Over 100 years in the past, the very first all metal physique for an vehicle was constructed, and from there, that was the usual materials you had been going to make use of to construct your automobiles. It did not matter if it was a coupé or a pickup truck, that robust steel was at all times the way in which to go. That was till the Nineteen Seventies when automakers began the gradual part out of metal in favor of aluminum. This can be a a lot lighter materials than metal, which in flip lets you get to sooner speeds with out placing as a lot burden in your engine. It made lots of sense to modify to this new materials, however there was a serious part of the auto panorama that wasn’t actually making that change in that point. That might be pickup vehicles.
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As a result of these are very massive automobiles meant for hauling payloads, there was a hesitancy to modify truck our bodies over to aluminum, because the lighter weight perhaps would forestall the truck from having the ability to deal with what it must haul or tow. It might take fairly some time earlier than an American producer would chew the bullet and construct a pickup truck with an all-aluminum body. That firm could be Ford, and as soon as that firm did it with the F-150, Ford’s best-selling automobile of all time, you can be hard-pressed to discover a fashionable pickup truck constructed on a metal body anymore. It’s possible you’ll suppose it took a decade or two for Ford to make this variation, however this shift occurred a lot nearer to right this moment than you would possibly anticipate.
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Solely aluminum for a decade
Ford first launched an aluminum physique to the F-150 in 2014 for the 2015 mannequin yr, which means that the primary American aluminum pickup truck marks its tenth anniversary the yr this was written. In comparison with smaller vehicles making this change practically 50 years in the past, it’s nearly stunning how fashionable this variation is. Initially, this was solely achieved for the F-150. This is smart as that is already the smallest and lightest truck in Ford’s F-Sequence, and the change away from metal allowed this to lose 700 kilos of weight. The 2025 Ford F-150 XL with a daily cab and a 2.7L EcoBoost V6 engine — the smallest an F-150 may be — has a curb weight of 4,687 kilos. If it nonetheless had that additional 700 kilos on it, that may put it in the identical weight class because the aluminum-based double cab hybrid model with a 3.5L PowerBoost V6 engine.
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Ford expanded its aluminum utilization for its pickup vehicles two years later when the corporate determined to start out making its 2017 mannequin yr Tremendous Responsibility vehicles out of the fabric as properly. These are Ford’s heavy-duty vehicles that will even make the most of massive Energy Stroke V8 engines, and it believed that it might be capable to have these vehicles function simply as properly. That ended up being the case, and now, Ford makes use of aluminum our bodies throughout all of its vehicles.
Aluminum is best for EVs
For lots of people, a lighter weight automobile principally implies that it is ready to obtain greater speeds extra shortly. Nevertheless, there are different implications at play, which automobile producers wouldn’t have even thought of after they had been initially making this variation with smaller automobiles again within the Nineteen Seventies. This has to do with the rise of electrical automobiles. A part of the attraction of an EV, apart from the environmental advantages that come from driving one, is effectivity. As this know-how continues to evolve, a part of the aim can be to enhance how far a automobile is ready to journey on a single cost. Having an aluminum physique helps with this tremendously because of the lighter weight.
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That is vital for Ford vehicles too, as a result of the corporate has launched a few electrical pickups for buy, such because the Ford Maverick and the extremely widespread Ford F-150 Lightning. Having converted to that aluminum base, it made transitioning these vehicles over to using electrical motors much more seamless. One other profit is that aluminum is pretty corrosion-resistant, and EVs have a better threat to corrode due to the fabric used for batteries and wiring. Environmentally, aluminum can be a plus as a result of it’s completely recyclable, and since sustainability is such a giant a part of this push to all-electric, this supplies that for the Ford vehicles. The corporate has been utilizing aluminum for ten years now, and there’s little or no cause why it ought to flip away from it now.
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