Does the Ford Ranger Raptor live up to the hype?

While this best-seller is a firm favourite for thousands of fans, it couldn’t unite our critics during a summer break.

It wasn’t exactly a celebratory– you bought a Raptor?! – moment when I arrived home with a pizza and Ford Ranger recently.

Well it was for me – but there was anything but a smile on my wife’s face.

Pizza does that sometimes, I thought.

I’d heard all the hype around the Ford Ranger, Australia’s biggest selling car of 2024 and wanted to see what all the fuss was about.

I’ve long been a fan of performance cars and probably sit right in the bullseye of the Raptor’s target market. So what could go wrong?

Is the hype surrounding Australia’s favourite car real?

When I told my wife I hadn’t actually bought the truck, it was a loaner for an in-depth experience on Australia’s most popular car, it ushered in a bright new dawn for our relationship.

“I love you even more because you didn’t buy that car,” she said before bypassing the pizza and cooking herself up some rice and greens.

Rice and greens pretty much summed up the uninteresting, see it everywhere, look like every other SUV, SUV we had to drive before the glorious Ford Ranger Raptor entered our lives and changed them forever.

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‘We’ve got a Raptor!’

“Dad, this is a ****ing car”, my youngest declared a few days into us owning the SUV after our beloved V8 Commodore Stationwagon had met a tragic end.

I didn’t have the motivation to even threaten to wash his mouth out with soap because I agreed with him, 100 per cent.

But now the worm, had turned again. We were … with Raptor.

LOVE AT FIRST RIDE

It was love at first ride for the kids, the kids’ friends, the dog, relatives, the neighbours, blokes I went to school with but hadn’t seen in years, strangers at the supermarket, girls in bikinis, delivery drivers – everyone.

Except. My. Wife.

Her contorted frown let everyone know, even those who didn’t want to like me, what she thought of the truck. But she had yet to expand on her dislike of the Zeitgeist 4x4 ute in Crunch Orange.

“I love it, I want one!” the next door neighbour and one of my wife’s best friends surreptitiously declared (it was love at first sight) when my better half was out of ear shot.

“But sheeee doesn’t like it,” I replied.

Dogs love Raptors. Fact.

The neighbour spun on her heels, looked back and shrugged her shoulders. It was either a buy it anyway and be damned look, or a buy it and it you will be damned look. I decided I’d ponder on it, during my next ride in The Raptor.

Which wasn’t long because the kids and my faithful Golden Retriever wanted to cruise the neighbourhood again in the beast looking at all the Christmas lights.

And yes, Christmas was that little bit better with a Raptor in the driveway.

I fell asleep that night with the Raptor’s melodious roar - not my wife - whispering sweet nothings in my ear and slept like a baby.

Maybe she was jealous?

A NEW DAWN

Next day, all anyone wanted to talk about was The Raptor.

“When are we going for a ride in the Raptor?” was the first thing my eldest said when he got up at 5.30am.

“When are we going for a ride in the Mega Truck (its new nickname)?” my youngest asked when he finally rolled out of bed four hours later.

We had driven “to the shops” twice already that morning but there was no reason we couldn’t go again. The dog jumped onto the tray and off we went.

I later ran into an old mate Steve down the shops I hadn’t seen for years.

“How have you been mate?” I asked.

It turns the garage into a catwalk.

“Tell me about the truck, “he replied, looking not at me but the truck.

“We saw a dog hanging off the back of a Raptor, looking so good and it’s yours! I’ve always wanted one …”

I thought I’d do him a big favour and have a word with his Mrs, who was beaming brightly as she glanced over the truck.

“Just buy him one,” I said.

“You won’t regret it.”

She nodded and gave the thumbs up. I hadn’t even had the car 24 hours and I’d sold one already. I should have been in sales. Or maybe it was just the car.

The next day at the boat ramp, a phalanx of bikini-clad day partiers invited me to tow their friend’s ex-husband’s $100m+ yacht out of the water they were so enamoured by the Raptor.

Eating up a fire trail.

SO IT GOES

And so it went.

Moses might have parted the Red Sea, but the Raptor parted the crowds with awe wherever she went.

On a road trip down south the Mega Truck dominated the highway. So comfortable, assured and powerful when needed, it even made those painful morons who can’t merge without slowing down to 75km/h bearable.

Off road, it ate up the fire trails and muddy roads with glee. Lizards and snakes stepped just aside … I even managed to NOT hit a kangaroo, which was too busy checking out the truck too, for it’s own good.

MORE: Why the Raptor is a modern muscle car

‘Looks, it’s a Raptor!’

Cruising around the city, it handled like a car half its size. So much so I had to get used to the family SUV again. The Raptor is an experience, that thing is just a chair on wheels.

The Ford even looks like it could take part in a Ms Universe quest when its just sitting in the garage.

But despite riding around like Queen Elizabeth in her Royal carriage for three weeks, my wife wasn’t suitably impressed. But the Raptor’s not alone, after 11 years of marriage she still feels pretty much the same about me.

“It’s too bogan,” she finally said. It might as well have been to herself because the kids, I or the dog didn’t want to hear it.

MORE: Why this Raptor is off-limits to Aussies

A great time was had by almost all but this story doesn’t have a happy ending.

‘THE BEST THING’

I think I did catch her smiling out of the side of her mouth, the side I can’t see, in the passenger seat, once or twice but that wouldn’t or couldn’t hold up in court.

“That’s the best thing about this car,” my wife said surprisingly as we returned from the beach as she vaguely waved her finger about.

I realised she was talking about the dog in the back, having the time of his life, soaking up life from the tray, like only Golden Retrievers can do.

“Harry can be in the back.”

Maybe it was the only thing for her but at least it was some – thing.

But of course, here’s the kicker: Women are always right. They control the pursestrings. Happy wife, life etc. So this little tale doesn’t have a happy ending like it did for my old mate Steve. I won’t be getting a Raptor for real.

The kids aren’t talking to me and the dog won’t wag his tail for me. They’ll get over it. Probably.

Not sure I will.

Originally published as Does the Ford Ranger Raptor live up to the hype?