2010 Ford F-150 Lariat
Discussion
My wife and I have gone to Canada for a 3 month career break to go snowboarding so we needed a 4x4. And what could be more quintessentially North American than a full sized truck? I figured that there's no where else in the world that you could legitimately own this class of behemoth for daily transport.
With my initial research from the UK, we set a budget and started looking. Ford F-150s with the King Ranch interior ( mmm, saddle leather) initially appealed but I wasn't sure I was that much of a cowboy. I then realised that all the F-150s in my price range were 4 speed autos and started looking at other models. Next up was the Nissan Titan with a 5 speed auto and a 360 hp engine, it loped to 60mph in a very respectable (for something that weighs 2.5 ton) 6.9 seconds. It was looking like we couldn't afford the nicer Chevs and V8 Toyotas, but at the end of the day it was going to have to come down what was for sale at the time.
Our only other must have specifications were 4x4, heated seats (this just sounded great after a day of snowboarding and they are great) and heated mirrors and screens. This meant that we'd be looking at the top or near top trim levels in all the trucks.
Our plan was to arrive in Calgary on the 31st of December because my wife has family there to drive us around and help us around any bureaucracy. The first day that dealerships were open was the 2nd of Jan and then the plan was to head out to our chosen town of Nelson, BC the next day.
Purchase
We had a short list of five trucks to go look at on the day, and a wallet full of cash - one-hundred and seventy $100 Canadian notes to be exact.
The first truck we went to look at was a newish (2009) Chevy Sierra 1500 LTZ with all the toys but when we turned up, the truck had no front seat (!), bad rust on the front (it's only five years old!) and a damaged tailgate. A severely disinterested salesman rounded out the package. NEXT!
Next up we went to look at a 2007 Nissan Titan with 150k kms. This is like a Navara on steroids - bigger in every dimension and with a 5.6L V8 thrusting it proudly at the horizon. This was the truck I had been looking at for months but the good ones seemed to have gone away a couple of weeks before we turned up and this was the only one we could find in our price / trim. It was OK, but had a flat tyre and a general aura of neglect.
But at the same a dealership a newish (2010) Ford had caught my eye. It had been discounted because of relatively high mileage (222k kms - 137k miles) and a couple of other points. These points were a lack of service history which our Canadian hosts assured us was fairly usual. It also had all-weather tyres that were on the verge of needing to be replaced.
The new model F-150 came out in 2009. It still had the 5.4L V8 now making 320 hp but it now had a 6 speed auto. I initially hadn't been looking at these newer Fords because they weren't within my price range, but a combination of the rising £ vs $ and the high mileage allowed this one to creep in.
The salesman was giving us the standard salesman crap to which my wife said "why is he telling me this, I don't care" loudly enough for him to hear and walked off.
I retrieved my wife (she claims she walked off because she had cold feet when standing in the snow in -5 and not that she was just rude) I managed to convince her we should give it test drive to see if it felt as tired as the kms suggested. After mollifying the salespig, the test drive was done at a fairly sedate speed in the backblocks around the dealership - I wasn't yet comfortable in something this size on the wrong side of the road. But it was really nice and didn't feel at all as old as the mileage suggested. All the fancy doo-das worked and it felt half it's mileage. It must have been driven exclusively on the highway - SOLD!
After the joy of haggling and dealing with sales tax and "standard dealer charges", we had to go insure and register it. Insurance proved to be pretty easy - we emailed them our proof of no claims and drivers license history and it was sorted. Registration was even easier - all they needed was our drivers license and proof of sale and insurance. We've now got a sparkling new number plate BLT 4026 which we bolt onto the truck back at the dealership and slide the behemoth gingerly into the peak hour traffic.
We also figure out a name for the truck. The trim level is "Lariat" so he's christened Larry.
Post Purchase Blues
On the drive back we notice that as we sidle up above 60 kph that the truck seems to be developing an alarming shimmy. By the time we get home it's approaching 6pm and our dreams of departing for Nelson look to be shot down in wobbly flames. I call the salesman who suggests wheel balance which makes sense. I start calling tyre places but they're all booked solid.
Finally I get through to someone at a Ford dealership who tells me the same thing so I desperately ask if he is open to bribery and corruption because we're due out in Nelson the next day. He comes alive at this point and asks if the truck has been sitting for a while. I tell him it has and he suggests cleaning the inside of the wheels and if that doesn't work, he'll slot us in first thing tomorrow. I think him profusely and we head out to find a pressure washer.
Well, it turns out that a heap of mixed up slush and grit had melted down inside the rim and plastered half of it with 5mm of cement-like accretion. We blew that off with the pressure washer and she was rollin' as good as new! Phew!
The Drive
Clearing snow off before we head out.
We didn't get away quite as early as I would have wished and it's snowing reasonably heavily when we set off. We stop at a car accessory shop to purchase the necessities:
Hit it.
Calgary freeway:
For our first song in Larry, we choose Hayseed Dixie doing "Highway to Hell". Yee Haw!
We initially head down south, running parallel with the Rocky Mountains on the plains. Alberta seems like it's real flat at this point! It's still snowing though and everyone on the highway sticks to one lane out of three. This is the clear lane and may not be the same lane that is delineated by lane markings underneath the snow. If you want to overtake, this mostly means merging out onto the snowy bit of the road and chancing your arm. We've got Larry in 4x4 mode (despite the fuel economy issues) and stick firmly to the clear lane behind all the trucks. We're averaging 70 kph in the 110 kph zone.
We stop for fuel and figure out that Larry has a big thirst. He fits in the family well. We fill up the 136 litre tank and discover that he now has heaps more grip - an extra 100 kilos over the back axle really helps!
Alberta highway - note the clear "lane" straddles the lane markings. Also note the flat - they've got a lot of flat:
The road clears out and we head down pretty much to the US border and take a right turn into the mountains. The scenery starts to get prettier and the road clears out briefly. Next up is Crowsnest Pass and Frank Slide where a mountain collapsed onto a town in 1903 and killed just about everyone. All that's left now is an enormous bolder field and the remains of most of the inhabitants are still under there. Very eerie.
Crowsnest Pass:
We dodge some Rocky Mountain goats which I fail to photograph and push on into the Rockys. The scenery is now getting seriously pretty and we have a lot of time to admire it as we're stuck behind a snow plow at 50 kph.
We stop for some awfully large and awfully awful coffee and a decent donut, then some lunch and some more coffee and then it starts to get dark as we're heading into our final mountain pass - Kootenay Pass. By now it's 4pm and we've been on the road for over seven hours. It's getting cold on the way up the pass and it's not been very well cleared. We get stuck behind someone with a big trailer on the way up and our nerves are starting to fray. Once we finally make it past and start to head back down, the wife is driving and has someone right up behind us who has even less patience than us and we have a hard time pulling off. She finally does and then figures she's not going quickly enough. She steams into a corner, brakes in the middle of it and I lambaste her for driving poorly. She starts to talk back, puts her foot down coming out of the corner and big Larry steps a fair way out of line into the other lane. We're not sure if we hit ice or what happened but we pull over for a driver change anyway!
Now the light has pretty much gone, I have no faith in the tyres or the road conditions and I discover the headlights are pretty much useless and I can't see where I'm going. At this stage we need to stick to what look like train tracks of clear road in our lane - either side of the tracks is melt water that has turned to ice. A very tense, nervous ride in sees us pull up at our new house at 5:30pm and me never wanting to drive the truck again. In punishment I turn off the traction control and plant it when we get stuck on the steep icy approach road leading up to the house and do a nice big four wheel burnout to announce our arrival.
I forgive him an hour later and we drive to pick up beer, wine and something for dinner.
Next Up
So considering how poorly this thing stops in the ice and snow, new tyres seemed like a good investment. I've gone with full winter grade tyres, Cooper Discoverer Mud and Snow, which mean they'll work down to below freezing temperatures which it is here pretty much all the time. I can report that I don't need to rely on the ABS when approaching one of the many downhill stop signs in town now, which is a good thing. I can also report that the low speed, 2.5 ton V8 drift truck is no more (it does have the optional LSD), which I'm not so happy about but I imagine the wife is.
Buying tyres looked like it wasn't going to be too expensive but I had again forgotten about the "plus taxes" style of pricing in use here and hadn't realised we had the bigger wheels on this truck (20 inch compared to the standard 18s). An extra 12% tax added on makes a difference when you're purchasing rubber in such industrial quantities (tires are 275/60/20)! $1300 fitted is a large whack of money but what price safety. Next up for Larry is a service and general check over and some upgraded headlights. We probably should have done that before the big drive. . .
The only other things that don't seem to work are the parking brake seems to stick on sometimes so needs a couple of extra yanks on the release handle and a rear parking sensor is broken but I can live with that.
Apart from that, it's getting spectacularly poor fuel economy. It was averaging 12L/100km in 4x4 on the freeway (23MPG) which was good but since then driving up the 20km steep hill to the ski hill has seen it report 22L/100km (12MPG) which is a lot worse! Let's hope that averages out.
The speed it can muster would best be described as deceptive rather than quick. And it does make a good V8 noise whilst it's doing it. The gearbox is OK for an auto and the steering is as expected feather light and mostly devoid of feeling. You get a sense of when it's sliding mainly due to the seat of the pants - I'm not rally driving, it just slid a fair amount on the old tyres! The ride is actually really good. It soaks up every bump and it's really quiet inside. It doesn't seem to buck over bumps despite it having heavy springs and no weight in the back. Seats are 10 way adjustable but not that comfortable on a long haul for my back but my wife was very happy.
I'm happy with him and I think he'll make a great companion for the next three months.
With my initial research from the UK, we set a budget and started looking. Ford F-150s with the King Ranch interior ( mmm, saddle leather) initially appealed but I wasn't sure I was that much of a cowboy. I then realised that all the F-150s in my price range were 4 speed autos and started looking at other models. Next up was the Nissan Titan with a 5 speed auto and a 360 hp engine, it loped to 60mph in a very respectable (for something that weighs 2.5 ton) 6.9 seconds. It was looking like we couldn't afford the nicer Chevs and V8 Toyotas, but at the end of the day it was going to have to come down what was for sale at the time.
Our only other must have specifications were 4x4, heated seats (this just sounded great after a day of snowboarding and they are great) and heated mirrors and screens. This meant that we'd be looking at the top or near top trim levels in all the trucks.
Our plan was to arrive in Calgary on the 31st of December because my wife has family there to drive us around and help us around any bureaucracy. The first day that dealerships were open was the 2nd of Jan and then the plan was to head out to our chosen town of Nelson, BC the next day.
Purchase
We had a short list of five trucks to go look at on the day, and a wallet full of cash - one-hundred and seventy $100 Canadian notes to be exact.
The first truck we went to look at was a newish (2009) Chevy Sierra 1500 LTZ with all the toys but when we turned up, the truck had no front seat (!), bad rust on the front (it's only five years old!) and a damaged tailgate. A severely disinterested salesman rounded out the package. NEXT!
Next up we went to look at a 2007 Nissan Titan with 150k kms. This is like a Navara on steroids - bigger in every dimension and with a 5.6L V8 thrusting it proudly at the horizon. This was the truck I had been looking at for months but the good ones seemed to have gone away a couple of weeks before we turned up and this was the only one we could find in our price / trim. It was OK, but had a flat tyre and a general aura of neglect.
But at the same a dealership a newish (2010) Ford had caught my eye. It had been discounted because of relatively high mileage (222k kms - 137k miles) and a couple of other points. These points were a lack of service history which our Canadian hosts assured us was fairly usual. It also had all-weather tyres that were on the verge of needing to be replaced.
The new model F-150 came out in 2009. It still had the 5.4L V8 now making 320 hp but it now had a 6 speed auto. I initially hadn't been looking at these newer Fords because they weren't within my price range, but a combination of the rising £ vs $ and the high mileage allowed this one to creep in.
The salesman was giving us the standard salesman crap to which my wife said "why is he telling me this, I don't care" loudly enough for him to hear and walked off.
I retrieved my wife (she claims she walked off because she had cold feet when standing in the snow in -5 and not that she was just rude) I managed to convince her we should give it test drive to see if it felt as tired as the kms suggested. After mollifying the salespig, the test drive was done at a fairly sedate speed in the backblocks around the dealership - I wasn't yet comfortable in something this size on the wrong side of the road. But it was really nice and didn't feel at all as old as the mileage suggested. All the fancy doo-das worked and it felt half it's mileage. It must have been driven exclusively on the highway - SOLD!
After the joy of haggling and dealing with sales tax and "standard dealer charges", we had to go insure and register it. Insurance proved to be pretty easy - we emailed them our proof of no claims and drivers license history and it was sorted. Registration was even easier - all they needed was our drivers license and proof of sale and insurance. We've now got a sparkling new number plate BLT 4026 which we bolt onto the truck back at the dealership and slide the behemoth gingerly into the peak hour traffic.
We also figure out a name for the truck. The trim level is "Lariat" so he's christened Larry.
Post Purchase Blues
On the drive back we notice that as we sidle up above 60 kph that the truck seems to be developing an alarming shimmy. By the time we get home it's approaching 6pm and our dreams of departing for Nelson look to be shot down in wobbly flames. I call the salesman who suggests wheel balance which makes sense. I start calling tyre places but they're all booked solid.
Finally I get through to someone at a Ford dealership who tells me the same thing so I desperately ask if he is open to bribery and corruption because we're due out in Nelson the next day. He comes alive at this point and asks if the truck has been sitting for a while. I tell him it has and he suggests cleaning the inside of the wheels and if that doesn't work, he'll slot us in first thing tomorrow. I think him profusely and we head out to find a pressure washer.
Well, it turns out that a heap of mixed up slush and grit had melted down inside the rim and plastered half of it with 5mm of cement-like accretion. We blew that off with the pressure washer and she was rollin' as good as new! Phew!
The Drive
Clearing snow off before we head out.
We didn't get away quite as early as I would have wished and it's snowing reasonably heavily when we set off. We stop at a car accessory shop to purchase the necessities:
- A big bottle of de-icing washer fluid. When there's snow on the road, there's lots of grit and together they cake your windscreen necessitating a blast from the washer every couple of minute or so. If you run out, you can't see and that would suck.
- An extend-able snow brush and ice scraper.
- One kilo of gummi bears.
Hit it.
Calgary freeway:
For our first song in Larry, we choose Hayseed Dixie doing "Highway to Hell". Yee Haw!
We initially head down south, running parallel with the Rocky Mountains on the plains. Alberta seems like it's real flat at this point! It's still snowing though and everyone on the highway sticks to one lane out of three. This is the clear lane and may not be the same lane that is delineated by lane markings underneath the snow. If you want to overtake, this mostly means merging out onto the snowy bit of the road and chancing your arm. We've got Larry in 4x4 mode (despite the fuel economy issues) and stick firmly to the clear lane behind all the trucks. We're averaging 70 kph in the 110 kph zone.
We stop for fuel and figure out that Larry has a big thirst. He fits in the family well. We fill up the 136 litre tank and discover that he now has heaps more grip - an extra 100 kilos over the back axle really helps!
Alberta highway - note the clear "lane" straddles the lane markings. Also note the flat - they've got a lot of flat:
The road clears out and we head down pretty much to the US border and take a right turn into the mountains. The scenery starts to get prettier and the road clears out briefly. Next up is Crowsnest Pass and Frank Slide where a mountain collapsed onto a town in 1903 and killed just about everyone. All that's left now is an enormous bolder field and the remains of most of the inhabitants are still under there. Very eerie.
Crowsnest Pass:
We dodge some Rocky Mountain goats which I fail to photograph and push on into the Rockys. The scenery is now getting seriously pretty and we have a lot of time to admire it as we're stuck behind a snow plow at 50 kph.
We stop for some awfully large and awfully awful coffee and a decent donut, then some lunch and some more coffee and then it starts to get dark as we're heading into our final mountain pass - Kootenay Pass. By now it's 4pm and we've been on the road for over seven hours. It's getting cold on the way up the pass and it's not been very well cleared. We get stuck behind someone with a big trailer on the way up and our nerves are starting to fray. Once we finally make it past and start to head back down, the wife is driving and has someone right up behind us who has even less patience than us and we have a hard time pulling off. She finally does and then figures she's not going quickly enough. She steams into a corner, brakes in the middle of it and I lambaste her for driving poorly. She starts to talk back, puts her foot down coming out of the corner and big Larry steps a fair way out of line into the other lane. We're not sure if we hit ice or what happened but we pull over for a driver change anyway!
Now the light has pretty much gone, I have no faith in the tyres or the road conditions and I discover the headlights are pretty much useless and I can't see where I'm going. At this stage we need to stick to what look like train tracks of clear road in our lane - either side of the tracks is melt water that has turned to ice. A very tense, nervous ride in sees us pull up at our new house at 5:30pm and me never wanting to drive the truck again. In punishment I turn off the traction control and plant it when we get stuck on the steep icy approach road leading up to the house and do a nice big four wheel burnout to announce our arrival.
I forgive him an hour later and we drive to pick up beer, wine and something for dinner.
Next Up
So considering how poorly this thing stops in the ice and snow, new tyres seemed like a good investment. I've gone with full winter grade tyres, Cooper Discoverer Mud and Snow, which mean they'll work down to below freezing temperatures which it is here pretty much all the time. I can report that I don't need to rely on the ABS when approaching one of the many downhill stop signs in town now, which is a good thing. I can also report that the low speed, 2.5 ton V8 drift truck is no more (it does have the optional LSD), which I'm not so happy about but I imagine the wife is.
Buying tyres looked like it wasn't going to be too expensive but I had again forgotten about the "plus taxes" style of pricing in use here and hadn't realised we had the bigger wheels on this truck (20 inch compared to the standard 18s). An extra 12% tax added on makes a difference when you're purchasing rubber in such industrial quantities (tires are 275/60/20)! $1300 fitted is a large whack of money but what price safety. Next up for Larry is a service and general check over and some upgraded headlights. We probably should have done that before the big drive. . .
The only other things that don't seem to work are the parking brake seems to stick on sometimes so needs a couple of extra yanks on the release handle and a rear parking sensor is broken but I can live with that.
Apart from that, it's getting spectacularly poor fuel economy. It was averaging 12L/100km in 4x4 on the freeway (23MPG) which was good but since then driving up the 20km steep hill to the ski hill has seen it report 22L/100km (12MPG) which is a lot worse! Let's hope that averages out.
The speed it can muster would best be described as deceptive rather than quick. And it does make a good V8 noise whilst it's doing it. The gearbox is OK for an auto and the steering is as expected feather light and mostly devoid of feeling. You get a sense of when it's sliding mainly due to the seat of the pants - I'm not rally driving, it just slid a fair amount on the old tyres! The ride is actually really good. It soaks up every bump and it's really quiet inside. It doesn't seem to buck over bumps despite it having heavy springs and no weight in the back. Seats are 10 way adjustable but not that comfortable on a long haul for my back but my wife was very happy.
I'm happy with him and I think he'll make a great companion for the next three months.
Edited by seefarr on Wednesday 8th January 21:54
Thanks Guys.
I saw one one the new Corvette Stingrays at the dealership where we bought Larry and they are a thing of great beauty, or at least great aggression. It was on winter tyres too - I wish I had got a photo but I was too excited.
My wife's cousin has a 2010 Dodge Ram with the 5.7 hemi and that is the truck I would have in a heartbeat if I could but sadly the newer ones were way out of my price range. The older ones have a comically bad interior. This is a top of the line 2007:
Nothing says "classy" like a grey leather interior.
I saw one one the new Corvette Stingrays at the dealership where we bought Larry and they are a thing of great beauty, or at least great aggression. It was on winter tyres too - I wish I had got a photo but I was too excited.
My wife's cousin has a 2010 Dodge Ram with the 5.7 hemi and that is the truck I would have in a heartbeat if I could but sadly the newer ones were way out of my price range. The older ones have a comically bad interior. This is a top of the line 2007:
Nothing says "classy" like a grey leather interior.
Word of warning , take it to a dealer if the plugs need changing . They're stupidly long and have a passion for snapping ,especially on the 5.4 . If that happens , and the heads have to come off the whole cab has to be removed also . I know , as I have one .
Enjoy the trip , Frank , Fernie , Creston , basically all of highway 3 is one of the best areas in AB/BC.
Don't use the E brake , just leave the tranny in park .
Enjoy the trip , Frank , Fernie , Creston , basically all of highway 3 is one of the best areas in AB/BC.
Don't use the E brake , just leave the tranny in park .
Edited by fttm on Thursday 9th January 03:08
Edited by fttm on Thursday 9th January 03:11
What a really good read .
I am guessing that leasing for 3 months wouldnt be cheaper then .Also i know this is nosey how do people take a 3month career break logistically .When you have a good job (needed to save up to move) probably a mortgage in UK .
Then if its a break a guess you dont want to work over there either .Seems like your living the dream if you come home and stroll back into work and your house .
I am guessing that leasing for 3 months wouldnt be cheaper then .Also i know this is nosey how do people take a 3month career break logistically .When you have a good job (needed to save up to move) probably a mortgage in UK .
Then if its a break a guess you dont want to work over there either .Seems like your living the dream if you come home and stroll back into work and your house .
Great write up, keep the stories coming.
We hired a (got upgraded) to a Lincon Navigator in August. As far as I can tell its a F150 in a frock.
Huge some noise, not much go.
It's about 30% bigger than a range rover! with vague steering, boat like ride, 80s switches and dials.
For something that costs the same as a range rover sport in the USA I know which I'd rather have.
My VW touareg felt like a sports car when we got in it at heathrow.
We hired a (got upgraded) to a Lincon Navigator in August. As far as I can tell its a F150 in a frock.
Huge some noise, not much go.
It's about 30% bigger than a range rover! with vague steering, boat like ride, 80s switches and dials.
For something that costs the same as a range rover sport in the USA I know which I'd rather have.
My VW touareg felt like a sports car when we got in it at heathrow.
fttm said:
Word of warning , take it to a dealer if the plugs need changing . They're stupidly long and have a passion for snapping ,especially on the 5.4 . If that happens , and the heads have to come off the whole cab has to be removed also . I know , as I have one .
Enjoy the trip , Frank , Fernie , Creston , basically all of highway 3 is one of the best areas in AB/BC.
Don't use the E brake , just leave the tranny in park .]
Thanks for that! I had read about those problems but had forgotten - I think I'll just get them to leave the plugs where they are.Enjoy the trip , Frank , Fernie , Creston , basically all of highway 3 is one of the best areas in AB/BC.
Don't use the E brake , just leave the tranny in park .]
We're planning some road trips to other resorts but still trying to work out when. My wife's family can get hold of cheap/free Flames hockey tickets sometimes too so we'll try and work that in at the same time.
pimpchez said:
I am guessing that leasing for 3 months wouldnt be cheaper then .Also i know this is nosey how do people take a 3month career break logistically .When you have a good job (needed to save up to move) probably a mortgage in UK .
We looked into leasing and that was really expensive. Long term rentals looked OK on the surface but then you don't get insurance by default, so insurance was going to cost the same again as the rental! I think the long-term rental market in Alberta is all driven by oil and gas companies, so everyone charges them mega bucks because they can. Forgot to say that fully comprehensive insurance was $700 for 6 months, so we should get almost half of that back when we cancel. Road tax was $100 for 14 months (don't ask) and again we'll get most of that back when we hand the plate back in.
It is possible that after the depreciation, tyres, service, insurance etc that we've not saved anything but it would be no where near as much fun and emotional investment with a rental!
Career breaks were easier than we thought. My wife works for a large accounting firm who have a HR process in place so we just went with that. I work for a smaller company so mine was a case of saying "I'm going for 3 months and I'd love to come back and work for you at the end of it". Part of the deal was that I'm on call for any emergencies too.
We rent in London so no bother there.
Now, 12cm of fresh up on the resort last night so I'm going to go get ready.
Very nice, enjoy the snow.
Try and find the Rain X winter screen wash, it has an additive to prevent freezing, and applies a little Rain X when used, which helps in preventing gunk sticking to the screen as much.
Also, buy a couple of large (large as you can) bags of kitty litter to place in the back of the truck bed, this puts more weight over the back wheels, an can be used to give traction if you ever get stuck, and I would assume you have, or will be getting a truck bed cover?
Try and find the Rain X winter screen wash, it has an additive to prevent freezing, and applies a little Rain X when used, which helps in preventing gunk sticking to the screen as much.
Also, buy a couple of large (large as you can) bags of kitty litter to place in the back of the truck bed, this puts more weight over the back wheels, an can be used to give traction if you ever get stuck, and I would assume you have, or will be getting a truck bed cover?
As HDM said RainX screenwash is great , available in Walmart and Canadian Tire .Pull your wipers off the screen when parking during snowfall as it stops them freezing to the screen .Top tip , get weight onto the bed 6 or 8 bags of water softner salt or sand will make a world of difference to traction.
Welcome to Canada .
Welcome to Canada .
seefarr said:
Apart from that, it's getting spectacularly poor fuel economy. It was averaging 12L/100km in 4x4 on the freeway (23MPG) which was good but since then driving up the 20km steep hill to the ski hill has seen it report 22L/100km (12MPG) which is a lot worse! Let's hope that averages out.
But gas is half the price here compared to the UK, so really you're getting between mid 20's and mid 40's mpg. Man maths always wins 
I've owned 3 F150 V8s, and averaged 15/110km unladen. That should be an achievable goal without having to pootle around too gently. Towing a boat or loaded horse trailer can see it plummet to mid 20's in the hillier areas of BC.
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