Ford Will Literally Custom Build You a Truck, If It’s a F-650 or F-750
If you go to the vehicle build utility on Ford’s site, you can configure a Ford truck in a million different ways. But for some of you, that’s not enough. Maybe you want a special color that just isn’t available? Maybe you have a specific feature requirement for your fleet of trucks? If that’s the case, and you’re purchasing a F-650 or F-750 medium duty Super Duty, Ford can build you nearly everything you could possibly want.
I had a chance to tour Ford’s Ohio Assembly Plant (OHAP) in Avon Lake, Ohio, where they build the E-Series Cutaway, the 2017 Super Duty chassis-cab, and the F-650 and F-750 medium duty trucks. While they do produce a lot of trucks at this facility, they simply do not have the same volume as one of the F-150 plants. But as a result, they can be a lot more specialized.
The plant, like many, uses robots. But there still a lot of people working they performing assembly that in a larger plant a robot might do. They also have to tackle three entirely different vehicles on two assembly lines. It’s neat to see all the vehicles mixed in together following the same production path.
Now speaking to the specialization, the F-650 and F-750 can be configured many different ways. Obviously, the most common color on the assembly line is white — most of these vehicles get wrapped after the sale — but your truck doesn’t have to be. You can choose from a wide range of colors, including Tangier Orange on the dump truck that I got to drive later in the day, or you can have them custom-blend a color for you.
It takes about 6 weeks of lead time, but if you wanted a F-650 in Porsche’s Brewster Green, they could do it for you. Maybe you want some variation of Dodge’s Plum Crazy? OHAP is capable of making it happen.
According to our friends in the Ford plant, there’s very little they can’t do. If you have a special request, such as different interior material, your dealer can contact Ford in Dearborn and work the folks at OHAP to see if it’s something that can be done.
I asked, hypothetically, if you could equip the massaging seats from the F-150 in the F-650? I was told that it might be possible. Maybe you want to make sure your trucks don’t have air conditioning? They can accommodate many requests.
That being said, because I know you’re thinking it, they won’t be able to equip the new F-650 or F-750 with a manual transmission. They simply don’t have one available to work with the new truck, and the take rate was so incredibly low that it didn’t even make sense for a smaller niche plant to keep it in production.
If you’re sad about that, blame the folks who bought trucks with automatics. Ford is just making what the customers want.
How would you spec out your dream medium duty truck? What business would you use it with? Let us know your thoughts and ideas in the comments section below or over in our forums!
