went right up that
little wheel spin on the one you got some good ice down there that was straight up ice you got
a little wheel spin out of one wheel that was i it felt like you should have sniffed me over there
i would i'm slipping more there than the truck is so the ford maverick
it's a trucks and it came out i thought what's old is new again this is going to be a
a new version of the pickup trucks the small pickups they actually
small pickups not mid-sized trucks but the small pickups of the 70s 80s and 90s a friend
of mine rick picked one up went for a ride and it's it's just not like that at all stay tuned
so the maverick xlt comes with a 2.5 liter eight-speed automatic transmission all-wheel drive
system the one impression the one thing that really stuck out with the truck is how roomy it is
inside i'm not sure if this is something that ford did with the panels the shape of them the way they
look you don't feel like you're in a compact truck you feel like you're in a much bigger vehicle
so in other words if someone had blindfolded you and put you inside that vehicle you would know
that you were in the smallest pickup available from ford motor company internal storage was a
big concern for ford there's storage cubbies and places to put things everywhere big glove box big
door panels cup holders places to store your phone in three different styles there's compartments
within compartments there's compartments in the bed the rear seat flips up to make a very usable
compartment the truck i'm in rick's truck he had a dodge 1500 everything that was stored in that 1500
he pulled out of and stuffed under that rear seat and had room to spare the ride on the maverick is
very car like it has independent rear suspension independent front suspension as well but you don't
get jarred there's no bouncing around like you'd have with a standard leaf spring and a solid axle
it goes over small bumps in the road potholes things like that with ease it's it's not a jarring
ride at all it's not a traditional pickup style ride and certainly not a traditional small pickup
style ride now the engine rick selected for his xlt was the 2.0 liter turbo that's 250 horsepower
277 foot-pounds of torque that powertrain seemed to work well with the eight-speed automatic zero
to 60 times and roughly in the seven second range 6.9 some magazines have tested fuel economy rated
by the epa is 22 city 29 highway that's with the all-wheel drive the mavericks dash layout was nice
the lcd was user friendly included apple carplay and whatever that thing android
does the heater controls which i prefer traditional heater controls with dials
seems to be a lot easier than going through an infotainment system the one thing i really didn't
like was the electronics gear selector although i was glad to see it's nowhere near the volume
controls or heater selections unlike a dodge the maverick was equipped with forged drive modes
they included normal tow haul slippery eco and sport the mavericks bed while it's only a four
foot bed it's not exactly gigantic it is capable you can carry up to 1500 pounds in the back of
there there's slots set up for 2x4 so you can set up partitions there's tie downs it's a workable
bed the really nice thing was the plastic cladding that went around the lip of the bed as well as
down the side so that would help with dent control stop you from denting things or banging things
into it now rick and i decided to try this truck in a snow and ice environment we had to drive
there and while rick had only driven this truck 100 miles i want to get his impressions of his
new maverick see what he thought so 1500 ride wise compared to what you're in now just driving along
uh how do you think this one would compare to the 1500 yeah actually the ride on this thing is feels
as far as smoothness it's about to see really okay yeah cause that 1500 road really smooth
it was pretty nice they had a pretty big wheelbase you know because that was a crew cab too right
you're not there's not a whole lot of lag there there's no mushiness
it's just so you turn it's turning yeah it feels like a little sport
and sticker on this one was what 28 20 28 so 28 000 you get a pretty well dressed up pickup truck
with a great little truck i think for 20. so at this point we know the mannerisms of the maverick
on pavement it drove well it's comfortable it handles bumps well the steering input seems to
be good the four wheel disc brakes stop it well the thing we didn't know was how does ford's
intelligent all-wheel drive work now ford says it's an advanced drive train system that's able
to monitor hundreds of difference of pieces of data every second to help improve handling and
traction and some of those things were rate of acceleration wheel spin wheel steering angle
accelerator position and all this information is is then verified by ford's onboard computer to let
it know how to send power how to send torque to each wheel independently and that sounds great but
how does that work in the real world so we took the maverick out to a park that had been snowed on
the week prior and snowed on two days after that so you had compacted snow it had been
driven over so there's now ice there it was a 40 degree day so some of that ice had melted
so there's actually water laying on the ice and that's a condition that really no one wants to be
in but it was a controlled environment for us let's see how the mavericks intelligent all-wheel
drive system actually reacts in the real world so you can see this thing just drove over ice like it
was not a problem the torque sensing in the in each wheel seemed to work very very well if one
wheel started to slip and i noticed no wheel slip throughout this driving session the other ones
would kick in that's theoretically how it worked there's a clutch between the front axle and the
rear axle and the front starts to give way the rear picks up the slack i didn't notice any spin
the maverick just handled it like it was not a big deal now keep in mind these were on the all-season
continental radials not really ideal for snow and i'm not saying that the maverick is a off-road
vehicle it isn't most people i don't think intend to take it over challenging trails but for what
you're going to run into in daily driving it's more than competent so i have to think that ford
hit a home run with this one he had a lot of truck there for not a lot of money it's nice to see
that segment returned to the market it was a segment that was a large portion of sales in
the 70s 80s and 90s i'm not sure why it ever went away maybe it's profit not sure but if you're in
the market for a small truck i can't speak to the hybrid version i haven't seen one i haven't tested
it it comes in front wheel drive only that's not going to work for folks most folks in pennsylvania
anyway get a lot of snow up here over the winters and the all-wheel drive just seems to be a much
better fit but for those down south where you don't get a lot of snow maybe check it out
oh like and subscribe if you get a chance that'd be awesome so rick's a guy that doesn't
show a lot of emotion he's pretty laid back i want to leave you with this look on his face
and i think what you see there is a satisfied customer and somebody for the first time that's
realizing the vehicle they purchased was a wise decision
it was nice to see till next time we'll see you