[+ Videos] My KOH Write-Up: Manual Bronco Badlands, non Sasquatch experience

[SD_Bronco]

UPDATE***Added some videos at end of this post *****

My KOH experience with Broncos. I would like first give my sincere thanks to: Midnight blue and the larger B6G community for the info on where to go and what the sign in process was like, My buddy Shawn who drove us there in his Jeep Rubicon, and my fiancée who puts up with me and gets genuinely excited from my nerdiness over the Bronco.

We woke up at 4:15am, started our journey in a White Jeep Rubicon

to Johnson Valley from the greatest city in the history of mankind; San Diego. Discovered by the Germans in 1904, they named it “Sahn Di-Ah-go” which of course in German means

a whale’s Vagina.

I wish Ford provided more information, rather clear information on where to go and how to sign up for the rides. I’ve never been to KOH so it was all a scramble to get there and find the line. On the flip side maybe that’s why more people weren’t there. We got there at 8:15am and basically tried looking for the Cyber orange Bronco on the raised turning platform.

Then by complete accident walked into gate 2 and I came face to face with the mother load! 4 Broncos lined up next to each other.

Later I realized and my fiancée confirmed, it was at this time I had lost all resemblance of a grown ass man and had turned into a the happiest little boy on Christmas morning:

It was surreal, no one was around and I was alone with 4 stunning examples of a truck that I’ve only seen in pictures ; and pretty confident I’ve seen all the videos that exist thus far. There was a first edition, Manual Badlands with 33” tires, and 2 Auto badlands with the optional 33’s. We ended up talking to the drivers who were super cool and excited to drive the Broncos all day. Then signed up and got our time slots.

Before I give you my impression of the Bronco, a little about me; I have very little experience off-roading. But I am not new to motorsports.

I am an engineer and have been a gear head my whole life. The Bronco has got me excited for off road adventures and also helps that my woman loves camping and backpacking trips.

Bronco impressions:

Engineering: The engineer in me truly appreciates the work and dedication Ford engineers put into this thing. You can tell the difference when something was engineered by a 9-5 guy and something that was engineering by a passionate engineer who poured loved into it. And this has a lot of passion. The rolling chassis gave me a great look at the frame, drive shaft’s, skid plates, suspension links, etc and this thing is BEEFY! I also spoke to the drivers and others there that were involved with the development and even though they’ve been there for 14 days, they were all super excited to talk to me about the Bronco. They met my excitement with excitement and I love it.

Bronco Config: We got a ride in a base badlands, manual transmission, 2.3L 4 Cyl, 33 in tires, Tire pressure ~30 PSI all around.

• Engine: We started out slow cause of traffic, and then once we were in the clear, the driver gunned it. The 2.3L was Freakin impressive! I now believe that the 4Cyl is more than enough for any capability and will not leave you lacking. You will be able to over take people on the highway easily. I did not leave wanting for more power. So anyone getting the 4Cyl, it’s a good choice. Oh and not to mention, we had 4 adult passengers in it.
• Manual Transmission: This thing is smooth. Not like my buddy’s manual Tacoma where there are long throws, and its jerky, makes noise and goes slow. Bronco was smooooth, short throws, it was closer to a sports car in the way it behaved and felt while riding. We also had a baja champion driving us so that definitely has to do with the smoothness but the truck deserves credit here too. The crawler gear LMFAO, that thing is insane. You let out the clutch and it rolls at 1mph, max of 5 or 6. So you aint going anywhere fast but holy hell you have all that torque to climb Jupiter as far as I’m concerned, Somebody call NASA!
• GOAT Modes: The goat modes are not a gimmick. They seemed to have gathered a lot of nerds and analyzed a ton of tps reports cause the goat modes work, they work really well. We were in deep sand, about to climb a sandy hill. There were people all around us in jeeps, Tacoma’s, and purpose built desert runners with 40”+ tires doing a running start to the hill. We came to, the driver stopped, let the others go, put it in first, and punched it. He was beating that sand hill into submission. I couldn’t believe how fast we were going up. And as we were going up, to my right there was a old classic Bronco that was stuck in the sand and they were trying to get it out. It had giant tires on it probably 45/50”. And then there was this Bronco with 4 passengers just humming along. When we got to the top, people stopped by to talk to us and told us how awesome it looked as the Bronco was climbing the hill and that they barely made it with their super lifted trucks.
• The goat modes remind me of what Nissan GTR did for track days when it was first introduced. It made novice racers look like Pros. I feel like the Bronco will make novice off roaders feel like Pros.
• Suspension: Since this was a badlands, it had the HOSS suspension with Bilstein shocks. I cannot articulate this enough to do the experience justice, we were going 60 off road and it was smooth. Like I didn’t need “oh shit” handles smooth. The suspension for me really makes this thing so much better than the other options. I know this because we did a similar terrain with my buddies Rubicon and we were thrown around going 30. Having ridden to this even in a Jeep for several hours really put things in perspective for me, and sadly made my friend who just purchased the Jeep a little jelly.
• MGV Seats and Passenger comfort: The seats are very comfortable. MGV isn’t like anything I can compare to in automotive terms. You really just need to feel it in person. Its not like leather, not like cloth, kinda like soft durable swimming short material. The rear passengers were comfortable, and had plenty of space. Which bring me to another thing, this thing is a lot more roomy than a Jeep. The seats front and rear were comfortable and I feel like I’m not gonna have any issues going long distances.
• Trunk: Yea, its big. Lots of space, sorry I forgot my tape measure at home and realized it when I got to KOH.
• Favorite Feature: There are many, but the two that really impressed me was the suspension and sway bar disconnect. We got a demo with the truck’s right rear wheel in the air and you press a button and bam! All is right with the world. Later that day we drove my buddies Jeep on a off road trail with the sway bar connected and then disconnected. I highly recommend the sway bar disconnect for people that will be off-roading this thing. Not only is it more capable, but I found that it was also more comfortable and didn’t make the cabin move a whole lot
• Vehicle dimensions: It is bigger than you’d think. In person I was pleasantly surprised by the presence it had. I think someone in the forum mentioned that the 2 door has perfect proportions and the 4 door looks stretched, and I would agree. But I think it is a compromise I am very happy to take. As a daily driver there’s a lot more room, and it’s super capable so I feel that this was a good balance here. And it’s not crazy stretched but you can tell.
• Tire size: At the end I spoke to the driver since we are getting the sasquatch package and he mentioned that compared to the 33’s the 35’s will be smoother off road and better over rocks. It will eat up the bumps and that makes sense since there’s more tire and wider patch.
• Build Quality: It was good, better than I expected. There was a lot of plastic but that was expected, it needs to be rugged. Fit and finish on this model looked good, nothing I could really complain about. Made me think of the fine folks in Michigan building these babies! Thank you for building it with pride and so awesome that it’s built in the USA! So thank you Stig, Ashley(618TRVLWILD), and all others.
• Overall: I put in an order in with Albert at Granger on Wednesday. I have never before ordered a vehicle sight unseen. Not only that but there were no automotive journalist reviews or anything. Having experienced this ride, I am beyond happy to spend 60K on this thing and can’t wait for it. GET EXCITED PEOPLE THIS THING IS GOOOOOOOD

Drove the Bronco Sport: This little thing was a lot of fun. It was way more capable than I thought it would be. I think it rightly deserves to be called the baby Bronco. Handled Sand really well, dirt road and rocks well, really capable little guy!

Some more pictures from our trip!

Some Videos:

Sponsored

 

[Natai]

Awesome write-up. Thanks for sharing.

 

[Rubisquatch]

Great write up, thanks for taking the time and sharing.

 

[Swatman]

My KOH experience with Bronco’s. I would like first give my sincere thanks to: Midnight blue and the larger B6G community for the info on where to go and what the sign in process was like, My buddy Shawn who drove us there in his Jeep Rubicon, and my fiancée who puts up with me and gets genuinely excited from my nerdiness over the Bronco.

We woke up at 4:15am, started our journey in a White Jeep Rubicon

to Johnson Valley from the greatest city in the history of mankind; San Diego. Discovered by the Germans in 1904, they named it “Sahn Di-Ah-go” which of course in German means a whale’s Vagina.

I wish Ford provided more information, rather clear information on where to go and how to sign up for the rides. I’ve never been to KOH so it was all a scramble to get there and find the line. On the flip side maybe that’s why more people weren’t there. We got there at 8:15am and basically tried looking for the Cyber orange Bronco on the raised turning platform.

Then by complete accident walked into gate 2 and I came face to face with the mother load! 4 Broncos lined up next to each other.

Later I realized and my fiancée confirmed, it was at this time I had lost all resemblance of a grown ass man and had turned into a the happiest little boy on Christmas morning:

It was surreal, no one was around and I was alone with 4 stunning examples of a truck that I’ve only seen in pictures ; and pretty confident I’ve seen all the videos that exist thus far. There was a first edition, Manual Badlands with 33” tires, and 2 Auto badlands with the optional 33’s. We ended up talking to the drivers who were super cool and excited to drive the Broncos all day. Then signed up and got our time slots.

Before I give you my impression of the Bronco, a little about me; I have very little experience off-roading. But I am not new to motorsports.

I am an engineer and have been a gear head my whole life. The Bronco has got me excited for off road adventures and also helps that my woman loves camping and backpacking trips.

Bronco impressions:

Engineering: The engineer in me truly appreciates the work and dedication Ford engineers put into this thing. You can tell the difference when something was engineered by a 9-5 guy and something that was engineering by a passionate engineer who poured loved into it. And this has a lot of passion. The rolling chassis gave me a great look at the frame, drive shaft’s, skid plates, suspension links, etc and this thing is BEEFY! I also spoke to the drivers and others there that were involved with the development and even though they’ve been there for 14 days, they were all super excited to talk to me about the Bronco. They met my excitement with excitement and I love it.

Bronco Config: We got a ride in a base badlands, manual transmission, 2.3L 4 Cyl, 33 in tires, Tire pressure ~30 PSI all around.

• Engine: We started out slow cause of traffic, and then once we were in the clear, the driver gunned it. The 2.3L was Freakin impressive! I now believe that the 4Cyl is more than enough for any capability and will not leave you lacking. You will be able to over take people on the highway easily. I did not leave wanting for more power. So anyone getting the 4Cyl, it’s a good choice. Oh and not to mention, we had 4 adult passengers in it.
• Manual Transmission: This thing is smooth. Not like my buddy’s manual Tacoma where there are long throws, and its jerky, makes noise and goes slow. Bronco was smooooth, short throws, it was closer to a sports car in the way it behaved and felt while riding. We also had a baja champion driving us so that definitely has to do with the smoothness but the truck deserves credit here too. The crawler gear LMFAO, that thing is insane. You let out the clutch and it rolls at 1mph, max of 5 or 6. So you aint going anywhere fast but holy hell you have all that torque to climb Jupiter as far as I’m concerned, Somebody call NASA!
• GOAT Modes: The goat modes are not a gimmick. They seemed to have gathered a lot of nerds and analyzed a ton of tps reports cause the goat modes work, they work really well. We were in deep sand, about to climb a sandy hill. There were people all around us in jeeps, Tacoma’s, and purpose built desert runners with 40”+ tires doing a running start to the hill. We came to, the driver stopped, let the others go, put it in first, and punched it. He was beating that sand hill into submission. I couldn’t believe how fast we were going up. And as we were going up, to my right there was a old classic Bronco that was stuck in the sand and they were trying to get it out. It had giant tires on it probably 45/50”. And then there was this Bronco with 4 passengers just humming along. When we got to the top, people stopped by to talk to us and told us how awesome it looked as the Bronco was climbing the hill and that they barely made it with their super lifted trucks.
• The goat modes remind me of what Nissan GTR did for track days when it was first introduced. It made novice racers look like Pros. I feel like the Bronco will make novice off roaders feel like Pros.
• Suspension: Since this was a badlands, it had the HOSS suspension with Bilstein shocks. I cannot articulate this enough to do the experience justice, we were going 60 off road and it was smooth. Like I didn’t need “oh shit” handles smooth. The suspension for me really makes this thing so much better than the other options. I know this because we did a similar terrain with my buddies Rubicon and we were thrown around going 30. Having ridden to this even in a Jeep for several hours really put things in perspective for me, and sadly made my friend who just purchased the Jeep extremely jealous.
• MGV Seats and Passenger comfort: The seats are very comfortable. MGV isn’t like anything I can compare to in automotive terms. You really just need to feel it in person. Its not like leather, not like cloth, kinda like soft durable swimming short material. The rear passengers were comfortable, and had plenty of space. Which bring me to another thing, this thing is a lot more roomy than a Jeep. The seats front and rear were comfortable and I feel like I’m not gonna have any issues going long distances.
• Trunk: Yea, its big. Lots of space, sorry I forgot my tape measure at home and realized it when I got to KOH.
• Favorite Feature: There are many, but the two that really impressed me was the suspension and sway bar disconnect. We got a demo with the truck’s right rear wheel in the air and you press a button and bam! All is right with the world. Later that day we drove my buddies Jeep on a off road trail with the sway bar connected and then disconnected. I highly recommend the sway bar disconnect for people that will be off-roading this thing. Not only is it more capable, but I found that it was also more comfortable and didn’t make the cabin move a whole lot
• Vehicle dimensions: It is bigger than you’d think. In person I was pleasantly surprised by the presence it had. I think someone in the forum mentioned that the 2 door has perfect proportions and the 4 door looks stretched, and I would agree. But I think it is a compromise I am very happy to take. As a daily driver there’s a lot more room, and it’s super capable so I feel that this was a good balance here. And it’s not crazy stretched but you can tell.
• Tire size: At the end I spoke to the driver since we are getting the sasquatch package and he mentioned that compared to the 33’s the 35’s will be smoother off road and better over rocks. It will eat up the bumps and that makes sense since there’s more tire and wider patch.
• Build Quality: It was good, better than I expected. There was a lot of plastic but that was expected, it needs to be rugged. Fit and finish on this model looked good, nothing I could really complain about. Made me think of the fine folks in Michigan building these babies! Thank you for building it with pride and so awesome that it’s built in the USA! So thank you Stig, Ashley(618TRVLWILD), and all others.
• Overall: I put in an order in with Albert at Granger on Wednesday. I have never before ordered a vehicle sight unseen. Not only that but there were no automotive journalist reviews or anything. Having experienced this ride, I am beyond happy to spend 60K on this thing and can’t wait for it. GET EXCITED PEOPLE THIS THING IS GOOOOOOOD

Drove the Bronco Sport: This little thing was a lot of fun. It was way more capable than I thought it would be. I think it rightly deserves to be called the baby Bronco. Handled Sand really well, dirt road and rocks well, really capable little guy!

Some more pictures from our trip!

Lots of great information. Thanks for taking the time to write this up.

 

[Greens05]

Another great write up. Thanks for posting. Now I feel like I need to plan a trip out west for some high speed off roading. Where I am on the East coast we have mostly rock crawling which is fun but not sure I will fully be able to appreciate BAJA mode anytime soon.

 

[Lakelife36]

Bronco Config: We got a ride in a base badlands, manual transmission, 2.3L 4 Cyl, 33 in tires, Tire pressure ~30 PSI all around.

[*]Manual Transmission: This thing is smooth. Not like my buddy’s manual Tacoma where there are long throws, and its jerky, makes noise and goes slow. Bronco was smooooth, short throws, it was closer to a sports car in the way it behaved and felt while riding. We also had a baja champion driving us so that definitely has to do with the smoothness but the truck deserves credit here too. The crawler gear LMFAO, that thing is insane. You let out the clutch and it rolls at 1mph, max of 5 or 6. So you aint going anywhere fast but holy hell you have all that torque to climb Jupiter as far as I’m concerned, Somebody call NASA!

This whole experience sounds amazing! Congratulations on the trip and fantastic choice in partners too...

I think this was the best writeup of the manual I've seen so far. Great to hear it shifts more like a sports car than an old truck. Did you happen to see your driver upshift out of C into 1st? Did he talk specifically about going into or out of C at all? I'll cross-post your answer on the Manual Transmission Master Thread if that's okay with you.

 

[SD_Bronco]

Another great write up. Thanks for posting. Now I feel like I need to plan a trip out west for some high speed off-roading. Where I am on the East coast we have mostly rock crawling which is fun but not sure I will fully be able to appreciate BAJA mode anytime soon.

I grew up on the east coast, near NYC so I get where you're coming from. The Desert out here in Cali is amazing for high speed off-roading. Come on down!

 

[PSUTE]

Awesome write-up. Thanks for sharing.

Ditto...

 

[SD_Bronco]

This whole experience sounds amazing! Congratulations on the trip and fantastic choice in partners too...

I think this was the best writeup of the manual I've seen so far. Great to hear it shifts more like a sports car than an old truck. Did you happen to see your driver upshift out of C into 1st? Did he talk specifically about going into or out of C at all? I'll cross-post your answer on the Manual Transmission Master Thread if that's okay with you.

Thank you! I am so grateful to have had this experience and I know what its like to be in the situation where you're hungry for more info, that was me the past 7 months haha. Please feel free to share in the other areas, I wrote this to share

I did not see the driver shift into it, but we did talk about it for some time at the end. He explained how awesome it was and his experience using it. We just didn't get the chance to experience it, I am sure if I had asked earlier we would have tried it, unfortunately I was so excited about everything and by the time I asked about crawler, there wasn't an area where he could demo it.

 

[AKBronc49]

These reviews just get me so much more hyped!

 

[SD_Bronco]

These reviews just get me so much more hyped!

Having experienced the base level BADLANDS Bronco, I am beyond excited for my 2.7 sasquach Badlands.

I also struck up a conversation with the Bilstein folks later in the day and they explained how they developed the shocks for the bronco. There is a Bilstein R&D office next to my old office and they told me they were working on the designs of this shock in secret 4 years ago. THEY WERE DEVELOPED IN THE BUILDING NEXT TO MY OFFICE!! if i only knew haha small world

 

[dcg2]

Another great write up. Thanks for posting. Now I feel like I need to plan a trip out west for some high speed off roading. Where I am on the East coast we have mostly rock crawling which is fun but not sure I will fully be able to appreciate BAJA mode anytime soon.

I'm in PA, we just need to dodge the trees!

I'm thinking this might be A LOT of fun in a Bronco... https://stpr.org/

 

[chownd]

Thanks for all the time writing this up!

 

[ScrunchFace]

Appreciate you sharing your experience

 

[Dubsilk]

As someone who ordered 7MT BL, I have been been looking for this. Thank you very much. Very helpful.

Sponsored