Founded way back in February 1880, the town of Eureka Springs is one of the true jewels of Northwest Arkansas, featuring street after street of Victorian homes, hotels, churches, buildings and storefronts that look like they’ve been trapped in amber since the early 20th century. The beauty of Eureka and the uniqueness of the town has made it a major tourist attraction, with tens of thousands of visitors still making the trip every year, even though the lure of the “healing waters” the town was built on in the days before modern medicine have long since been debunked as snake oil. There’s plenty to eat, see and do in Eureka, which is why it’s one of our favorite weekend road trips here at McLarty Daniel Ford. So get on over there! Whether it’s been a long time or a little since you visited Eureka, there’s bound to be something to tickle your fancy. Read on for a few of our favorites.

Turpentine Creek Wildlife Refuge
239 Turpentine Creek Lane

Though it would seem like a no-brainer that you don’t want a dangerous, meat-hungry tiger, lion or cougar as a family pet, there are always going to be people who can’t resist the momentary charm of owning an exotic cat. Sadly, when the charm runs out, big cats can be neglected, mistreated or killed by owners who don’t know how to take care of them. For over two decades, Turpentine Creek Wildlife Refuge in Eureka Springs has been taking in and caring for big cats and other large carnivores whose owners no longer want them, attending to the needs of animals who may have been abused during their time with private owners, small zoos or circuses. To date, Turpentine Creek has saved hundreds of animals who might otherwise have been destroyed, keeping them happy and healthy in a nurturing, cruelty-free environment. It’s all paid for by donations and ticket sales to animal lovers just like you, who come in droves to take the tour of this world-class animal sanctuary. Tickets to Turpentine Creek are $20 for adults, $15 for teens, and $10 for children 4-12. For more information, visit their website at www.turpentinecreek.org

Thorncrown Chapel
12968 Highway 62 West

If you’re a person of faith, the pristine beauty of the mountains around Eureka Springs makes the area perfect for a little quiet and contemplative communing with Big G. There’s no place better for that than the soaring majesty of Thorncrown Chapel. Opened in 1980, Thorncrown Chapel was the brainchild of Jim Reed, a retired teacher who wanted a beautiful, non-denominational place for people to pray or attend services while surrounded by the faith-affirming splendor of nature. Designed by the renowned Arkansas architect Fay Jones, the 48-foot-high Thorncrown features a light and almost ethereal wooden frame, a foundation of native local stone, and 425 individual windows. Over five million visitors have made the pilgrimage to Thorncrown Chapel since it opened, both to contemplate their faith and to view one of the great masterpieces of American architecture, which won the American Institute of Architecture’s Design of the Year Award for 1981. Admission is free, but donations are welcomed for the continued maintenance and upkeep of the chapel. For more information, visit the Thorncrown Chapel website at: www.thorncrown.com

Le Stick Nouveau
63 Spring Street

Though there was a time when the height of the Eureka Springs restaurant scene were all-you-can-eat tourist trap buffets, the little village that could has seriously upped its restaurant game in the past few years, with new cafes and restaurants joining old favorites like the outstanding Ermilio’s and Mud Street Cafe. One of our longstanding faves during trips to Eureka in the last few years has been Le Stick Nouveau. A cozy space situated inside the romantic New Orleans Hotel at 63 Spring Street, Le Stick Nouveau translates to “The New Stick,” a homage to the famed Candlestick Inn which opened in 1962 in nearby Branson, Missouri, but was sadly destroyed by a tornado in 2012. After the loss, the family behind The Candlestick moved their operation to Eureka, opening on a smaller scale while keeping their same high standards for gourmet food and beautiful presentation. The result is one of the best restaurants in the state, with a high-concept menu featuring dishes like escargot, deviled duck eggs with smoked paprika and red onion, and Le Stick’s take on Beef Wellington in a puff-pastry basket with pickled mustard seed and bordelaise sauce. Fond memories of a bucket-list quality culinary experience are provided at no extra charge. For more information and a full menu, visit their website at www.lestick.com

Lake Leatherwood City Park
1303 County Road 204

The largest city park in Arkansas, Eureka’s 1,600-acre Lake Leatherwood City Park is built around — of course — the 85-acre Lake Leatherwood, which was created in the 1940s after the Works Progress Administration built one of the largest hand-cut limestone dams in America across Leatherwood Creek. Along with the dam, several other WPA structures at the site are still standing, and have been protected by being listed on the National Register of Historic Places. In addition to opportunities to cool off in the chilly, spring-fed lake, the park includes over 25 miles of hiking and mountain biking trails that wind through the natural beauty and serenity of the surrounding mountains. If you’re in the mood to paddle or drift, there’s a paved boat ramp and a kayak and canoe launch, plus an outfitter near the lake that rents kayaks, canoes, paddle boats by the hour or day. If you’re just into soaking up some nature, plentiful wildlife calls Lake Leatherwood home, including raccoons, beavers, deer and over 100 species of birds. Whatever you’re looking for, it’s a great place to visit when you want to leave the hectic world behind.

Take a ghost tour at the Crescent Hotel
75 Prospect Ave

Considering that a majority of Eureka Springs looks like it would make a great set for an episode of “Scooby Doo, Where Are You?” it’s probably no surprise that Eureka has long had a reputation as a place where all manner of spooks, specters and things that go bump in the night freely roam. Situated on a picturesque mountaintop with commanding views of the town below, the Crescent Hotel has become something of a hot spot for seekers of Eureka’s most permanent residents in recent years. Completed in 1886, the hotel is rumored to be home to several ghosts, including Michael, a stonemason who, according to legend, fell from a scaffold and died during the construction of the hotel, and victims of the notorious quack medicine practitioner Norman G. Baker, who bought the hotel in 1937 and turned it into a hospital where he bilked desperate patients with phony “cures” for fatal ailments, including cancer. Baker’s former morgue in the basement of the Crescent is rumored to be haunted by more than a few ghosts these days, with tour guides thrilling guests with stories of past experiences and inevitably blurry photos of purported paranormal activity. Whether you’re a believer or not, it’s a whole lot of fun. Tickets for the Crescent Hotel ghost tour are $22.50 for adults, or $8 for kids. For more information, visit the ghost tour website at: www.americasmosthauntedhotel.com

Whatever brings you to Eureka Springs, there’s plenty to fill your time there, from quaint shops to thrills to just relaxing and letting the beauty of the place wash over you. If you need a car, truck, van or SUV to take you there, stop in today at McLarty Daniel Ford in Bentonville. With unbeatable deals and a selection of new Fords and pre-owned vehicles that’s second to none, we’re sure to have a vehicle that fits both your needs and your budget. Stop in today for a test drive!

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We sell a heck of a lot of Ford F-series trucks here at McLarty Daniel Ford, from the sporty capability of the 2018 Ford F-150 4×4, to the take-no-prisoners horsepower of the 2018 Ford F-150 Raptor, to the workhorse durability of Ford’s Super Duty models and beyond. Still, we’ve got a soft spot in our hearts for good ol’ Ford F-150, and we’re especially impressed with the 2018 Ford F-150 in particular. It’s just packed with high technology, design and engineering details that are second to none.

As F-150 freaks, we’re always running across some new tidbit of information about the F-series trucks that amazes us. With that in mind, we’ve put together a list of twelve bits of cool trivia about the Ford F-series trucks. Let’s call it: McLarty Daniel Ford’s Believe It or Not! You can definitely believe this though: if you’re looking to buy a 2018 Ford F-150 in Bentonville, Arkansas at a great price, your first, last and only stop should be McLarty Daniel Ford. Stop in today for a test drive. or shop our big selection of 2018 Ford F-150’s online right now. Lighter, stronger, tougher and more fuel efficient than ever before, the 2018 Ford F-150 really is the best truck Ford has ever built. Now, read on for a dozen fabulous, fun, freaky facts about the Ford F-150!

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1. The Ford F-series truck, now called the F-150, has been the best-selling truck in America for more than 40 years, and the best selling vehicle of any kind in the United States for over 30 years.
2. As of May 2018, Ford reportedly makes $100 million PER DAY from F-series truck sales alone.
3. The most expensive F-150 in the world is Hennessey Motorsports’ F-150 VelociRaptor 6×6, which starts at $349,000. Based on a 2017-2018 Ford F-150 Raptor crew cab pickup, the six-wheeled, six-wheel-drive truck is an exercise in ridiculous excess, featuring a stretched frame and bed, elongated fender flares, and twin turbochargers that boost performance to 600+ horsepower.
4. The Dearborn Truck Assembly Plant in Dearborn, Mich turns out a new Ford F-150 every 52 seconds. That’s over 30,000 trucks a month!
5. In 2017, Ford sold 1,052,658 F-Series trucks. If lined up bumper to bumper, they’d stretch over 4,000 miles! That’s all the way from New York to Los Angeles and most of the way back again.
6. The longest-running component ever used in Ford F-series trucks were the rear fenders on the narrow-box “stepside” bed, which were used virtually unchanged on all stepside models from 1953 through 1979.
7. In August 2003, the Guinness Book of World Records bestowed the title of “World’s Fastest Production Pickup” on a stock 2003 Ford SVT F-150 Lightning which reached a top speed of 147 miles per hour on Ford’s Arizona test track. That’s almost glacial, however, compared to a modified, turbocharged 2002 Ford F-150 Lightning that topped 178.8 miles per hour at the “Texas Mile” racing event in October 2016. That apparently makes it the fastest F-150 in the world. (Seriously: don’t try this at home. You will die.)
8. Though he was a billionaire several times over by the time he passed away in 1992, Walmart founder Sam Walton bought a 1979 Ford F-150 long wheelbase truck brand new — from the dealership that is now McLarty Daniel Ford in Bentonville! — and drove it almost every day until his death.
9. When asked once by an interviewer why he drove a beat up 1979 Ford F-150 long after he became the world’s richest man, Walton famously answered: “What am I supposed to haul my dogs around in, a Rolls-Royce?” Sam’s F-150 is now on display at the Walmart Museum in Bentonville, and has even been replicated as a die-cast car in Mattel’s Hot Wheels line.
10. Thanks to the use of space age aluminum alloy in the body panels and other components, the 2018 Ford F-150 weighs a full 700 pounds less than the previous model.
11. After F-150 production was shut down due to a May 2018 fire at a supplier of critical parts, Ford was able to get the assembly lines started again by flying 87,000 pounds of equipment to a factory in England on one of the world’s biggest cargo planes: the Russian Antonov An-124, which has a lifting capacity of 150 tons and a wingspan of 240.5 feet. That’s wider than two Boeing 737s parked wingtip to wingtip.
12. In 2016, engineers with Ford Performance entered a stock, street-legal 2017 Ford F-150 Raptor in the grueling Baja 1000 race, which destroys many purpose-built race trucks. After finishing third in the stock class, they literally gassed it up, ran it through a carwash, then drove more than 400 miles back to Ford’s testing center in Phoenix, Arizona with the cruise control and air conditioner on.

With Ford F-series trucks having been around since the 1940s, we’re always learning some new and interesting fact about America’s favorite pickup, the Ford F-150! If you’re looking to buy a new 2018 Ford F-150, stop in at McLarty Daniel Ford for a test drive today, or browse our big selection of Ford F-150 models online. There’s a lot of great things to know about these trucks, and a lot of great reasons why they’ve been the best selling vehicle in America for over three decades. Come see us at McLarty Daniel Ford, and let us show you why.

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When it comes to trucks, a big part of their job description is hooking on, hitching up and towing the loads, both for work and play. While towing with older trucks could be an exercise in anxiety and peril, especially for drivers not used to the tricky maneuvers one has to perform with a trailer hitched on, the new 2018 Ford F-150 has a full suite of standard and optional equipment to make towing even the heaviest loads safer and easier than ever before. That’s a good thing, because with the 2018 Ford F-150’s best-in-class towing capability of up to 13,200 pounds when properly equipped, it’s a half-ton pickup that can really move the freight. If you have loads you need to tow, come see us at McLarty Daniel Ford in Bentonville to check out our full lineup of 2018 Ford F-150s, with options that can make doing tugboat duty no problem. Meanwhile, read on for seven ways the 2018 Ford F-150 makes towing easier and safer

Can you say ‘EcoBoost’?

While there was a time when it took a lot of cubic inches to tow the big loads, modern technology and power-adders like superchargers and turbochargers have flipped the script on engine architecture considerably, allowing the big brains in the engine engineering department at Ford (say that three times fast) to squeeze more horsepower and torque out of ever-smaller packages. For a case in point, see the 2018 Ford F-150’s available 3.5-liter EcoBoost twin-turbo V6. Rated at 375 horsepower and a locomotivesque 470 lb.-ft. of torque, it’s the most towing muscle currently available in any half-ton pickup, gas or diesel.

Lighter is better

Every pound your truck weighs is a pound less it can tow when it comes time to hitch up that trailer. With that in mind, Ford put the F-150 on a serious diet through the use of cutting edge, high strength alloys, including using military-spec aluminum in some suspension components and all the body panels. The result is a 2018 F-150 that weighs 700 pounds lighter than the previous model. When you realize that’s about the equivalent of three full-size refrigerators you don’t have to haul around with you 24/7 anymore, the 2018 F-150’s world-class towing capacity becomes a little more understandable.

Ford’s Smart Trailer Tow Connector helps keep the lights on

One of the worst things about towing a trailer is chasing down the stubborn gremlins that always seem to wake up when you try to plug in trailer lights. Helping cut down wiring woes considerably, the 2018 Ford F-150 can be equipped with Ford’s innovative Smart Trailer Tow Connector, which uses in-line sensors to issue driver alerts whenever there’s a problem with trailer lights, wiring, connectors or the battery. They haven’t quite figured out how to have a little robot with a roll of black electrical tape pop out of the bumper to fix frayed trailer wiring, but it sounds like they’re getting close.

Pro-Trailer Backup Assist takes the anxiety out of the rear view mirror

For someone new to towing, it can seem like you dang near need a slide rule to back a trailer up, especially when you inevitably need to turn while reversing to go around obstacles or line up with the load to be hauled. We’ve slow-speed jackknifed a few in our day. To make it easy when towing a trailer turns to pushing a trailer, Ford came up with the certified genius idea of Pro-Trailer Backup Assist, which makes backing up a trailer as simple as turning a knob on the dash. Want the rear of the trailer to go left? Turn the knob to the left. Want it to go right? Turn it right. That’s literally all it takes, and if you keep it quiet, your friends will think you’re a trailer backing BOSS.

Blind-Spot Information System with Trailer Coverage wards off close encounters

When towing a trailer on the highway, you’ve got a lot to keep an eye on: the road ahead, the load, your mirrors and The Other Guy, who is always out there, trying to ruin your day. The 2018 Ford F-150 can take some of the worry about The Other Guy off your plate with their available Blind-Spot Information System, which uses radar to alert you when there’s another driver lurking beside you on multi-lane highways. The “trailer coverage” part of the system is that it can be configured to alert you not only drivers motoring along beside your truck, but your trailer as well, no matter the length. Take that, Other Guy.

High-tech hitchup help with Dynamic Hitch Assist

Though hitching a trailer by yourself used to mean eyeballing it as best you can, beating the heck out of your bumper and license plate, and hoping to get close enough to muscle the hitch over a few inches to the trailer ball, the 2018 Ford F-150 has you covered when you don’t have a friend back there by the hitch to deliver helpful “almost there” and “turn left a little bit” hand signals. Dynamic Hitch Assist works through the available 8-inch productivity screen in your F-150’s dash, providing live, full-color video of the hitch from your truck’s rear view camera, overlaid by a colorful grid that shows you which way you need to turn to line everything up the first time. It can’t go fishing with you like that helpful friend, but no computer’s perfect.

Turbo-diesel power and economy

Towing means torque, and when it comes to posting the big torque numbers that make for easy towing, diesel is king. Ford F-150’s new 3.0 liter Power Stroke Diesel V6, available this May, might be more petite than the 6.7-liter Power Stroke plant found in massive Ford Super Duty workhorses, but it’s got all the high-tech internals of its big brothers, including a forged crankshaft, variable-geometry turbocharger, and two-stage oil pump, while delivering world-beating torque and a crazy-high 30 mpg(!) on the highway. That’s the highest EPA-estimated mileage of any full-size pickup, gas or diesel, while posting best-in-class 250 hp and 440 lb-ft. of torque and up to 11,400 pounds of towing grunt.

We’ve only scratched the surface on what makes the 2018 Ford F-150 the best and safest Ford half-ton ever built when it comes to towing, but then again, there’s no need to take our word for it. Come down to McLarty Daniel Ford in Bentonville today, take a test drive, and see for yourself. You’ve got work to do and stuff to tow! Let us show you how the newly redesigned 2018 Ford F-150 can help take the hassle out of your hitch-and-giddy-up today!

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Lots of folks get nostalgic about how battleship tough cars and trucks used to be in the Good Ol’ Days, but the truth — revealed by any vintage photo of an auto accident before 1975 or so — is that vintage cars were pretty terrible at keeping people safe when the inevitable crash happened. Most cars didn’t even have seatbelts until 1968! That alone led to some serious highway carnage back in the day.

The good news is: from airbags to crumple zones to blind spot alerts, vehicles are better than ever at keeping the soft and squishy humans inside safe in a crash. The next evolution in safety is now reality with Ford’s Co-Pilot360. The most advanced collection of standard driver-assistance technologies of any brand, Ford Co-Pilot360 is not only designed to keep you safer, it’s a glimpse at the autonomous car future that’s coming soon to a dealership near you. Read on for more about this incredible tech from Ford.

Available starting this fall on the new 2019 Ford Edge and Ford Edge ST, with plans to make the package standard equipment on all Ford cars, SUVs and the F-150 within two years, Co-Pilot 360 is already a great package, and engineers plan to keep adding more safety tech to it as new methods become available, with the company prepared to spend $500 million in the next five years to develop new safety gear to help keep Ford customers safe. Here’s a list of what’s available in the first roll-out of the Co-Pilot360 system:

Automatic Emergency Braking with Pedestrian Detection: A nightmare for any driver is the scenario where a person on foot suddenly darts into the roadway and directly into the path of your vehicle. With automatic emergency braking with pedestrian detection, your car can sense an obstacle ahead, whether it’s a person or a car that’s suddenly stopped, and will trigger visual and audio alerts. If you don’t respond, the system automatically deploys the brakes to minimize a front-end collision. As part of Co-Pilot360, Ford plans to make the tech standard on 91 percent of new Ford vehicles sold in North America by 2020.

Blind Spot Information System: Also standard with Co-Pilot360, the BLIS system utilizes on-board radar to detect cars that might be motoring along in your blind spot on the highway, keeping you from inadvertently trying to make two 3,000 pound hunks of metal, glass and plastic occupy the same space at 60 miles per hour. The system uses an alert on the side mirror to warn you there might be a vehicle in your blind spot.

Cross Traffic Alert: Backing out of a parking spot in a crowded and busy parking lot is another major spot where a driver can get into trouble. Co-Pilot360s Cross Traffic Alert system utlizes the same radar as the BLIS system to detect and alert you to oncoming cars or pedestrians when your Ford is in reverse, potentially sparing you from a nasty fender-bender or worse.

Lane Keeping System: It only takes a moment of inattention to drift out of your lane and into other lanes of travel. In a multi-lane highway, this can result in crowding other drivers or a collision. On two-laners, it can result in a high-speed head on crash. Co-Pilot360’s Lane Keeping System helps lessen that possibly by alerting you if you’re drifting out of your lane with three functions: steering wheel vibration that alerts you that you’re moving out of your lane, physical steering torque that can nudge you back into the center of your lane while allowing you to be fully in control, and a driver alert system that constantly monitors you driving and provides visual and audio alerts if the system suspects you might be sleepy or otherwise impaired.

Whether it’s performance, entertainment, comfort or safety innovations like Co-Pilot360, Ford is always on the cutting edge of automotive technology, and that’s a big part of why we’re proud to sell the Blue Oval at McLarty Daniel Ford. If you’re in the market for a new Ford car, truck, SUV or van, stop by today at McLarty Daniel Ford and check out the hundreds of new Fords available on our lots, filled with the technology and safety features you’ve come to expect from one of America’s oldest car makers. Take a test drive, and then take home a new Ford with Co-Pilot360 driver assistance and safety technology soon. Like the old saying goes: the life you save may be your own.

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Is there anything better than running into an old friend you haven’t seen in awhile? You know: catch up, see how you’re doing, count each others’ new wrinkles and share a laugh. It’s a grand ol’ time. If you’re a long time fan of Ford trucks, one old friend you might love to see on the street again is the iconic Ford Bronco. Debuted in 1966, the original Ford Bronco has since become an icon of automotive style, with timeworn examples sought out and lovingly restored by fans of the model. Sadly, everything has a lifespan, and after several redesigns, including a turn away from the mid-sized profile of the first-gen originals in favor of full-size, Ford announced they would discontinue the Ford Bronco in 1996. Other than a tantalizing retro Bronco concept that appeared at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit in 2004, a new Ford Bronco hasn’t been seen on American highways in over 20 years.

That will soon change. After several tantalizing hints that the Bronco might make a triumphant return, Ford announced at the 2017 North American International Auto Show on January 9, 2017 that they will put a mid-sized, sixth-generation Ford Bronco back in production for the 2020 model year. Not much is certain about the all-new Bronco at this point, but read on for everything we do know about the 2020 Ford Bronco that’ll be galloping across the hills and valleys of America in the near future.

It’ll very likely be a retro-modern take on the first-gen Broncos

When the Ford Bronco Concept debuted in Detroit all the way back in 2004, Ford was already thinking in the retro-modern style that has been embraced by customers through modern revivals like the latest generation VW Beetles, Ford Mustangs, Dodge Challengers and Chevrolet Camaros. The 2004 Bronco concept was mid-sized, boxy, short wheelbase, round headlighted, and clearly modeled on the beloved first-generation Ford Broncos built between 1966-1977. Though the effort to put that concept into production failed after the introduction of the popular Ford Escape, in March 2018, Ford dropped the bombshell of a photo that accompanies this post on their social media, showing the tarped profile of the all-new 2020 Bronco prototype. You don’t need X-Ray Vision to see the boxy forms lurking underneath, which sure look like a modern take on a first-gen Bronco. That includes the high, rounded wheel arches, steeply canted rear glass, short wheelbase, wagon-like roof, square nose, and rear-mounted, full-size spare.

It’ll be made in the U.S.A

One of the first hints that both the Ranger and Bronco would be returning from the dead is a mention of both that turned up in contract negotiations between the United Auto Workers and Ford all the way back in November 2015. As written, the contract specified that as part of a $700 million dollar investment the company will make in their U.S. plants, the Ranger and the new Bronco will both be constructed at Ford’s Michigan Assembly Plant in Wayne, Mich. In March 2018, the plant — which had previously been dedicated to production of the Ford Focus and C-Max Hybrid — was closed for retooling. It will reportedly re-open in October 2018 to begin production of the 2019 Ranger and, the following year, the new 2020 Bronco.

It’s designed to take on the Jeep Wrangler JL

If you’re looking for convertible, doors off, four wheeling fun from a new vehicle, right now the only game in town is the Jeep Wrangler JL. In the first quarter of 2018, the Jeep Wrangler moved more units than any vehicle in America other than the Toyota Camry, and that’s a trend that will likely continue unless a true challenger for the throne emerges. By reviving a retro Bronco for 2020, it’s clear Ford wants to get in on a share of that action, building an SUV that’s designed to compete for buyers who want a fun, easily-personalized off-roader with a classic look. Because of that, Ford experts online expect the 2020 Bronco to feature a lot of the Jeepish features that made the generation-one Broncos special, including a short wheelbase and short overhangs to help the Bronco mount and climb over obstacles, a removable hardtop or folding convertible top, an integrated, high-strength roll cage and possibly — be still, our beating hearts — easily removable doors.

It’ll share a lot of mechanicals with the new Ford Ranger

Ford is a big, global company that builds a lot of vehicles, and there’s no sense creating all-new components when you’ve already got things on the shelf that will work. For that reason, the 2020 Bronco will likely share a lot of components with the all-new 2019 Ford Ranger, including body-on-frame construction, rear-wheel drive in two-wheel versions and the 2019 Ranger’s robust off-road running gear in four-wheel drive models. If so, both will feature a solid rear axle, an independent front suspension and Ford’s EcoBoost four and six cylinder engines, which make big torque and high horsepower numbers from small packages, thanks to modern turbocharger technology.

It’ll be an off-road beast

With offerings like the Ford F-150 Raptor and the new 2019 Ranger, Ford is staking a claim as the king of the hill when it comes to building capable off-road, mud-hungry vehicles. That’s likely to continue with the 2020 Bronco. Four-wheel drive models of the Bronco will probably share the 2019 Ranger 4×4’s off-road features like tuned long-travel shocks, frame mounted steel skid plates, and the latest version of Ford’s Terrain Management System, which features a shift-on-the-fly electronically controlled transfer case with several drive modes available at the twist of switch, including normal driving, grass, gravel and snow, mud and ruts, and sand. The system also automatically controls other systems, including remapping throttle response and transmission shifting to maximize traction for the selected terrain.

It’ll likely continue Ford’s trend of smaller-and-more-powerful under the hood.

Ford seems intent on proving their ability to squeeze more and more horsepower from fewer and fewer cubic inches with the help of power-adders like turbochargers and twin-turbo systems. Witness, for instance, the 3.5-liter EcoBoost V6s that are putting out 450 hp in the Ford F-150 Raptor, and 647 hp in the Ford GT! Don’t hold your breath for similar tugboat-like power in the 2020 Bronco, but it’ll be no slouch, either. The standard engine in the 2020 Ford Bronco will likely be the same turbocharged 2.3-liter EcoBoost four cylinder that’s slated as standard equipment for the 2019 Ranger. Don’t fret that it’s only a four-holer, though. Ford has managed to squeeze up to 350 hp and 350 ft.-lb of torque out of the 2.3-liter four in the latest Ford Mustang, and given Bronco’s storied history as an off-road racer, a high-performance version — maybe even one with a high-output EcoBoost V6 — seems inevitable.

We might — might — eventually see a Raptor Bronco!

At an event held in Thailand in late 2018, Ford announced they would be building a Raptor version of the 2019 Ford Ranger, featuring an all-new 2.0-liter twin-turbodiesel four cylinder that puts out 210 hp and 369 lb.-ft. of torque, thanks to sequential turbos that kick in at different spots on the power curve, mated to the 10-speed automatic from the F-150 Raptor. Now that we’ve got you all excited, Ford also announced at the same event that the 2019 Ford Ranger Raptor will only be sold in overseas markets, and not in America. Still, with the American public being as horsepower hungry as they are and the newly revived Ford Ranger and Bronco surefire hits, it wouldn’t surprise us if the Bronco eventually wore the Raptor nameplate with a corresponding power boost under the hood.

If you’re looking for something to do while waiting on the all-new 2020 Ford Bronco to arrive in dealer showrooms, come see us at McLarty Daniel Ford in Bentonville. While we don’t have the Bronco and Ranger just yet, we have plenty of great Ford off-roaders in every price range and trim package, and any one of them can satisfy the yearning for adventure in your heart until the Bronco of your dreams appears. Come see us today for a test drive, or shop our big selection of Ford cars, trucks, vans and SUVs online today!

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