Ford is inching towards the on-sale date for the eagerly anticipated, aluminum F-150 pickup. While we're preparing to drive the new truck (expect our take on it sooner rather than later), the best-seller has reached another, albeit more minor, milestone as its online configurator has officially been switched on.We took to Ford's consumer website to mess about with it and see just how ridiculous of a truck we can build. Among the fun things we discovered were these two nuggets – the most expensive truck we could configure was not the top-end Platinum model, but instead the King Ranch, which rang up at $65,955. The other exciting discovery? The new truck would be available in a questionable shade called Blue Jeans (shown above with the optional contrasting Caribou paint). Yep, Blue Jeans.
Source: autoblog.com
Ford operates a number of performance divisions around the world. There's SVT in the US, Team RS in Europe and Ford Performance Vehicles (FPV) in Australia. But the Blue Oval has been steadily integrating its performance operations into one unit, and here we might have our first indication of what it will be called.A reader at Jalopnik sent in a survey in which respondents were asked to gauge the name for a new performance brand from a "major automotive manufacturer," and while the identity of that automaker was not disclosed, according to the survey, the automaker is considering the name 999 for its new go-fast unit.As our compatriots point out, the 999 was Ford's first racecar, a rudimentary chassis with a 19-liter inline-four campaigned by Henry Ford around the turn of the 20th century. (Ford also used the number to designate aFusion fuel-cell racer a few years back.) That could prove the tie-in Dearborn is looking for in rebranding its performance operations worldwide, replacing the letters SVT, RS and FPV globally under one name.Of course that doesn't mean that models like the upcoming Shelby GT350, F-150 Raptor, Focus ST or FPV Falcon will necessarily be rebadged 999 as part of their nameplate, but if the customer clinics prove positive, the number 999 could come to stand for Blue Oval performance wherever Fords are sold.
Source: autoblog.com
