[s-cars] Work vehicle advice needed

[calvinlc at earthlink.net]

Taka, I believe you are wrong here.  The F-series before the 1997 changeover
had fine crash test ratings!  1994-1996 5 stars on both sides baby!
Checkout the NHTSA website.  I believe you are being tainted by the reports
on the F-series trucks between 1997 and 2004 where they used inferior metal
in the frames.  This has nothing to do with the earlier models I am talking
about...unless you know something more specific than that, if you do please
let me know because I certainly don't want to be steering people in the
wrong direction.  I'm really just trying to help and save you a ton of money
by buying an older truck.  If there is some report you have that shows these
models are unsafe I would really like to see it because I hate having
incorrect info.

Besides that, we could do a rear end collision, my '91 F-150 into your
STi...let's say I hit you around 35 mph with somebody in your
backseat....probably not good results on the old STi...I think the occupants
might wind up in a "crumple zone."

--Calvin



  -----Original Message-----
  From: Taka Mizutani [mailto:t44tqtro at gmail.com]
  Sent: Tuesday, December 19, 2006 6:24 AM
  To: calvinlc at earthlink.net
  Cc: Young, Steve; S-CAR-List
  Subject: Re: [s-cars] Work vehicle advice needed


  Reliability might be decent on a 94-96 Ford, but safety? I think not.

  The '04+ F-series has good crash testing results- the prior trucks do not.

  I won't get any truck that doesn't crash test well- I see far too many
accidents on
  I-95 here, involving multiple cars and sometimes tractor-trailers.

  Taka



  On 12/18/06, calvinlc at earthlink.net <calvinlc at earthlink.net> wrote:
    While I don't know about the newer ones, I can tell you that the 5 speed
    manual in the older F-150's was perfectly reliable.  Also, on the
earlier
    F250's the 460 was rated at 410 lb-ft, so not quite the 444 that the
diesel
    was but pretty close.  Of course this isn't like the newer ones rated at
    500+ but then again neither is the price tag of around 7k to 10k for a
1996
    F-250...and for a few extra bucks you can do what we do to our Audis.  A
    chip can gain you 85 HP and 172 ft-lbs, for a total of over 600 ft-lbs.
You
    gotta love the hair dryers :)  I also do not know how the automatics of
this
    generation compare to what Steve is speaking about in the newer trucks.
I
    do know that if you look at the reliability on 94-96 F-250's you will
find
    them ranked at the very top.
    --Calvin