Going BIG Off-Road in a Ford Bronco Wildtrak - Does it Still Live Up to the Hype?

Hey folks and welcome to the Truck King YouTube channel. This new Ford Bronco has been on the streets and the trails now for over a year and Ford brought it back specifically to challenge that Jeep Wrangler. Well we've taken it already in the rocks and the mud and we're going to do it again today to try to finally answer that question. A year into it, is the Bronco truly the new off-road king? A big thank you to the Minden Off-Road Park for the use of their trails for today's video. If you're heading off-road in Ontario, make sure you check out mindenoffroadpark.ca Alrighty folks, let the rock crawling begin. Now let's first start by saying that this is the Bronco WildTrack Sasquatch. Sasquatch means we have the 35 inch tires. WildTrack means that this is actually the high speed model. This is not the rock crawling model. It's the one meant to go really fast in the desert and because of that one of the tricks we don't get is the disconnectable sway bar. But besides that we get all of the great off-road goodies on the Bronco and even though it's the high speed model it's still pretty dang good at rock crawling as we are showing you right now. And soon enough we will do a little high speed as well just to make sure we get a feel for it. But so far the first thing that jumps out at you are the tires. 35 inch tires, the Goodyear Territory's great traction and just the size gives you great clearance. So I have really gotten a feel now for which rocks out here I can hit and which rocks I can't hit. And I'm getting real steep now. Okay here comes a big climb now. I do have the Bronco down in four low. I also have the rear end locked up. And hold on. Okay here's my first reading. I want to get the steepest angle I can out of the Bronco today. That's 17 degrees right there. And I'm going to keep watching it and I want to make sure I get that biggest number I can. So I got to start turning passenger here as well. And I'm very nervous for the belly of this Bronco. Oh there it is right there. I don't know man. I wonder if I front lock right now. If that'll do anything for me. Yeah I'm fully locked now. It's not gonna get the traction. I'm gonna have to bump it. Ready? Just popped her up. All right up and over the rock with a little bit of rubbing from the control arms. Some of the stuff here is really steep and the rocks are huge. So we're not going to make it over everything. But with this Bronco, if you pick and choose carefully your line, you can do some pretty extreme stuff. And that's exactly what we're working on right now. Now the next thing I'm going to say about driving this thing. It has all of those excellent off-road characteristics you want. I have this high seating position up here. I can see everything around me. The bonus of those corners up front, those little corner tie-down points, is they really give you a sense for yeah where those front corners are. Unlike a Wrangler, I can't quite see my fenders. I usually like that in the Jeep. But besides that the Bronco has that typical off-road tall seating position which I like. Okay so now we're coming down and I'm going to use forged trail control with one pedal drive. So right now I'm not touching the brake. I'm only using the gas. The vehicle is holding the brakes on. And then I just have to work the throttle. Just bring my momentum forward. And you know what? You can be really delicate with this system. That's what I like about it. I am in four low as well. So of course the gearing is helping here. When you lift all the way off, it does kind of grab you pretty quick. But once you're into it, you can really just feather it the tiniest bit. And for really hardcore rock crawling, you know, a lot of guys would do two-foot driving. And that's not what I'm doing here. But this simulates that two-foot driving with just one foot. The other thing I can show you here is this is your front nose camera. And when I put the vehicle into mud and ruts mode, this actually came up automatically. So as you're rolling forward here, you can actually see what's directly in front of your Bronco. And this is especially important when you're on extreme angles. Because right now I can't see what's down in front of my nose because I'm looking down. Or when you're coming up a hill, you're staring up at the sky and you can't see what's in front of your nose or your tires. So just another camera angle is really helpful. And I'll also say big screen is nice and the camera here is pretty crisp. So it's a nice looking camera. All right, now up to my next rock here. Now I'm trying to, again, avoid scraping anything. So I think the key for me is hitting things at an angle. You don't want to take these rock faces just straight on. So I'm going to try to kind of come at it and turn as I'm going up. Hit it at this angle, which is perfect. Now the breakover angle on this Bronco is also really good because it's got this short wheelbase, which is awesome because you can kind of, when you're getting nervous about your belly dragging, the rear tires usually hit the rock and then lift you right up. Well, folks, another key rule in off-roading, something that I really believe in, is to get out and check it out. If you're not sure where you're going, don't just keep driving, get out and look at your obstacle. And that's what we just did. We walked the trail in front of us and honestly, the rocks coming up were too big. So now we are executing the classic off-road turnaround on a trail, which is never that easy either because this trail is not that wide. All right, I just wanted a better angle on her. Yep, there we go. Successfully executed turnaround. Now I was just talking about the maneuverability. That's one part of it. Another thing I've noticed on this Bronco, every time we drive it, is that the lockers engage and disengage instantly. I've never had an issue where I'm sitting here rocking it or waiting for it to come on or anything like that. The lockers are just boom, lightning quick. And when you're trying to turn around out in the bush, well, yeah, you don't want to lock everything up. And you also don't often have a lot of maneuverability to be able to rock the vehicle and do any of that stuff. So I really appreciate the lockers here in the Bronco, how easily they engage. And here's an example where unlocking is going to hurt me. I unlocked, I left it unlocked. And even just trying to crawl up these rocks, the second you're lifting a tire, yeah, the traction is not happy. But man, again, instantly locked up and right away the thing just starts climbing like a mountain goat once again. Now I rubbed a little on the way up. Let's see if I rub it all on the way down. I think I actually... No! Camera down! Can you grab that please so I don't run it over? I blame the Bronco. I definitely blame the Bronco. All right folks, and now it's time for the mud. Let's see how she does. Gotta get a bit of wheel speed. Oh, it's soupy in here today. Oh, it's soupy. Nicely done, Bronco. Now I can show you underneath the Bronco thanks to our handy-dandy truck ramp. First of all, we have two big exposed hooks right up here. Now next, and I should point out, yes, this is after we went off-road. Next, we have two big skid plates in the front and magnet test. Yes, those are steel skid plates. The magnet sticks to them. Now this is one difference. Some automakers will give you one long front skid plate. Ford actually splits it up into two. I'm assuming that's probably for service to make it easier just to drop one plate to access different things. Now over here in the suspension, you can see the shocks there. They have a nice set of remote reservoirs. That's to make sure the shocks don't fade when you're out there running at high speeds. Now moving back, there is no transfer case skid plate like there normally is, and that's because the T-case is tucked up nice. But there is a fuel tank skid plate, and that is also a steel skid plate. So the Bronco is all steel underneath to protect it. At the rear end, you're also getting those nice set of remote reservoir shocks to make sure you're ready for some serious off-roading. And now it is time to properly test this wild track. I mean, it did a great job at rock crawling, but again, that's not what this model is about. This model has Baja mode, which I'm in right now, and that's all about going super fast in the desert. Now, we don't have any desert here in southern Ontario. We have big wide open farm fields, which is where we come to test Baja mode. So let's hammer down and see what happens. So Baja mode takes me into four high. It also activates my front camera here. First thing you notice is this little shorty wheelbase coming up and over these whoops. The back end just really bucks up on you. It's not what you'd call a smooth ride whatsoever, but it is also exciting. Now, the suspension here is, again, really the gem, and it's doing a nice job of soaking everything up. This Bronco is very softly sprung. So when you're driving it on road, it comes across really kind of roly poly, but then you get it into this and you start picking up the speed through these big holes and you feel exactly why it's like that. Oh man. And in Baja mode, it actually keeps the turbo spooled up. So the power is immediately there under your foot. When you nail it, it absolutely takes off. And I thought maybe I would lose my rear end around that corner. But again, I'm in four high. When you go into Baja mode, it puts you in four high. So coming around that corner, it didn't break loose at all. I nailed the throttle, the front end hooked up and just pulled me right through. This is, it's ridiculous. The high speed capabilities of the off-road vehicles we have today. And what's more, and you know, dad and I talk about this a lot. Off-roading, we use it as a blanket term, but it's not all the same. The rock crawling we were doing earlier, that's like putting a puzzle together. That's finding a specific line and picking which tire is going to hit which rock. This is more like, I don't know, playing an extreme sport. You're out here going super fast. You've got to make lightning quick decisions. And it's amazing to me that a platform like this Bronco can now be put together to do both of these things so well. I think that's the key. Other key here is if you buy the wild track, you're still going to be a pretty dang good rock crawler and then excellent high speeds. If you go for the bad lands, you're going to be an even better rock crawler and then pretty good at high speeds. So you've got to kind of pick the area of specialty you want out of your Bronco, but every Bronco is going to handle all off-roading pretty dang well. Well, folks, we're off the trails now and you saw this Bronco do some pretty crazy rock crawling. It was hauling through that field. In fact, dad actually caught total air, all four wheels off the ground. So kudos to him. I didn't hit it that hard. And you know what? The Bronco held up incredibly well. So with all of that in mind, now, dad, I think we try to answer the question we asked off the top, which is that, is the Bronco the new king? Because the Wrangler's been around for so long now, things have come and gone that have competed with the Wrangler, like FJ Cruiser, but nothing has had the staying power of the Wrangler, right? So Ford came along and said, no, we're going to take the fight to that thing. And yeah, I guess after seeing what the Bronco did today, how are you feeling about it in terms of comparing it to the Wrangler? You know what? I'm going to call this a dual monarchy. I'm going to say that each one kind of has its strengths, but they both perform really, really well. And I love having the competition. I love having the competition at this level because at one time Wrangler, that was it. And you had to sort of suck up whatever they were doing. Having Ford in the fight means that both of them are just going to keep getting better. And if you just consider that since Bronco came out, we've got 35 inch tires on Bronco and Wrangler now. Second Bronco did it, Jeep did it. The second Bronco, you know, Bronco Raptor's coming, Jeep said, hey, we're going to put a V8 in the Jeep. So you've already seen the fruits of that competition because you're right. It doesn't allow Jeep to sit there and get stagnant. They got to keep on innovating. So we've ended up with a lot of great models because of it. Yeah. But at the end of the day, you know, take your pick, Jeep or this Ford. They're both fun. Man, are they ever fun. They absolutely are. Well, folks, we have come to the end of this one. Now, I think you saw it today, whether you're picking through the rocks or you're flying across the desert or a farm field, this Bronco is a heck of a lot of fun. Now, I won't say outright it's better than a Jeep Wrangler, but it's fair to say that Ford and Jeep are going to be battling in this segment for years to come. Now, folks, that is it for this one. So please go below, leave us a comment. Let me know what you think of the new Bronco. As always, while you're down there, don't forget to hit like, hit subscribe, hit join to become a member, and then come right back here to Truck King to see what we're testing next, because you never know what it might be. See ya.