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2021 New Ford Bronco Reveal

SPEAKER 1: three and a half years ago, Ford teased with the Bronco logo at the Detroit Auto Show, a vehicle they haven't produced in over 20 years. Well, the wait is over. And not only do we have one Bronco, we have three. [MUSIC PLAYING] We have the two-door Bronco, the four-door Bronco, and the Bronco Sport, which is based off of the Escape. The main Bronco will go on sale in the beginning of 2021 while the Bronco's Sport will be available near the end of 2020. Of course, style is one of the biggest draws for the Bronco. And it has a ton of it, especially when we talk about the cool retro heritage that comes with the original first gen Bronco. First off, we have this one-piece grille and the round headlight styling. That is unmistakable Bronco styling. And quite honestly, I love it. We also have very, very short overhangs that gives it a very steep approach angle as well as in the back with the departure angles. Now, modularity is going to be a word that comes up a lot in this video because almost everything you see here is removable or modifiable. These rails right here are very sturdy, easily removable, but they give you a very good indication of where the corners are when you're off roading. Throughout the side, we also have big, featureless kind of door panels if we had doors. But the key here, too, is it's very quick to remove the doors. It's one bolt that goes through the hinge, pretty smart and a lot easier than pulling doors off of a Wrangler. Further down, we have a lot more heritage traits coming in. But most importantly, it looks great. The rear 3/4 looks fantastic with these upright tail lights and with a tire mounted on the rear gate. Now, I don't have full specs yet, so I'm going to send that forward to future Mark. As you probably can tell, I was rushed for time and short on information when I was checking out the Broncos in Michigan. But I'm home now. And I have a lot more to share with you, at least all the information we have so far. So let's start with specs. The two-door and four-door Broncos will be body-on-frame SUVs, which means they're built a lot like a pickup truck. They should have better off road and towing capabilities than the typical modern crossover SUV. The two door has seating for four while the four door has seating for five. The base engine will be a 2.3-liter turbo-charged four cylinder that makes 270 horsepower and 310 lb feet of torque. Not all that impressive, but there will be an upgrade. There will be a 2.7-liter turbo-charged V6 that's good for 310 horsepower and 400 pound feet of torque. Now, that sounds a lot more appropriate, especially for the four-door Bronco. At the moment, there is no word or even a hint that there will be a hybrid-electric variant. But one could hope. The big news as far as I see it is transmissions because the base transmission will be a seven-speed manual transmission. You heard right, a stick shift in the Bronco. But get this. The seventh speed will be a dedicated crawl gear. Brilliant! How cool will that be? Unfortunately, that transmission will only be offered on the base four-cylinder engine. The V6 will get a 10-speed automatic, which will also be optional on the four cylinder. As a proper offroader, these Broncos will come standard with a two-speed transfer case. There is also an option for an electromechanical transfer case. The front suspension gets AA arms while the rear is a solid-axle multilink setup. Both get coilovers and Bilstein shocks. There will be several trims and packages available with awesome-sounding names like Big Ben, Black Diamond, Outer Banks, Badlands, and Wild Track. There's even one called Sasquatch, which comes with beadlock capable wheels. Rad. Some of these may alter the Bronco's off-road capabilities for better or worse. But even in base form, the specs are strong. Add in the available 35-inch all-terrain tires, and those specs get downright impressive. In base form, the Bronco will have 8.4 inches of ground clearance. Approach angle is 35 and 1/2 degrees. Break over is 21.1 degrees. And departure angle is 29.8 degrees. If you opt for the 35-inch all-terrain tires, ground clearance claims to an impressive 11.6 inches. Approach angle increases to 43.2. Break over's 29 degrees. And departure angle is 37.2 degrees. And with a Sasquatch package, maximum fording depth comes to 33 and 1/2 inches. Wow. Because I was so rushed in Michigan when I was taking a look at those Broncos, I want to take a little more time to go over all the details. And there are a ton of them. They all add up to something pretty amazing. Now, starting from the front, let's talk about that grill. It is, obviously, a nod to the first generation Bronco from 1966, the one-piece horizontal grill with two round headlights on either side. Just above those headlights are some cool cleats. Now, those cleats can be used as tie downs for whatever you want to secure to the hood rather than using tow straps that go from a bumper, pass the headlights, onto the hood because those straps will block some of the forward line that you have available to you. Those cleats also serve as limb lifters or limb risers. So if you're off roading through some dense woods, put a cable between that and the top of the windshield, and they'll gently lift some of that vegetation right out of the way. There's also a very cool detail within those cleats. And that is the shape of the grille itself-- two dots with a horizontal bar between them. It's a nice little touch. But it also serves a purpose. We can still secure stuff with a nylon strap through that slot while also using the limb lifters through one of the round holes. You'll also notice at the top of the fender is a tiny little peak. And that's also a nod to the original first-generation Bronco that had these kind of almost fins that go from nose to tail. If you were to look at the classic Lincoln Continental, it has something similar with that fin that goes the entire length of the vehicle. Not only is it a nice little aesthetic touch, but it also serves a purpose. It gives the driver a much better indication of where the corners are on the vehicle. If you've ever driven an old classic car with tail fins, you know what I'm talking about. There are even cool details about the mirrors. You might notice that they're not mounted to the doors. And we'll get to that in a bit. They're mounted to the hood, that section just between the hood and the windshield. Now, there are several benefits there, too. First off, when you remove the doors on the Bronco, that means you still have mirrors. And integrated into those mirrors are a lot of the surround view and off-road capable cameras. So you're not going to lose anything by taking off the doors except, well, you know, protection. Also at the top of the windshield, you might see these two little tabs. If you pop those open, underneath will be two hard mounting points. Now, that means you can mount anything you want up there. Whether it's a light bar or a big heavy rack, it can handle it. A few months ago, a few pictures of the Bronco leaked online. And the Bronco faithful had a few objections, notably the black plastic fenders that were shown. But I will say that they're very quickly mobile with some quick release tabs underneath. So within a matter of seconds, not minutes, you can pull them off and hit the trails. Another cool detail are the torque bolts that seem to hold everything together on the Bronco. There's this very cool embossed Ford logo in it. Now, that's a throwback to the World War II era when Ford was building jeeps for the war effort. Now, they distinguished the Ford build jeeps from everyone else with a slight little F, Ford, on their bolts. I like details like that. Further down the vehicle are the doors which are, obviously, removable. But unlike the Jeep Wrangler, these doors are removable with a single long bolt. It has an added bonus-- they're coupe like doors, which means they don't have these roof pillars attached to them. So here's the kicker. When you roll the windows down and remove the door, it can fit inside the car if you have the option for stowable doors. They also built in clever handholds right where you would normally try to grab it because they're not particularly light either. So with the handholds at the corners, you should be able to get it into the back of the Bronco with a little less effort. Also removable are roof panels. And when you do remove them, you have a straight shot right up to the sky. There's no big bar kind of blocking your view. You can literally stand up in the front seats and look out the top just like Safari style. Sign me up. In the back, there is a side-hinged rear gate. But if you ask me, it's hinged on the wrong side, at least for the US, where we drive on the right side of the road. That means if you're parked on the street, in order to load anything into the cargo area, you'll have to do it from the driver's side of the car. I brought that up to the Ford designer. And he was very quick to respond that, if it was hinged on the left side, that means you're opening that gate into traffic, leaving yourself open to the possibility that someone might drive right into it. So I'll give him that one. As for the interior of the Broncos, they are just as cool. Keep in mind that wherever you see one of these torque bolts, it's an indication that whatever it's mounted on is removable. And that goes for those handhelds that are right on the edges of the dash as well as on the center console for the front passenger. That means you have the freedom to swap them out, or remove them, or add extra ones to your heart's content. I certainly wouldn't be surprised if the aftermarket community comes full force with a ton of accessories for the Broncos. Now, talking about those handholds for the front passenger, you might notice that there's one on the side right where the dash ends. There's also one right next to the center console. That means that the front passenger can actually triangulate themselves with their handholds, giving them a much better purchase on the seat so they won't be bounced around when you're really doing some serious off roading. One of the coolest interior features of the Bronco is something that I had wished would show up in the Land Rover Defender. And that's a drain plug in the floor. You know where I'm going with this? [GIGGLES] That means you can hose off a lot of the interior, open up that drain plug, and it just goes draining out the bottom of the car. Brilliant. It was something that the original Land Rover Defender had. And just like the Defender, this new Bronco has sealed switches where it counts. So you won't short circuit a thing when you're hosing all that mud and dust out of the interior. The theme of modularity also carries over to features that are as typical as map pockets. In the doors, you'll see those pockets with some netting. But those are also removable. Swap out with whatever you want, or make whatever you want. Another cool detail that I fell in love with on a Bronco was on the top of the dash. It's this little accessory rail that you mount stuff to. In a lot of ways, it looks like a picatinny rail if you're into shooting sports. But it's something that you mount a GoPro to, a radar detector to, a phone mount. Whatever you can dream up, you could probably mount it to that system. And if you don't have that kind of system, if you don't have the particular mounting hardware for that kind of rail, you're still in luck. That entire rail is removable and can be replaced with something that you can use. All of this new Bronco goodness won't end when you leave the vehicle either. When they go on sale in 2021, you'll have the option to attend the Off Rodeo. The Off Rodeo will be an offroad school situated at four permanent locations throughout the country. And it'll allow, let's say, less gifted off roaders get the skills they need to tackle some real rock crawling. Also available will be something called Bronco Nation, an online community for previous and current Bronco owners to talk about great trails, show off the rides, and just feel like they're part of a big movement again. The Bronco Sport is based off the Ford Escape and, obviously, won't be as rugged as the other Broncos. But it will be capable nonetheless. The base engine is a 181 horsepower 1.5 liter three cylinder, which sounds a little weak. There is an upgrade to a 2-liter turbo-charged four cylinder that's good for 245 horsepower. An eight-speed automatic is the only transmission offered. But four-wheel drive and a locking differential is available. Thanks, future me. Man, that guy is a hell a lot smarter than I am, isn't he? We're going to have a lot more information on all the Bronco lineup as we get closer to its on-sale date. So keep checking back with edmunds.com for the latest. And of course, if you want to know anything about them and their competition, head on to edmunds.com. To see more videos like this, hit subscribe.

The Ford Bronco is back! And not only that, but it's also available in three different flavors: a two-door, a four-door and the Bronco Sport.

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