It weighs well over three and half tons, if it were a building it would be over two stories in length, and it is six-and-a-half feet wide as well as tall. Yes, the 2020 Ford F-350 (one-ton truck) Crew Cab 4x4 is a beast. Unless you are over six foot five inches tall, entrance and egress consists of snagging the grab handle and hoisting yourself in, then wishing you had a parachute to jump out.
I was excited to see what the Tremor package was all about for 2020 and I’ve been wanting to test the new 7.3-litre gas V8 engine for a while now. Many of you have looked for a rig to pull loads but did not want to spring for the cost of the Powerstroke diesel.
Here is where I think this truck has a real application: You can work out of the truck during the week, and then have an extremely capable off-roader for camping or getting away on the weekends. I can’t imagine anything could stop this behemoth.
It looks impressive with sharp 18” black matte-finished wheels wrapped in meaty 35-inch-diameter Goodyear Wrangler Duratrac tires. A factory 2” lift in the front makes the truck sit level and increases ground clearance.
I must say the 7.3-liter was impressive with 430-horses and 475-pound feet of torque. It is mated to a 10-speed automatic transmission that shifts extremely smoothly and unless you look at the gauge cluster, you’ll never know what gear you are in.
The 2020 Tremor features selectable drive modes, which allow you to choose the setting best suited to driving conditions. These include normal for around-town use, tow/haul for optimized performance under load, eco for enhanced fuel economy, slippery for icy conditions, and deep snow/sand for low-traction conditions. Unique to Tremor is a new rock-crawl mode, which is optimized to operate in 4x4 low.
The Tremor I tested was based on the Lariat Sport package so it comes with virtually everything. My tester had the dual-pane moonroof, power heated and cooled leather seats, remote start, navigation system, and much more.
I anticipated this truck being cumbersome to drive in town. Much to my surprise, it was easy to park, and the turning radius was short. The ride quality was also much better than I thought it would be for a one-ton truck that will tow 20,700 pounds. It has the Ford trailer backup system and the fantastic trailer towing mirrors that fold in and extend out with the push of a button.
The EPA does not rate fuel economy on trucks larger than a half-ton, but in several hundred miles of intown and highway driving, I averaged 9.2 miles per gallon.
This is a lot of truck, but what a great balance of work application and a daily driver. I did not get a Monroney sticker with this unit, but I built it online and MSRP came in around $84,000.
