The 2023 Ford Raptor R’s engine produces 700 horsepower and has been tuned for rough roads.
Courtesy Ford
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Ford Motor
introduced a new truck—and it isn’t an electric vehicle.
The car maker (ticker: F) opened ordering for its new F-150 Raptor R Monday, billing it as the “fastest, most powerful, most extreme high-performance off-road desert Raptor yet.”
The truck comes equipped with a 5.2-liter, turbocharged 700-horsepower engine that puts out 640 foot-pounds of torque and can tow up to 8,700 pounds. (Torque is what helps vehicles jump off the starting line quickly and tow big loads.) The engine also powers the Ford Mustang Shelby GT500.
It’s quite a truck. It starts at about $107,000, according to Kelly Blue Book, the new and used-car price provider.
Production is slated to begin in late 2022 at Ford’s Dearborn, Mich., truck plant.
The Ford F-series, which includes F-150 trucks, is arguably the company’s most important product. In the U.S., Ford sold about 726,000 F-series trucks in 2021 out of a total of 1.9 million vehicles. Those figures include the eight F-150 trims: XL, XLT, Lariat, King Ranch, Platinum, Limited, Tremor, and Raptor.
Ford, of course, just started delivering its all electric F-150 Lightning. It comes in the Pro, XLT, Lariat, and Platinum versions. Starting prices for those four range from about $40,000 to $91,000. Ford delivered 1,837 Lightning trucks in June, bringing the total for 2022 to about 2,300 as of the end of that month.
How big a seller the Raptor R will be is unknown. The company doesn’t report Raptor sales and declined to comment on sales volumes. Ford delivered 57,673 F-series trucks in June, up about 26% year over year.
Trucks are one of Ford’s highest-margin products, according to Benchmark analyst Mike Ward. That profit is critical to helping fund Ford’s lofty ambitions for electric vehicles. Ford began sales of its electric F-150 Lightning in 2020 and wants to sell two million EVs a year around the world by 2026. That could amount to roughly 35% to 45% of all Ford sales.
Ford stock was up 2.6% in Monday afternoon trading. The
S&P 500
and
Dow Jones Industrial Average
were up 0.8% and 0.5%, respectively.
Ford shares are off about 40% this year. Inflation and higher interest rates have hurt auto stocks. Automotive shares in the
Russell 3000 index
are down roughly 33%, on average, so far in 2022.
Write to Al Root at allen.root@dowjones.com
