After two-and-a-half years in the oven, we have our first partial picture (farther down in this post) of the next Ford Explorer, along with chief engineer Jim Holland's assurance that the new unibody crossover will be just as capable as the body-on-frame rig it's replacing.
Of most interest initially is the picture itself (at left), a portrait of Holland leaning on the front fender of the new Explorer. We can't see much, but there's enough here to start to get an idea what the Explorer will look like. First, we can see a very flat hood with a slight bulge over the engine, altogether reminiscent of the original Explorer and the current Land Rover Range Rover, which Holland was also chief engineer on.
Below the hood, though, things get more interesting. The puffed-out grille is instantly recognizable as a current Ford trademark piece and conjures up images of its two closest crossover siblings, the Flex and Edge. That's an important point since some dealers who were shown the vehicle at a product meeting reported that it resembled an upsized Edge, and we can already see where they got that impression. To the side, we note the all-new headlight assemblies that appear to feature parking lights large enough to double as runway markers with the headlights themselves moved down below.
"When you see it, you know it's a Ford, you will know it is an SUV, and you will know it's a very modern interpretation of our Explorer," Holland told the
Detroit Free Press.
Though detractors have decried the switch from the old-school truck-based body-on-frame design to a newfangled unibody platform lifted from the new Ford Taurus, Holland isn't worried. After all, he guided the Range Rover through the exact same transition and most would agree it turned out pretty well.
Thanks to:
Motor Trend
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