Bronco R in action, BAJA 1000

[Jalisurr]

Check out some towing videos. People manage to get cars in some pretty ridiculous places.

Ha, I mean, granted yes. With effort, some willful body damage, and a healthy sprinkle of stupidity, you can get pretty much any car to end up pretty much anywhere. Getting it out again on the other hand...

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[JimmyDean]

So, I watched some videos of the Baja..I don't see what the big deal is. We deal with worse roads here daily in Louisiana, doing 80+. And we have to deal with avoiding all of the lawsuit hungry hazards everywhere.

(Thats a joke, for anyone who doesn't get it, but not by much.)

 

[Stampede.Offroad]

... Camry could take on MOAB with ease with about the same amount of modification

Yeah, there are some trails that soft-roader vehicles like the Jeep Trailhawk series routinely get driven on in promotional events. Plenty of people conflate the entirety of "Moab" with the idea of difficult to traverse boulder strewn obstacles, and Jeep exploits that to their advantage in advertising.

That's exactly what Ford was hoping to do here with the Baja 1000 and the Bronco R. Except they broke down so many times they couldn't finish the race.

 

[frinesi2]

I think we've seen enough Top Gear road trips to know that with willpower, time, major funding, a convoy of support vehicles, and copious use of the phrase "oh cock", ANY vehicle can go ANYwhere.

 

[BONESTOCK]

I get the fact you like the rumble.. the rev... the sound of power. Lots of people do... including myself.

But I still say it wasn't breaking a sweat... nothing wrong with that in my book.

Yeah. I'm sure the drive train was not struggling. Doesn't take much with modern tech...but neither would a nice 5.0L! haha!

 

[Stampede.Offroad]

... with willpower, time, major funding, a convoy of support vehicles, and copious use of the phrase "oh cock", ANY vehicle can go ANYwhere.
...

Even the top "Rubicon" trim Barbi Jeep Limousine is no different. With a team of people stacking rocks and pushing it can get through its namesake trail.

Automotive Sadism - Gladiators Run the Rubicon

This kind of event is meant by the advertising team to exploit peoples misunderstanding of what the challenge is to sell an image of universal capability. The Baja 1000 track isn't objectively that difficult to traverse, its the pace and time limit creating the challenge -- the same can be said of most desert racing, and racing in general.

A few types exist in which the primary obstacle is the course itself, and competitor times only apply as a secondary delineation of success. Formula Offroad, W.E. ROCK, Rock Racing, King of the Hammers. Although they usually also have a significant time element, they are far more objectively challenging courses than Baja racing -- you won't see any stock sedan competitor classes there. A Bronco "T" prototype could show us what kind of objective challenges the vehicle is capable of overcoming at KOH.

I'm still waiting for someone to claim that it's OK the Bronco R broke a bunch of front end parts because the production vehicle will surely have more robust parts than Fords race vehicle.

 

[level3looper]

Another clip at 1:40min

 

[Nickp]

I'm still waiting for someone to claim that it's OK the Bronco R broke a bunch of front end parts because the production vehicle will surely have more robust parts than Fords race vehicle.

I mean I’d bet that the ranger raptor could do the Baja and we know the Bronco’s suspension is better than the Ranger Raptor’s according to teocali.

 

[OX1]

Will be interesting to me to see if the new bronc will be able to drop in new axles (suspension, whatever) for 10 grand (like you can on a heep) and then hammer home and run this stuff. Not really rock crawling, more like grease crawling @ "mudding" wheel speeds, many days. Short vid of KOH race qualifier in 09 I was at. Absolute nightmare, but a normal day on the east coast.



http://bowermedia.com/2010/06/rick-mooneyham-finishes-at-rausch-creek/

 

[BroncoMike]

I'm still waiting for someone to claim that it's OK the Bronco R broke a bunch of front end parts because the production vehicle will surely have more robust parts than Fords race vehicle.

It will probably have to be "improved" now, if more for PR reasons than an actual enhancement in engineering/metallurgy performance. "Found On Baja Dead" could be the next fun term to get hung around Ford's neck if there isn't some public response to their failures.

 

[Stampede.Offroad]

I mean I’d bet that the ranger raptor could do the Baja and we know the Bronco’s suspension is better than the Ranger Raptor’s according to teocali.

As I recall, that was an "in passing" or "once upon a time" for some target specifications, not a final results objective validation. So we don't know that either the Ranger or Bronco is "better", only that they would have liked it to be.

"My guess is more than 10" based on the relative length of the A-arms, and its not less than 10 unless something changed from what I heard a year or so ago..."​

 

[Uncle Gump]

Another clip at 1:40min

That was less exciting then I hoped for.

Sure looked as though they were driving it to finish... then driving it to win.

Wish they would have showed it pull the hill...

 

[Stampede.Offroad]

That was less exciting then I hoped for.

Sure looked as though they were driving it to finish... then driving it to win.

Wish they would have showed it pull the hill...

That was the impression I got from it too. Many of the others took the corner and the crossing more aggressively. Since the SCG was ahead of them at this point, they had already broken down and lost a 30+ miles lead by the time this video was taken though.

 

[aplm7]

With an “unlimited” budget for Bronco that the guy in charge of Bronco supposedly has, why didn’t they knock this outta the park? Would have been a nice publicity stunt before release in 6 months... now they have to race again next November, after the initial release which makes less sense.

 

[Jalisurr]

With an “unlimited” budget for Bronco that the guy in charge of Bronco supposedly has, why didn’t they knock this outta the park? Would have been a nice publicity stunt before release in 6 months... now they have to race again next November, after the initial release which makes less sense.

I want it to be clear, I'm very disappointed that the R didn't finish, but there are a couple of data points to temper the disappointment.

- The Bronco R was reportedly developed in just six months, from sketch to reveal. That's not a lot of time for testing and redesigning things.
- Desert racing on a long course is difficult and invites many opportunities for things to go wrong - of the 204 competitors entered this year, only 132 finished the race, with the DNFs including many full trophy trucks. Nobody is saying that they aren't capable of completing it, just that they didn't do it this time.
- Let's not forget the first thing that went wrong was them getting hit by a trophy truck.

Now, it comes down to their showing in the next outing. They have a year to make improvements and give it another go, and they need to make it count. Otherwise this is the Nissan Deltawing all over again, cool concept but they kept getting punted off the track by other cars during races...

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