Ford revived the street truck with the sporty Maverick Lobo, a little pickup with running gear from the old Focus ST and RS. Now, it seems to be giving the Lobo treatment to the mighty F-150. Our spy photographer captured the new F-150 Lobo in its full, undisguised glory.
From the photos, we can see that the F-150 Lobo gets a unique front fascia with a lower air dam, side skirts, and black 22-inch wheels on street-oriented Bridgestone Alenza all-season tires. There's also an "F-150 Lobo" badge in the little trim piece on the front fenders.
Ford Authority reported in 2023 that Ford filed a trademark for the "F-150 Lobo" name, which was before even the Maverick Lobo was confirmed. But other than some photos of camouflaged F-150 Lobos running around, the rumormill on this sport truck has been fairly quiet. So, we don't know what to expect exactly.
Obviously, Ford has a couple of hot-rod engines to chose from—most obvious are the F-150 Raptor's 450-horsepower twin-turbo V-6. There's also the Raptor R's 720-hp supercharged V-8. But, we don't know how extensive Ford's planned changes for the F-150 Lobo are. The Raptor comes from Ford Performance, and it's a comprehensive work of the standard truck, with the explicit aim of increasing dune-bashing capability. We don't know if Ford will go so far with the F-150 Lobo.
Ford has some history with sporty, street-oriented F-150s. The SVT Lightning of 1993-1995 and 1999-2004 both got power and handling upgrades, along with sporty exterior trim. The second Lightning was even supercharged. Ford obviously revived the "Lightning" name for its electric F-150, hence why it's using Lobo here. But spiritually, this will very much be a successor to the old SVT Lightning models.
Also of note, Ford's F-150 Lobo prototypes are all double cabs, with four full-size doors. The SVT Lightning was always a single-cab, and while Ford still offers a single-cab F-150, two-door full-size pickups are far less popular than they used to be.
Given that the F-150 Lobo looks production ready, we'll hopefully see it soon in a more official capacity. As SVT Lightning fans, we can't wait to learn what Ford has in store.
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