Heavy-duty trucks are a white-hot market that doesn’t seem to be slowing down in sales anytime soon, and Ford Motor Company knows this. Their Super Duty line is paying a lot of bills, and with the arrival of the new Super Duty series of trucks, they have to keep themselves one step ahead of GM and FCA’s Ram division. While we’ve made cracks about the $70,000 plus King Ranch options and overloaded pickups that won’t see a lick of work in general, Ford can’t afford to put out a weak truck, because someone, somewhere will work the truck to it’s full potential, and possibly even harder than that…it has to be able to stand up to whatever punishment will be dealt out. All of that strength has to start at the frame of the truck…if the frame isn’t up to the task, there is no point assessing the rest of the truck. Ford decided the best way to show off what the new Super Duty can do was to hang a frame off of a crane…then successfully attach eight F-150 pickups and the F-750 “Tonka” dump truck to simulate a load test. Ford claims that the crane’s connections are meant to simulate the axles, while the connecting points for the trucks are meant to induce stress at the most critical points. The Super Duty sports a fully boxed frame, but nine trucks? You make the call, BangShifters: is this legit or just clever showmanship?
All the weight is hanging from cables through the spreader bars. Only a very small area is taking the load not the entire frame. Show the weld points and the brackets welded to the frame. ” Smoke and mirrors”
Hey don’t be so negative — I’ve made a ton of money operating cranes and other equipment on gigs like this
Just set back and enjoy the show LOL
Yep- loading is concentrated such that the frame is more in tension in a very small area rather than under any bending moment. If the frame did not pass this, it wouldn’t belong under a VW beetle. This is no test for rigidity, just the tensile strength of the frame.
Proves the spreader frame is stronger than the ford frame.