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New Ford Ranger in the Pipeline for the US Market

After the 2012 model year, the United States was deprived of the Ford Ranger compact truck. But someone from Ford is biting his or her nails right now over General Motors' recent success with the 2015 Chevrolet Colorado and GMC Canyon. Thus, the American automaker hinted it's working on a similar product to the previously mentioned GM trucks.
2012 Ford Ranger 1 photo
Photo: Ford
Truth be told, the full-size pickup market in the United States is dominated by the Ford F-150. For more than 30 years now, the F-Series range is leading the segment, with the Ram, Chevy Silverado and Toyota Tundra always behind in terms of sales. But it was an uninspired move to stop selling the Ranger.

A considerable percentage of people in the market for a pickup truck don't need a full-size model, that's not as frugal on fuel or as easy to park as a compact. In this regard, Ford expected this type of customer to reorientate to the bigger F-150, which aids with the ever-important market share. However, things didn't turn out as expected for sales planning personnel.

"We could sell a compact truck that's more like the size of the old Ranger"

It was a far-fetched idea from the get-go, as many pickup customers and automotive media figures noted when it was announced the Ranger will die after the 2012 model year. Now finally aware of the big mistake in judgement it made, the Blue Oval is considering to get back in the compact truck game.

Ford marketing manager Doug Scott told USA Today that "we're looking at it. We think we could sell a compact truck that's more like the size of the old Ranger, that gets six or eight more miles per gallon, is $5,000 or $6,000 less, and that we could build in the U.S. to avoid the tariff on imported trucks."

However, don't expect to see the redesigned 2015 Ford Ranger in this part of the world because of the old powertrain tech and the 25 percent of the wholesale price U.S. truck tariff.

The future compact pickup truck is expected to be a slightly reengineered 2015 model year F-150, which translates to a unibody (unitizing body and frame) aluminum construction to keep the curb weight low for improved fuel economy, tow and payload ratings. Fingers crossed we'll have it sooner than 2018.
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About the author: Mircea Panait
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After a 1:43 scale model of a Ferrari 250 GTO sparked Mircea's interest for cars when he was a kid, an early internship at Top Gear sealed his career path. He's most interested in muscle cars and American trucks, but he takes a passing interest in quirky kei cars as well.
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