Spy Shots—Best Look Yet at Bronco Mule

From SEMA:

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Caught testing in Dearborn, Michigan, the Bronco mule wears light camo over a cobbled-together Ranger T6 body. Recently, the Bronco has been seen testing with the Jeep Wrangler and Toyota 4Runner, but it has been a task to capture them all in one image since they’ve been leaving the proving grounds at different times.

The Bronco will have body-on-frame construction, and unlike the Ranger, will have a coil-spring solid axle in the front and back. According to sources, the Bronco will have Dana Spicer AdvanTEK axles with a Dana 33 up front and a Dana 44 for the rear. The axles will be assembled at a new facility in Toledo, Ohio, and is located right down the street from the Jeep Wrangler plant. For cost reasons, the F-Series’ aluminum construction will not make its way to the Ranger follow-up or the Bronco.

The Bronco is expected to share the Ranger’s 2.3L turbocharged four, paired to the new Ford/GM 10-speed automatic transmission. A hybrid powertrain is rumored to be part of the lineup as Ford goes all in on hybrid availability throughout its product portfolio.

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They've never said it had a solid front axle. Dont know where this article got that from but probably just another person confusing Dana meaning solid axle

If they want the bronco to compete with jeep and they put anything other than a solid axle in the front, the only jeep they will be competing with is that of the Cherokee and renegade. Both are a laughing stock off the off-road community.
 
I’ve been told it will be strong off road but not the rock crawler of the wrangler...

We shall see. The ranger has mediocre axle articulation with that watts link, and I’d imagine this will be similar.

This will be a mall cruiser that looks looks the part IMO, which is what the masses want.
 
If they want the bronco to compete with jeep and they put anything other than a solid axle in the front, the only jeep they will be competing with is that of the Cherokee and renegade. Both are a laughing stock off the off-road community.
Im well aware, only thing better would be a center mounted 9" IFS KOH style. But that aint happening either.
 
We shall see. The ranger has mediocre axle articulation with that watts link, and I’d imagine this will be similar.

This will be a mall cruiser that looks looks the part IMO, which is what the masses want.
Hopefully not. The ranger sucks ass and Ford has a ton of small mall parking vehicles that are nothing more than stationwagons.

Ford has failed over and over these past 3 years...
 
I don’t remember where I read it but someone said it best when they said that Ford is having an identity crisis. Everything they’re making has so much compromise that their target audience is put off by the final product because it’s so far away from what the target wants by then.
 
You would think people aren’t clamoring all over the internet of what they want and are willing to buy.

A turbo GT500 with forged internals. A Bronco that looks like the teaser photos. I mean they keep raising the price on things and not delivering. They’re going to hit the intersection of demand/price and regret these stupid decisions, if they haven’t gotten there already.
 
You are still very limited with the CVJ angles if you want to lift it.
You'd be able to make it plenty tall with the length of cv shaft a center mount gives you. And if you wanted a rolling skyscraper they'd still make drop bracket for it. Not a lot of people are aware but IFS has overtaken solid axles in pure all out rock abilities in the top buggies, (Ultra4) its just expensive, but a favtory effort could make it cheap, no reason it has to cost more than the rinky dink IFS systems in modern trucks.

Actually a good example is SXS's on the affordable scale
 
You'd be able to make it plenty tall with the length of cv shaft a center mount gives you. And if you wanted a rolling skyscraper they'd still make drop bracket for it. Not a lot of people are aware but IFS has overtaken solid axles in pure all out rock abilities in the top buggies, (Ultra4) its just expensive, but a favtory effort could make it cheap, no reason it has to cost more than the rinky dink IFS systems in modern trucks.

Actually a good example is SXS's on the affordable scale

You won't see that in a factory offering from Ford.
 
I would buy one tomorrow. But they won't make this, they will make a neutered looking ranger with a bed cap. I really hope I'm wrong, but based on the ranger, I'm guessing I'm not.


I'd be willing to bet the test mule is just a chassis test. The official teaser pic from Ford as well as the shadow behind the baby-Bronco still give me hope for a boxy, Jeep Wrangler competitor.
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I'd be willing to bet the test mule is just a chassis test. The official teaser pic from Ford as well as the shadow behind the baby-Bronco still give me hope for a boxy, Jeep Wrangler competitor.View attachment 1570097
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That teaser shot of it under the cover is the only thing keeping me interested, i feel like it will actually look like what we want but shitty suspension and shitty powertrain options.
 

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