Ford bolsters working Ranger line-up

FORD Australia has bolstered its already expansive Ranger line-up with the addition of the XL Special Edition and XLT Fully Loaded, two variants designed to increase the ruggedness and value factor of the established line-up.

Priced at $49,990 driveway, the XL Special Edition will be offered exclusively in 4x4 dual-cab chassis guise and will be powered by the 3.2-litre turbo-diesel five-cylinder engine (147kW/470Nm), paired only with the six-speed automatic transmission.

Compared to the standard XL dual cab, the Special Edition adds a genuine Ford factory bullbar, LED light bar and fixed-mount snorkel, additions Ford says serve to “enhance its usefulness and dependability”.

For reference, the standard car retails for $49,790 (plus on-roads) – Ford has not yet listed the retail pricing of the Special Edition.

The XLT 4x4 Fully Loaded meanwhile goes in the opposite direction, with all of its additional kit tailored towards visual flair and luxury.

Priced at just $1500 more (driveaway) than the standard XLTs, Ford says the Fully Loaded adds more than $3000 worth of gear to its volume-selling model, with the extras consisting of gloss-black 18-inch alloy wheels, adaptive cruise control, leather-accented upholstery and semi-automatic parallel parking.

Unlike the XL Special Edition, the XLT 4x4 Fully Loaded is available with the same two powerplants as the regular XLT, those being the previously mentioned 3.2-litre diesel unit or the more powerful 150kW/500Nm 2.0-litre bi-turbo diesel four-cylinder.

Both of the Fully Loaded twins rely on the familiar six- and 10-speed automatic transmissions respectively, with no manual offered.

Elsewhere in the range, Ford has taken the opportunity to introduce a raft of new options and packs designed to improve the personalisation options for the almost infinitely different needs and tastes of customers.

The most comprehensive of these options is the new ‘heavy-duty pack’ for the XL 4x4 line-up, which adds heavy duty suspension, 17-inch black finish steel wheels, solid wheel nuts, Continental ContCrossContact all-terrain tyres and black side steps as well as a reversing camera on the cab-chassis variants.

The heavy-duty pack will set customers back between $1600-$2000 depending on the cab and body style.

Elements of the heavy-duty pack are able to be specified individually with the Conti all-terrain tyres available on the XL 4x4s for $500 while the black 17-inch wheels can be had on the XLS for $750.

Other new features include an $800 Tough Bed spray-in bedliner for the XL and XLS dual-cab pick-ups, a feature costing just $300 on the corresponding Sport and XLT dual cabs.

According to new Ford Australia and New Zealand president and CEO Andrew Birkic, the brand is “working hard to ensure that tradies and their teams across the country, and businesses pushing to get back on their feet, have the right equipment and support to get on with what matters to them most”.

“Ranger has been designed and engineered in Australia, and our harsh continent is an ideal place to develop, test and test again to ensure Ranger meets the Tough Done Smarter mantra,” he said.

Due to hit showroom in September, the introduction of the new variants and packs also heralds the arrival of the FordPass Connect embedded modem as standard on Rangers.

Ford Australia chalked up 17,406 Ranger sales through the first seven months of 2020, enough to see it edge out the Toyota HiLux (17,276) and take top honours in the lucrative and all-important 4x4 ute segment with a 23 per cent sales share.

2020 Ford Ranger 4x4 pricing*

*Excludes on-road costs