2023 Ford Ranger Raptor review: Prototype drive

“Righto, mate, lift your elbows… NOW!” So comes the shouted command from the driver’s seat as the new 2023 Ford Ranger Raptor rushes at the base of the jump. There’s a jolt, a momentary pause as the suspension compresses and then… silence.

We fly through the air at 130km/h, like a house brick jettisoned into low orbit, the Raptor soaring flat and true before the ground rushes up. I wince and lift my arms clear of the bucket seat – we’re in an early Raptor prototype fitted with a roll-cage and race seats so smashing funny bones is a real risk – but then… nothing.

The Raptor lands with the grace and poise of a jungle cat.

“Nice, huh?” shouts my driver with what I assume is a grin behind his helmet. “It’s like a rally car!”

He emphasises the last point by hurling Ford’s all-new performance ute at another jump. I nod and lift my elbows.

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Welcome to Loveday 4X4 Park, a sprawling off-road adventure destination in outback South Australia where Ford is giving the new Raptor its final engineering sign-off. By the time you read this, the new Raptor will be on sale, for the princely sum of $85,490 before on-road costs (we’ll get to why this is actually a positive thing later) but right now Ford’s Australian engineering team is busy making some last-minute tweaks before it enters full-scale production. And today, we’re tagging along for the ride.

Time is tight: we only have a few hours of seat time, but the day is full of promise. Loveday’s facility includes a deep sand section, a gnarly-looking off-road course and, finally, a high-speed rally circuit where we can assess the Raptor’s ‘on-limit handling’.

Ford also has two elbow-bashing development vehicles fitted with roll cages and racing harnesses for passenger laps around a ‘Finke-style’ track that includes, you guessed it, jumps.

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Before we get airborne, though, let’s talk first impressions because they’re illuminating.

Clock the new Raptor in the car park alongside its predecessor and the family resemblance is obvious. But the new ute is burlier, more foursquare and more aggressive.

Width is the same as the old ute (Ford couldn’t go any wider because it wouldn’t fit down the production line in Thailand) and because the glasshouse now extends to the edge of the shoulder line instead of tapering in aggressively, the 2022 Raptor looks blockier and more substantial.

It’s a nice progression of the original’s chunky aesthetic but if the exterior is an evolution of the same recipe, the cabin feels entirely new. And significantly more premium.

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The vehicles we’re driving aren’t the final product. They bear a codename roughly translating to Ford engineering speak for ‘almost complete’ so the fit and finish of the cabin is rough and some of the materials aren’t quite right.

But even with ill-fitting parts and a coating of fine red dust collected from Loveday’s tracks, the ambience is noticeably more upmarket. Huge, high-resolution screens dominate on the centre console and digital instrument cluster, measuring 12.0 and 12.4 inches respectively, but the fundamentals have been improved too.

The steering wheel seems to fit more snugly in your hands and it now adjusts for reach as well as rake (finally!), which does wonders for the driving position. And the seat itself, which is electrically adjustable and has been redesigned with heavy side bolsters and flashes of ‘code orange’ material, feels a micron lower.

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Press the starter and the new twin-turbo V6 petrol fires with a flare of revs but, weirdly, the engine isn’t the first thing you notice about the new Raptor’s driving experience. You do register that the soundtrack is different – the diesel clatter is gone, replaced by a smoother backing track that sounds distinctly like an Alfa Romeo – but start to move and the thing that grabs your attention most is the steering.

The old Raptor’s tiller was good, but not great. It was a little too light and had a vague spot on either side of the straight ahead. This new model offers a much firmer initial handshake. It’s immediate off-centre and carries a more natural heft, which delivers an almost subconscious sense of confidence and connection.

You get the same feeling through the brake pedal. The braking hardware hasn’t changed from the old Raptor – it’s still disc brakes all round and rotor diameter remains at 332mm front and rear – but upgrading to an electric brake booster has transformed how the pedal feels.

Press the starter and the new twin-turbo V6 petrol fires with a flare of revs but, weirdly, the engine isn’t the first thing you notice about the new Raptor’s driving experience.

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The old car’s vacuum-operated system had a dead zone, or ‘sneeze factor’, at the top of the pedal travel and the consistency of the pedal would change a little as the system warmed up. The new Raptor’s brake pedal is instantly firmer and more responsive.

In fact, it takes about 15 metres to realise this new ute is an entirely different animal. The whole vehicle is more alert and considerably more focused. Hit a bump, even at low speed as we transit to the deep sand section at Loveday, and there’s a surprising tautness to the suspension.

The old ute’s expensive feeling, semi-race suspension was incredibly capable and delivered a supple ride but the trade-off was body control that could be a little lax.

This new Raptor feels considerably more tied down thanks largely to new high-tech dampers from US supplier Fox. The dampers feature Fox’s ‘live valve’ technology and are adaptive for compression, which has given Ford’s engineers a much larger window to tune the ride and handling.

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The new Raptor's dampers feature Fox’s ‘live valve’ technology and are adaptive for compression, giving Ford’s engineers a much larger window to tune the ride and handling.

The differences are considerable. Where the old Raptor could float and take a beat to settle, the new ute returns to centre with real authority. And the way it deals with bigger bumps is seriously impressive. There’s no second stroke to recover; just unwavering control.

I wonder briefly how this newfound tautness will impact the ride comfort on normal sections of tarmac during day-to-day driving but at first blush, the new chassis set-up is a winner.

Right, time to open the taps.

With an extended section of deep sand ahead we twist the drive mode selector into ‘sand mode’ and flatten the throttle. Unleashing the new 3.0-litre twin-turbo for the first time is an event. The Raptor leaps onto the soft surface, its rear tyres flinging plumes of red sand into the ether behind us.

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Power has almost doubled compared with the original Raptor to 292kW and the extra performance is instantly obvious.

Ford claims the 0-100km/h time has almost halved and while you don’t get the same rush of low-down torque as before (peak twist is now at 3500rpm compared with 2000rpm in the diesel donk), get the big 3.0-litre petrol into its mid-range and it feels seriously potent.

It delivers, in one throttle application, the type of performance and engagement the Raptor always deserved.

Sounds good, too, which is a relief. V6s can sound hollow and uninspiring but Ford has managed to produce a soundtrack that’s deep, purposeful and builds nicely through the rev range. There’s more than a whiff of Alfa Romeo about it, which Ford confirms is intentional.

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“We actually used the Stelvio Q as our benchmark for the exhaust,” says David Burn, chief program engineer for Ford Performance Asia Pacific.

You can change the volume and timbre of the active exhaust by cycling through the Raptor’s many drive modes (Baja is the loudest, most anti-social and best) but that’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to configurability.

Owners have seven drive modes to play with (four dedicated to off-road driving, three to on-road) and Ford has placed a big focus on using them to broaden the Raptor’s skill set and personality.

High-speed bush bashing might be the Raptor’s headline party trick but it has to be equally capable when it comes to low-speed, technical four-wheel driving. And on that front, initial impressions are positive.

The deep sand section is dispatched with ease (Sand Mode locks the rear differential and adjusts the mapping for the engine and gearbox) but there are trickier obstacles for us to tackle. Loveday is littered with steep inclines, deep pits and offset moguls that give us a chance to explore the Mud/Ruts and Rock Crawl drive modes.

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Throttle and ESC calibration of both modes is excellent and some of the terrain the Raptor clambers over and through is fairly intimidating. Is it a significant improvement over the original Raptor? And does the new ute’s move to a permanent four-wheel-drive system with lockable front and rear diffs deliver a night and day difference?

Not really, at least during this brief first taste. Ford had both generations of the Raptor on hand for a back-to-back comparison and I found them equally capable.

Approach and departure angles are unchanged across the two versions and I actually found the original Raptor’s more gradual brake pedal easier to modulate at the top of its travel while using the ‘brake over throttle’ technique on some of the trickier obstacles.

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There are some tech advantages in the new ute, though. Crest a steep rise or dive into a deep pit and a forward-facing camera pops up on the central screen to give you a high-resolution view of what lies ahead. It’s genuinely useful and doesn’t just save you from craning desperately over the steering wheel to avoid rocks and obstacles, but lets you place the ute with confidence.

Another useful system is ‘Trail Control’, which Ford describes as “like cruise control for off-roading”. It’s a clever piece of tech and a boon for inexperienced off-roaders because once you’ve chosen your desired speed, the system then controls the throttle and brake. All the driver needs to worry about is steering.

We’ll have a more detailed analysis of how the Raptor performs off-road soon – and you can read the expert review from 4X4 Australia here to get their opinion – but for now it’s clear Ford’s new super ute is just as capable off-road, if not more so, than its predecessor.

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If this new Raptor delivers incremental improvements when it comes to overlanding, however, then it’s truly transformational through the quick stuff.

Loveday’s high-speed track is essentially a rally course. Fast, slippery and peppered by jumps, yumps and heavy compressions, it’s a serious challenge for dedicated off-road racers let alone a production dual-cab ute.

Once again Ford has an original Raptor on hand for back-to-back loops and the difference between the pair is eye-opening. The new Raptor isn’t only quicker, by up to 20-30km/h through some sections, but it trounces the first-gen ute for grip, confidence and connection. It’s more fun, too.

Dial in Baja Mode and the Raptor allows a decent amount of yaw angle and wheel slip but it’s when you turn the electronic nannies off that Ford’s Baja beast really comes alive.

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Suddenly it rotates more willingly and isn’t only fun to slew sideways on the brakes as you barrel into corners but it’s seriously addictive at corner exit, too, as you power out the other side in a flurry of dirt, corrective lock and V6 power.

Oh yes, the power. There’s no doubt this new Raptor is considerably more potent and exciting but I’m also pleased to report the new 3.0-litre V6 doesn’t dominate the dynamic experience. The risk with doubling the power is that everything else gets thrown out of balance, like loading your favourite cocktail with twice the vodka, but the chassis is equally up to the task.

Drive this new Raptor at the limit and it feels wonderfully rounded, which is testament to the countless hours of tuning and calibration put in by Ford’s Aussie engineering team.

The risk with doubling the power is that everything else gets thrown out of balance, like loading your favourite cocktail with twice the vodka, but the chassis is equally up to the task.

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The suspension is amazingly capable. More than once I found myself wincing as we hurtled through deep washouts and over rocky potholes only for the Raptor to glide across them with barely a jostle. And because the body is now so tightly controlled, you can attack an off-road course in a way you just simply can’t in the first-gen ute.

The gearbox? The 10-speed auto is a revised and lightened version of the unit used in the first-gen Raptor and perhaps the biggest compliment I can give it is that I barely noticed it until the end of our high-speed lap.

Shifts are smooth, the titanium paddles behind the steering wheel are a delight to use and at full attack, the ’box was never caught between ratios.

So the new Raptor is seriously impressive and not just for its newfound agility and ability, but for the punishment it can withstand. We finish the day with another blat around Ford’s jump-infused ‘Baja course’ and the loads, forces and hits the chassis is able to withstand are genuinely remarkable for a vehicle built on a regular production line.

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You get the sense Ford knows it’s made a good car. You can feel it in the quiet confidence of the engineers, the knowing smiles of the product managers and the assured voice of the driving instructor who tells you, no dares you, to “keep it flat through this next bit, mate” on the high-speed course even though you’re fairly sure you should lift.

It feels like more than a generational step forward, which is why it’s surprising Ford has priced it at $85,490.

Yes, that’s a lot of cash for a dual-cab ute – six grand more than its predecessor – but popularity of the first Raptor, as well as thousands of pre-orders for the new one, shows Aussies are more than willing to pay in excess of eighty large for a Baja-ready Ranger.

And given how far this new Raptor moves the game on for pace, engagement and ability, you could argue it’s something of a bargain.