Red Horse

Well appreciate your loyalty to Cat. Like I said, a very loyal base. Just hope they keep it as the low cost Chinese product makes its way here. Friend of mine bought a Liugong loader about the size of a 638. He said he could have bought two and had one as a parts machine vs. what the 638 would have cost. Scary.

Thx-Never knew Textron was into this market. Just out of curiosity, do you know who builds the Deere line of ATV's///

Well come on guys-cut him some slack-after all, he did call it a "Concrete mixer" as opposed to a "Cement mixer"

I think KSC's point is they have made a lot of changes. As for the Cat truck circus, I said when they came out-"a marriage made in hell". think of it- Cat abandons the on highway engine business and International was involved with the EGR fiasco where the guy at the top thought he was smarter than everyone else. Doomed from the start. IMO Cat thinks they can paint a pile of dog shit Cat yellow and everyone will stand around saying..."isn't that the nicest pile of dog shit you have ever seen". Don't get me wrong- I like Cat equipment-but I do think they do depend on their rep to win sales in new markets. International's sales have taken off so hopefully things are looking up. Then again, friend of mine owns a salvage yard with a few ramp trucks- Dodge 5500's (Cummins) and International. He is fed up with International service and his next trucks will be Fords-not at all worried about the 6.7 PowerStroke.

wonder who rebrands this for Cat? Polaris? wonder why the ol' boy didn't ask about the power train? Hopefully it will live longer than the Cat "truck"

You guys have it all wrong-plenty of jobs will remain-starting with lawyers, all the staffing to man the court system and probably quite a few in the trades to BUILD the new court facilities that will be needed.

Kevin-I do believe frames were same options-only difference was engine matched to appropriate transmission. As to class 8, I would assume given GVW they were 8's. then again when GM was building "mediums", you could get a GM tandem yet they never reported any class 8 sales. How did THAT work? You have an explanation? No clue as to how Ford reported those sales-might be a good question for BON site.

No clue on the hydraulic retarder but Ford in that era offered a "Transmatic" that I think was an Allison-my bet same transmission as used in the Chevy.

Correct on "T" designation. F-800, gas-or 8.2. F-8000, diesel- 3208 and then Ford 6's. I don't think there ever was an F-9000. There was an FT-900 and it was a 8.2 Detroit, with either a 34 or 38 rear but not gas. It is amazing if you go on Ebay or Trucktrader and see the Ford listings with incorrect designations. If you want to understand Ford's designation history, DO NOT use either of these two to verify your info!. My memory is getting "old"-yuk yuk-so some stuff I remember but usually I go to archives and dig out what sales literature I might have. Also the Wagner book is good.

And I thought Howie Long was bad!

Kevin- the 9 L is off road only?

For sure-everything looks good when you step up to the cash register with your EBT card!

Nice Rich- and Kevin, per TJC later on the Brazil Ag Fords. And as "1965" said even the 8.2 Fuel Pincher. That I think was the first diesel offering in the F 8 series and in the end they even offered it while they were using 3208's. the 3208's were F-8000's and if it was an 8.2 it was a 900. Now if you really want to get into ancient history, in the 60's you could get a Cummins C-180. I think they were a 464 cu. inch 6 but that was in the old Super Duty cab-which was 800 and up. The 750 and smaller mediums used the "pick up" cab.

Well if Rich says so that is a given for sure. And Rich-where is the F-8000 today?

I'm with HG. 10 G is very low IMO Buddy did his R-688 last year for 18-new Mack rails plus liner, and new pintle plate. Done by Mack dealer Truck has 55 rears. He was hesitant to do it and I gave him same speech. That R will still be a mush lesser headache than any new POS. Also an 88. 350, 6 speed.

Hah-might be fake-but in anycase looks to me that the Boosta-Load should be down even when the thing is empty!

Well one thing for sure, it is the best looking in that class. Still amazes me that the Europeans stick with cab overs for ALL their applications. then again, I can remember the Mack H81 mixer chassis-Beasts!

Agree 100%. While reading all that info on Hackett's views of the industry, I could not help but think of Jac Nasser. He was visiting Boston and the Boston Globe interviewed him. A more memorable quote from Jac.."I want to find out what the consumers's tastes are in his kitchen"..or words to that effect. Then when he spent all kinds of money buying junkyards....."buy analyzing parts we find in these yards, we will be better able to improve our products"..again words to that effect. guess he had no clue that looking at their warranty claims could do the same thing! I think we have jumped from the fire to the you know what! No doubt electrification will arrive. But at a measured pace. Hackett says they are going to come out with 40 electric vehicles in 4 years? and he wants to cut engineering staff? And cut component costs? Sounds to me like conflicting objectives. Oh and he is looking to Apple and Tesla for forward thinking? I suggest he look to Toyota, Honda and the Koreans for some better ideas. They are the ones that are eating Ford's lunch

Hah- how true. I have been all over that stupid terminology on the BON site ever since they first used the term. It speaks volumes as to how clueless they are.

Unfortunately, I'm afraid you are correct. And it is obvious that you are not a newcomer to the field-and most importantly have a passion for the subject-as evidenced by the time you take to offer opinions on this site. But I can say, in the typical dealership, how many sales reps have a clue regarding any truck beyond a 150?? And regarding your comment on Ford listening more to researchers than the people in the field who day after day interact with the customer, how screwed up is that. Nothing like a balanced approach. And how many Ford people do you interact with that it could be said are career truck people with a true passion for their work? My bet not many. Instead they are people who have bounced from job to job under the guise of "career development". Navistar? PACCAR? F'liner? They are truck guys with no thought that their next assignment will be outside their world of trucks.

Many on this site as well as the BON site share that opinion. When you are late to the party however, I wonder if you can afford that kind of strategy.

Kevin, Check out January HDT. Big teaser ad from Hino announcing new class 7 and 8 's with tandem axle-shot of a tandem chassis-back of cab so no clue if its conventional or cabover. Says wait til Work Truck Show in March.

JB-You work in a dealership. what is the sentiment of your owners and the dealer network in general? They have to see what you are talking about. I missed his comment you referred to about ..."taking back the streets from cars", but unbelievable. I'm having nightmares! Jac the Knife is back with more dumb ass ideas. I had faith in Bill Ford. The fact he picked this guy gives me second thoughts about all my ford shares.

Kevin- Hear you on the E-550. Dealer friend of mine was really pissed when they dropped it. He had converted a lot of customers to the truck and was enjoying repeat sales. As for the utilities, I do see some 5500 Dodge buckets running around these parts but there is an Altech facility in next town over. Their yard is always full of chassis awaiting installs. There are probably 100 or more Fords there now and a few -5??- Dodges. As for big trucks-(class7,8) virtually all F'liners with a few Internationals and an occasional PACCAR. Have not seen a Ford since Blue Diamond shut down. And there are plenty of utility co. 750's in service around here but they all Bluediamonds. What's changed? The failure of Ford to offer something other than the 6.7Powerstroke-Torqueshift IMO

Here you go January Heavy Duty Trucking class 3-4-5 Units YTD 11 MOS. Market Share Dodge 156,773 42.3% Ford 131,410 35.45% By the way. In addition to being a "Mack guy", I'm a "Ford guy" too. If you don't believe the numbers, take it up with HDT