We won’t be getting Ford’s Ranger Raptor

Truck would require expensive retooling for U.S. market

Despite the fact it’s been spied testing in southern Ontario, North America will not see a Raptor version of the Ranger when the mid-size offroad pickup makes its global debut.

When the truck was first announced, the 210-horsepower 2.0-litre twin-turbo diesel truck seemed a perfect fit for Canada, but from the start Ford added the caveat “for Asian markets only.”

Enthusiasts started getting hopeful when Ford said it’ll “have more to share about Ranger Raptor at a later date,” and started to feel pretty certain when a left-hand-drive model showed up around Windsor, Ontario. All false flags, apparently, with confirmation the Ranger Raptor would not be seeing North American shores coming this week from Ford Performance director Hermann Salenbauch.

The truck is based on the global Ranger and would require an expensive retooling for the U.S. market, he told Autoblog. Furthermore, the goal with the mini-Raptor was to offer it in regions that didn’t get the full-size F-150 Raptor we already enjoy.

The blog surmises there wouldn’t be enough of a price gap between Ranger and F-150 Raptors either, that they’d cannibalize each other’s sales; the diesel engine in the Ranger Raptor would be new to the U.S. market, too, and probably require some reconfiguration for emissions standards.

Salenbauch did not rule out the Ranger Raptor concept for North America forever, it could eventually turn up down the line.

— FORD FILES Setting a new benchmark in off-road capability, the Ranger Raptor has been purposefully-designed to incorporate Ford Performance DNA as well as the toughness of core Ranger design and engineering capability.