Ford's new hybrid Maverick: A 40 MPG pickup for $20,000.
 

https://ecomodder.com/forum/attachme...1&d=1623169682The $21,250 Civic is rated up to 32 city / 42 highway. I would like to see ecomodders having their way with each of them! :)Ford Takes Aim at Import Crowd With Small Pickup Under $20,000

Is this the compact pickup for which many of us have been hoping? :)

Jalopnik's take on the Maverick
 

After I posted I realized that everybody knows that Jalopnik is the world's best news outlet, so I should have gone there first!
https://ecomodder.com/forum/attachme...1&d=1623169904Summon freebeard!
https://ecomodder.com/forum/attachme...1&d=1623170822
Is it not a geodesic dome if it has rectangles? :)https://ecomodder.com/forum/attachme...1&d=1623171040
I prefer the 2007 Fit's back seats:
https://ecomodder.com/forum/attachme...1&d=1623171189

What a time to be alive when a 3/4 ton truck is considered a "puny payload"

I wonder if they'll make a single cab, long bed version. That's what I need.

Nice! I guess now I can't corner people and loudly and wetly complain at them about how there are no true hybrid trucks.

... I'll still wonder aloud why the industry is still chopping at the hybridization of their fleet from the wrong end of the segment; the smallest vehicles. If they'd have started at the heaviest vehicles, they'd have solved the problems of recovering hybrid expenses and packaging more easily.

When I was building geodesic domes in the 1980s we called that a riser wall. What you have there is a 2v Icosahedron. They have a traditional equator.

When Jalopnik mentioned how long the Maverick's truck bed was I looked up how short that was comparatively. However, I didn't want to take away from Torchinsky's fun writing style with boring data.

That wasn't the most interesting Jalopnik article I have read.

Google says that the Nissan Frontier's short bed is 59.5 inches long, but the Explorer Sport Trac was only 48".

The Santa Fe's bed is 48.4-52.1" long.

The Subaru Baja's truck bed was 41.5"

I thought the Avalanche bed was tiny, but apparently it is 63.3"

Then there is this modified Ram 4,500 that for some reason a sheikh had modified with a 16' bed, which is in a museum for some reason:
https://ecomodder.com/forum/attachme...1&d=1623177329

How long is the Maverick bed?

More important in my view is how wide. The limiting factor for what I can get into a car is hardly ever length, as I can get 6+ in with the seats folded down, and whatever doesn't fit can hang out the back. What limits utility in a car is the width and height that can be accomodated.

The bed is four and a half feet long. I cannot find exact numbers, but it is designed for 4x8 sheets to sit on the wheel wells and the tailgate in its intermediate position. https://www.autoblog.com/2021/06/08/...rick-flex-bed/

No, they won't make a single cab long bed. Regular cabs are down to 3% market share.

They just need an open bed for their bull****, otherwise a station wagon or van would suit their needs better.

Yeah, I know it'll never happen. But since Ford actually managed to release a smaller pickup, I figured I'd wish for the moon.

You know the needs of every regular cab pickup owner?

I have a van and it works well for what I use it for - camping. I also have a station wagon. If I was buying a vehicle today I would most definitely pick the Maverick over my current sportwagen TDI. I want a cargo area I can hose out and the Maverick's 8 inches of ground clearance is just about perfect.

On paper this vehicle is great. Small engine? Check. Good fuel economy? Check. Lots of utility? Check. Oh and other things people care about, such as ground clearance, back seats, and a big touchscreen they can play with while driving.

If I had to recommend a new vehicle, this would be on my radar, along with some Korean offerings. My only hesitation is it being a Ford product - which doesn't necessarily make it bad (re: Fusion) - but my father-in-law just retired from Ford from a senior engineering position and, after turning in his Ford vehicles, promptly bought something non-Ford. According to him, the "150,000 mile end of life design" is alive and well at Ford, at least for their non-trucks.

What would I effectively gain by switching from my Insight to this truck?
-$20,000 less in my pocket
-Reduced fuel economy
-Reduced handling/acceleration/fun to drive (presumably)

+I could tow some things I don't
+If I had someone to put in the backseats, I'd have that
+3 inches more ground clearance (hasn't been an issue)

~

As cynical as I am, I'm glad to see this.

When I washed my girlfriend's Rav4 it was dirty, but when I washed my Accord tons of dirt washed out of the wheels.

So, she has increased clearance and AWD. I drove off-road. :)

I was talking about "family cab" buyers.

What are these "Needs" you speak of? :)

"A 40 MPG pickup"
 

Ford's marketing people must be laughing at the sheer number of media/blog reports touting their new "40 MPG pickup".

Of course we all saw & understand that's the city rating, where most hybrids excel.

Joe & Jane Consumer won't make that distinction. I think they're going to sell like hotcakes. And then we can shake our heads at all the owners complaining that they can "never get anywhere near 40 MPG".

Any guesses on the highway number?

Probably observation bias, but it seems it's always pickups that are doing 85 MPH on the freeway with the econoboxes doing the speed limit in the right lane.

I'd wager the highway rating isn't much lower. 37 perhaps?

33

40/33/37

Pretty dang good considering 30 MPG is about the best a 90's Camry does.

33mpg per official release

https://www.autoblog.com/2021/06/08/...hybrid-pickup/

I rather have a new 50mpg 5mt Rabbit Diesel Pickup , was hoping the Maverick would be a modern version of it.

Many commercial operators resort to trucks which are smaller and simpler than a Maverick in 3rd-world countries. Needless to say the Fiat Strada has been one of the best-sellers in Brazil.
https://engineeringworkarounds.blogs...a-and-why.html


I guess Ford would rather try to push commercial operators into the Ranger with the extended cab there.

https://www.long-mcarthur.com/maveri...icalspecs.html

Per the spec sheet the non-hybrid Maverick weighs about the same amount as my old full size half ton and can’t hold or tow as much

Boo, classic small Ford lead weight itis

It doesn't really surprise me, even though an old half-ton is not featherweight at all.

Maverick eco-drivers: "600 mile club"
 

I was happy to discover today that some early Maverick hybrid owners are geeking out about the vehicle's fuel economy potential.

One forum has a thread dedicated to getting 600 miles to a tank, equating to about 45 MPG US = 5.2 L/100 km

https://ecomodder.com/forum/attachme...1&d=1640794524

https://www.mavericktruckclub.com/fo...ick-club.7080/

My brother's SLP bragged that she can drive 650 miles in her truck, but the pump automatically clicks off at $128.

Mom said she can do the same in her car.

The EPA says that she can go 536.5 miles.

There was a similar comment in that forum thread: someone said their F150 was just as capable of doing 600 miles. Ergo, buy an F150 instead of the wussy "truck".

The Airbus A350 can go 11,000 miles on 37,248 gallons of fuel. A fill up is about $178,000

Empty/@minimums or is ithat the efficiency at gross? Big difference.

Is that the also included mandatory 45 minutes to the alternate airport?

I think the Nimitz went 1/2 million miles on it's first tank but it cost 1.5 billion to refuel. Then again it hauls 6000 "passengers". I'd be interested to know how many miles the USS Constitution has traveled on never a drop of feul. Or what is the record for a sailing vessel lifetime miles traveled although all modern boats have an ICE motor in addition to the sails.

My retirement plan was to sail. I figure by then fuel will be $100/gallon, or possibly illegal. There will be awesome "autopilots" by then so I can sleep while the boat sails on. Musk has solved internet at sea. The future is going to be awesome.

Magnus Effect, else the cost of re-rigging with hemp or wire rope, turnbuckles, toggles every ten years will sink you.

My retirement plan should have been Lieven Standaert's Aeromodeller2
https://krisdedecker.typepad.com/.a/...5b7d970c-700wi
www.lowtechmagazine.com/.../gipsy-zeppelin-baseship

Funny you should say that. I've always had a passion for the sea but my late wife not so much. So I had made plans to build her her dream home in Montana when I retire in 5 years. Well now the boat is looking pretty good. I found out my Navy sea time satisfies all but 90 days of experience required to get a charter captain's liscense. So I plan on at least trying for awhile a liveabord old Grand Banks wooden trawler or maybe a motor sail boat in Puget Sound or Southern Alaska. Do some charters on the side to help cover costs. We will be going up to Juneau or Anchorage this June to check it out. I have been in the Bearing Sea before but never set foot on Alaska. Maybe summer up there then go back to Montana and a tiny home for winter. I got to check it out first. I love Puget Sound too but Washington state is going to the dogs, and I don't know if I could take being one of their government's surfs.

'Serfs'.

I'm starting to like Low Tech magazine. Here's an article on sailing:

www.lowtechmagazine.com/2021/05/how-to-design-a-sailing-ship-for-the-21st-century.

Lots of pictures of sailors scrapping and caulking the decks. :)

Scraping and caulking? :)

How do I make a Maverick Hybrid seaworthy? :D

Get that tiny home in Montana and consider that your permanent residence. WA doesn't have income tax, so just haul everything you need there so you don't pay sales tax. Oregon's close by to avoid sales tax too. Or, tiny home in Alaska and winter wherever you want on your boat.

I generally am against paying more than necessary to the government, and even more so governments that take your money and then refuse to enforce the law.

Why Anchorage is America's Most OP City

After a while Alaska shares the oil money ...or they did?

Ok, you got me on serfs, but after 11 years of being a sailor I'll say you ment "cocking the decks"

No avoiding a Washington state use tax equal to sales tax on any boat purchase. They even go after boats on the Columbia Oregon side as they say they must be crossing into their waters at some point. The best way to avoid it would be to buy it in a low sales tax state, some have like a $2000 cap on even a million dollar yacht purchase, and then you won't get dinged in Washington because you paid a tax once already even if it's lower then theirs. But buy one in Oregon or Montana and you pay full Washington use tax to ever set fin in their waters. You can get a one year permit for less than the tax, but then the boat has to leave Washington waters for 2 years after even if sold to someone else.

Then if you take charters they are going to state income tax any revenue there no matter where you claim permanent residence.

'Meant'? I was led astray by the linked article: "Renewing caulking on the poop of the 'Parma'. Alan Villiers, 1932-33."

I keep urging my son to use the redwood canoe his grandfather made. Is this why he's so reluctant?