In Money Magazine the Ford F250 was named the most overpriced vehicle on the planet vs production cost. I can see why when the MSRP on mine was 51,710 but they let it go for 30,885. If Ford were to set the MSRP on the F250 (equipped like mine) for say, 37k, they'd probably sell a lot of them at MSRP. I personally don't know ANYBODY that would have paid 51,710 for my truck, but it really is a nice truck, and hauls everything I need in the back since I went the add-a-leaf route on it. It's basically an F350 badged as a 250 now...lol

 

From what I have seen the mpg's are pretty close between a SD v10 and a SD 5.4. I get 15 mpg out of my 5.4 and Johnny gets 15 mpg out of his v10. We are going to get the same mpg's, have virtually identical maintenance costs(he has two extra plugs to change) and both are going to be the same when it comes to reliability. So no, I see no downside to going with a v10 over a 5.4.

I would agree with that. I have a couple of relatives that work for Chevy in their Ohio plant and they said it costs about $5,000 to produce a Duramax 3500 truck. They have to turn around and sell it to the dealer for enough to cover their $5,000 investment PLUS enough to make a profit on it. Then the dealer has to turn around and sell it for enough to cover what he paid Chevy for it then add on enough to pay the salesperson that sold it and enough for the dealer to make a profit. I would imagine Ford is around that same amount.

Edit-When Dodge shut down a lot of dealerships a while back they shut down the one where I live. They took out an ad in the newspaper and said that they were not allowed to sell any new Dodge vehicle for one dollar more than what they paid Dodge for it. They had crew cab, dually, Laramie's, Big Horn's, etc, for less than $20,000 when the sticker price on them was over $50,000. They sold out in about 2 days.

 

It might only cost $5,000 in parts, but then you have labor and legacy labor costs, you can probably add at least another $5,000 to it for those. In addition you'll have engineering costs, and DOT testing costs.

I (the who one hates Dodge trucks) would even buy one like that for under $20k.

 

Yep, I would probably buy 19k for a Laramie...I'd sell it immediately, but I'd buy one for 19k.

 

He was talking about total materials and labor costs to build the truck for $5,000. That doesn't include testing and engineering and stuff like that, but they spread that out over however long the designed part is in use. Like the super duty. For 10-12 years the exterior remained virtually unchanged. They may throw in a new grille or headlights here and there, but for the most part there weren't drastic changes that required big money redesigning.

Take a junk car to the scrap yard and see how much you get for it. If you're lucky, you may get $150-200. I am sure Ford gets a discount on their metal because they buy in bulk, so I would highly doubt that there is more than $300 worth of actual metal in the truck. Sheet metal costs next to nothing. I used to work for a gutter manufacturing plant and we would take about $100 worth of sheet metal and turn it into about $5,000 worth of guttering. Interior parts are the same way. It's nothing more than molded plastic.

I thought really hard about buying one and then selling it or trading it in on a Ford.

 

I now have $100K in it with the custom touches.

 

Most of the time the previous model is the one paying for the engineering on the next model. But even new grills need engineered to meet certain standards. And in reality, legal fees are probably even more than engineering costs.

I would think there is more than $300 worth of metal... Just last year people were making $400-500 for junking a car, and truck has for more metal than that. Additionally, the price of scrap metal is low because the quality of the metal is unknown. When a manufacture starts specing out certain quality and composition (in say an engine or radiator), things get costly quick. I bet DOT makes sure they specify the composition of their frames too, and do radon testing to make sure it is within certain limits, but I don't know. But I'm sure there is more to it than just buying whatever metal they can find from whoever has it on the back of their truck like a scrapper.

 

The most I have ever gotten for scrapping a car is about $400. How I managed that was taking as many scrap parts off of other things that I could find and putting them inside of the car I was scrapping. I would get about half of that if I just rolled the car down there as is. If it had aluminum wheels I could get a little more.

If you look at a lot of OBS trucks you will see about half of them with more rust than they have good metal and you will see some that don't have a spot of rust on them. Others will have a bed that is rusted off and the cab looks brand new. My dads f150 and my Bronco have been garage kept, never driven in snow or on salt, washed and waxed regularly, etc, and the fender wells and tailgates are rusting through on them. My OBS 250 has been used as an oil field truck, never waxed, washed about once a year(just hose it off after a job), been covered in mud and salt and doesn't have a spot of rust on it. From something I read a few years back, it was because some parts were made with high quality metal and other parts were made with cheap recycled metal from China because Ford got a good deal on it. So sometimes they do just buy the cheapest stuff they can find. As for the price of the Chevy, I am just going by what my relatives tell me and one of them has worked for Chevy for 40 years and knows what he is talking about.

 

Well! MY PSD will out pull YOUR V10 any day of the week actually!!! Okay, okay, the V10 Tritons are GREAT motors, but PSDs are better. Higher value, last longer, more power, basically what all the others said.

 

Higher cost generally equals higher value. More power depends on what you are talking about. The psd makes more power than the v10 at lower rpms but the v10 makes more power at higher rpms than the psd does at any rpm. It's just a matter of whether you want to turn 2-3k rpm or 3-4k rpm to pull the same load up a hill.

This isn't a knock on the 6.4, but just my opinion. Before we can talk about how they last longer, I think they need to be more than 2-3 years old. Once they get 15 years old, 300-500k miles, etc, then we can talk about them lasting longer. Right now though, that part of the argument is being based off of the 7.3's reputation. The 7.3 proved itself in that department, as have the modulars. The 6.0, not so much.

 

The later 6.0s are just as good as the 7.3L. Actually better! My friend had a 1997 7.3L and he replaced the flywheels NUMEROUS times, and when he got to 150,000 miles he had to replace 3 injectors. He has a 6.0L now, and at 60,000 miles he has had no problems, where at 60,000 on the 7.3L, he had already replaced an expensive flywheel. But the V10s ARE good motors and I've never doubted that, but diesel is just a better way to go in my opinion. Also, what I mean by later 6.0s is the 2006 and 2007 models. The only really good 7.3L was the 1999 to 2003.5. Thats when Ford got the 7.3L flywheel problem worked out and the trucks were great. But anyhow, Ford FOREVER!!! No matter what!

 

My 97 7.3 has 217k miles and is all stock. What I would ask your friend though, is why he kept putting the same flywheel back on. The flywheel is a bad design and as soon as mine goes bad(or I change my clutch) I am putting a single mass flywheel back on it. Fix it once and be done with it. I actually don't like the last few years of the 7.3 because they switched to the powder coated metal parts and it isn't as stout as the older models.

I have seen really good and really bad 6.0's, so I know not all of them are bad. I have just yet to see one in person that got better than 12 mpg's stock. I can't justify buying a truck that "might" be a good one and gets mpg's that bad. The v10 is going to get that same kind of mileage, but at least I know what kind of engine I am getting and getting the same mpg's it will be cheaper to drive because of cheaper fuel.

 

My 94.5 PSD went through a flywheel every year, what a pain! I traded it at 181K because it needed too much other work. The LUK flywheel came out around that time.

 

So I see this is still a hot topic.... Cool

 

Is it in your area? In last couple of months all the stations where I buy diesel, sell gasoline for about 7 cents more and this is how it was in 16 out of last 20 years.