulling power.

 

Ford also upgraded the cooling fan power by 25 per cent, and redesigned the engine mounts to handle greater stresses during sustained high-load use.

 

The Euro 6 regulations do mean that the V6 now uses AdBlue, with Ford outlining that the consumption will vary based on use cases – a common reality in the light truck world but something recreational users will have to get used to.

 

A 130-litre fuel tank means that despite its 2.5-plus-tonne kerb weight, the Super Duty will apparently have a real-world range of more than 1000km, but we’ll need more time in the vehicle to ascertain an accurate average fuel use figure.

 

While the Super Duty shares its wheelbase with the regular Ranger, it’s wider at 2197mm (with mirrors extended), longer at 5644mm (with tow tongue), taller at between 1977mm and 1985mm (depending on the body type), and the track width has also been increased to 1710mm.

 

The off-road credentials are also significantly better, with a ground clearance of up to 299mm, wading depth of 850mm, ramp-over angle of up to 26.9 degrees, and approach and departure angles of up to 36.3 and 29.3 degrees respectively.

 

It rides on 18-inch wheels, shod with 33-inch light truck all-terrain tyres (275/70 R18), and beneath them are larger disc brakes – including at the rear.

 

There’s also plenty of standard fare suited to severe-duty users like on-board scales, a sealed snorkel, differential locks front and rear, larger mirrors, dual-rated front and rear recovery hooks and underbody bash plates that can withstand the full weight of the vehicle.

 

Underpinning all of that, though, is a heavily reinforced chassis that shares only 6 per cent of its architecture with a standard Ranger, and everything from the diffs to the driveshaft, even the transfer case, have been upgraded.

 

Many of the parts have been lifted from other Ford models, like the Bronco Raptor front differential and the F-250 Super Duty eight-stud hubs, but much of it was designed in-house by the Ford Australia team – like the beefed-up engine mounts that actually required new bosses on the engine block, which meant retooling.

 

Compare the Ranger Super Duty to a GVM-upgraded dual-cab, and the differences are night and day because Ford has upgraded everything from the brakes and suspension to the supplied jack and it’s built to last, evidenced by the inclusion of a full-fat five-year warranty.

 

The Super Duty features the same active and passive safety systems as the standard Ranger too, while doing away with start-stop and allowing operators to delay a DPF regeneration – both changes born out of customer feedback.

 

How much does it cost, though? Well, it starts at $82,990 for the Single Cab-Chassis, before jumping to $86,490 for the Super Cab-Chassis and then $89,990 for the Double Cab-Chassis – all before on-road costs. Not bad, considering you won’t need to mess around with a GVM upgrade or beefier rubber.

 

Driving Impressions

 

How do you test a vehicle that claims to be as much, and do as much as the Ranger Super Duty, for so many customers across such severe industries? Short of spending time at a mine, or on a farm – all things Ford did when developing this, mind you – you simulate it.

 

We started with a short road loop out of Michelton Winery in Nagambie, Victoria, before heading to Eagle Ridge Event Park, where owner of Fenwick Dirtworks, Ty Fenwick, built a series of off-road tracks that would test the limits of the vehicle.

 

Ty builds supercross tracks for Redbull, and also happens to own an F-250 Super Duty, so he’s well and truly qualified, and the dirt playground he prepared was pretty close to perfect.

 

It was dry and dusty, so 50 pounds in the light truck tyres was guaranteed to be slippery, but that really wasn’t cause for concern in a twin-locked ute like this. Front and rear diffs locked, and up the Super Duty crawled, albeit throwing plumes of silt. We did most of it using Trail Control, which is effectively off-road cruise control.

 

The reason for the high pressures, too, was that the majority of severe-duty industries don’t drop tyre pressures for safety reasons, so this was a true representation of how customers will use the Super Duty.

 

Another hindrance on paper was the fact we’d be doing a lot of the off-road work with an empty tray, in a ute sprung for a two-tonne payload.

 

Somehow, Ford’s engineers have chosen a leaf-spring and shock combination that rides as good unladen as the majority of lighter GVM utes, if not better. This was first apparent on the road loop, but off-road is where it really surprised us.

 

A short 4x4 skills park, also built by Ty, had an array of obstacles that effectively showcased the Super Duty’s potential, getting very close to its clearance, approach and departure limits, while also showing off a feature called Trail Turn Assist that’s a scaled-back version of a tank-turn.

 

The loop kicked off with a water crossing that was bang-on 850mm, or so we were told, and sure enough it did it with ease.

 

Then, a series of climbs, descents, and even a motocross-style ‘double’ provided a taste of the Super Duty’s clearance, complete with a few big body scrapes to remind us the underbody protection is there to be used.

 

And on the Trail Turn Assist, it brakes the inside rear wheel to allow the ute to turn on a tighter radius, which isn’t dramatic but certainly does tighten up the fairly average 13.6-metre turning circle.

 

Back at the meeting point, we were given a chance to try some of the vehicle’s smarter features, like the onboard scales, Smart Hitch and Pro-Trailer Backup Assist – which all do basically what the names suggest.

 

The scales are a game changer and are an example of technology we’d like to see trickle down to regular Ranger models, because the safety benefits are evident. They don’t, however, show you axle weight splits.

 

A short road loop provided a chance to tow, and we opted for the largest 4.5-tonne three-axle trailer on offer which put the GCM at 7800kg without including occupant weight (around 150kg, for two of us lighter folk).

 

As is the case when towing heavier weights, it’s slow, and perhaps not as punchy as an F-150 pulling the same weight, but for a mid-size ute it felt assured and at no point did we feel as though we were being pushed downhill – an all-too common feeling when using smaller tow vehicles to pull big weights.

 

It didn’t feel like it was sagging at the back or pulling up the front of the vehicle either, with planted steering.

 

The fact that a mid-size ute is able to tow 4.5-tonnes as confidently as the Super-Duty, with a small load in the tray for good measure, is impressive and undoubtedly the result of some intelligent engineering.

 

Heading on a two-hour drive to Marysville, in the Yarra Valley, the ride continued to impress us. It was compliant with a heavy load, compliant with a 4.5-tonne trailer, and it remains alarmingly compliant unladen.

 

Talking with Ranger program manager at Ford Australia, Drew O’Shannassy, who was heavily involved in the vehicle’s development, he told us the first thing he did after he drove it was go and interrogate the vehicle dynamics team to find out how they got it to ride so well. Fair play.

 

Out on the road, a colour that stands out is the Seismic Tan, which closely resembles a certain sandy shade offered by a key competitor, but buyers will also get the choice of Arctic White, Shadow Black, Command Grey or Aluminium (silver).

 

The following day we headed out to the Mount Terrible Lookout, within the Great Dividing Range, which is surrounded by a series of trails that are more of a real-world test of the vehicle’s off-road potential.

 

Tracks were far rockier and for the purpose of having fun, Trail Control was left switched off, as were the diff locks for all but the gnarliest sections.

 

On road pressures, the Super Duty continued to eat up everything we could throw at it, including a sizable water crossing that must have been above the lower section of the doors.

 

The limit of the vehicle is beyond where the average punter is ever likely to take a ute, and Ford are adamant it’d do it all right up at its 4500kg GVM, as many fleet buyers will.

 

We’d like to do some serious off-road driving with a service body or a load in the tray, but based on how effortlessly the Super Duty ate up everything we threw at it, our calculated guess is it wouldn’t struggle.

 

The Super Duty eclipsed our expectations, despite the seemingly impossible and undeniably conflicting list of attributes we’d been given during early discussions, and how they’ve ticked this many boxes is testament to the local engineering prowess within Ford Australia’s walls, really.

 

Ford Australia’s home-brewed Super Duty blurs the lines between the medium ute, light-duty truck, and 1500-class pickup segments. In fact, we’d go as far as to say it stands alone in an entirely new segment.