Lightning Strikes Again

Today, we're gonna make lightning strike again.

First, we're taking Ford's latest version of their F 150 out for a road test.

Then with the help of Rausch

performance, we'll turn it into our own version of a supercharged lightning.

That's all today here on trucks.

Hey, welcome to trucks. Well, a while ago, we got our hands on a brand new 2007 Chevy Silverado. We tested it out and gave you guys our impressions of it.

We told you right off the bat. We're gonna be testing a lot of brand new trucks and letting you know what we think. Well, now it's Ford's turn

and we've got our hands on this regular cab 07 F 152 wheel drive pickup truck that we're gonna put through its Pacers

and just like we promised, we're gonna tell you the truth about it.

The F 150 is probably the best selling production truck ever made and has proven itself on and off road many times over

throughout Ford's history of groundbreaking innovations. Performance was always a main focus even introducing the popular and ground pounding lightning in 1993.

Sadly, the lightning was discontinued in 2004 despite its huge popularity with enthusiasts and its legendary performance.

Now, I know a lot of you guys are feeling like we are and you're dying for a new version of a lightning. Well, we're gonna do something about it

with

or without Ford, but we'll talk more about that later.

But for now, let's check out the truck. We've got the keys to

and there's no better way to check out a new vehicle. Let's check it out for a little road test.

Our truck came stock with all the standard features, power windows, door locks, climate control, power rack, opinion steering and a fully box frame for extra rigidity and better handling.

Now, one of the options includes the 300 horsepower 5.4 L three valve engine, which is the foundation for the new Shelby Mustang that pushes out over 450 horsepower.

Now, your Shelby is not capable of running E 85 but this truck is and that's going to give you an option at the pump.

But enough about that for now, let's see what this truck will do bone stock.

Now, we don't need a hyper pack to tell us that this truck absolutely refuses to do a good burnout.

Actually,

that was lame.

What's that?

But the hyper pack will tell us things like 0 to 60.

Our truck rang up an unimpressive 8.6 2nd time and labored through the quarter to a 16.4 seconds,

86 mile an hour posting on the hyper pack

with disc brakes all around

this truck stops pretty well.

All right. What do you got?

100 and 40 ft?

Feels a little spongy.

Yeah, she's got some body roll, doesn't she? Yeah.

Well, overall we like the F 150. We found it a little sluggish in the mid range. A bit spongy

and a tad grandpa in the styling department. But all in all it's a nice truck, especially for the price.

The base model comes in at around $22,000. Ours rang in at just over 28,000 loaded up with some pretty decent options,

but no matter how you cut it, this is still no lightning and it really did leave us wanting more.

So with the help of

rush performance, we're going to fill the void that Ford has left us without a lightning and walk you guys through what it takes to build your own version of a stage three truck. And this is the heart of the stage three kit. It's the root

South Super Charger that lets us bolt on 100 and 45 horsepower and makes our 5.4 L engine capable of 500 ft.

Sounds a torque.

It's a 50 state legal in the Valley supercharger system that integrates the inner cooler into the manifold base. It's a complete system that ships with new cold range plugs heavier injectors, a manifold plenum adapter, electric water pump heat exchanger, and all the pulleys brackets and hardware that you need to install this at home with simple tools. But one of the issues

with throwing a super charger on a stock engine is the extra pressure that the charger and belt puts on the crank shaft. And more importantly, the number one bearing up front and that can actually cause premature bearing wear. Well, Raus has solved this problem with their new damper pulley adapter and this second chief bracket system that actually distributes that new load amongst the super charger and all the drive accessories.

Now, here's the stock intake, it comes off pretty easily with basic tools. Now, we also had to remove the fan and shroud, the alternator fuel rail throttle body as well as the air intake system

and the serpentine belt.

Now rush

feels confident enough in this system to be

up for its three year 36,000 mile powertrain warranty that covers your engine transmission, the rear end plus the transfer case if you got a four wheel drive, even if you do it yourself first, the plugs are swapped for a cooler range to allow increased cylinder pressure and temperature.

There's a simple wiring modification that taps into an existing vehicle circuit and will control the super charger bypass.

The power steering reservoir is modified and relocates with a supplied bracket to make room for the new blower mount.

The heat exchanger slips between the radiator and the grill

and is bolted to the upper tie bar on the support,

the electric coolant pump mounts on the frame rail and is wired into a key

on circuit for constant flow of coolant.

The lower charger pulley piggybacks and bolts right on to the balancer.

When we come back, we'll finish up our super charger install

and then we'll show you what's on the inside of a true performance muffler.

Hey, welcome back to trucks. We're taking one of the most popular pickup trucks ever built and beef it it up big time. We're also filling the void that Ford left us with when they shelved their lightning series by throwing Rush's stage three performance package at this 2007 Ford F 150.

Now let's get back to our project.

Larger injectors are installed onto the stock fuel rail and it's very important that they're clocked to 90 degrees to the rail leaving this step out could cause you rough idle and fuel delivery problems at wide open throttle.

The stock throttle body sits on the blower using a new adapter

and the new lower manifold base reuses the stock 5.4 gaskets.

The coolant crossover is dropped in

and the coolant hoses are

rerouted

and finally, the supercharger is set in place and torque to spec

next, the alternator is reinstalled, followed by Rau's

new pulley bridge that redistributes the increased belt pressure amongst all the accessories.

Now, according to some people less is more.

But here on trucks

you think more is more. So we dropped on this rouse charger top end package. That's the heart of this proven and tested 445 horsepower system.

Now, rush surprised us a little bit and they just started offering a smaller diameter pulley that'll increase boost levels a little bit and have us flirting with 500 horsepower.

And once you get your rouse charger bolted down, there are a few other details. You've got to attend to

the pulley and belt from the new blower adds about two inches to the front of the drive assembly. So the stock shroud needs to be trimmed back for clearance.

A cut off wheel works great, but a reciprocating saw or a hand saw would work fine too.

Now, this entire install took us about 10 hours. So if you're going to do this at home plan on having your truck out of service for a couple of days, but trust us, it will be worth the wait.

But you can expect to throw a huffer on an engine and not allow the rest of the system to breathe a little deeper. Rauch reuses Ford's mass airflow sensor but gets rid of this small filter, the restrictive air box and quite frankly silly to con duct work in exchange for a much larger air box and this huge air filter that's going to really allow this thing to flow a lot more CFM.

Now, Rausch

engineers found that with their system, installing a set of headers only offered minimal power gains. So they rolled with the stock exhaust manifolds and they just re-engineered the exhaust with this stainless cap back system that'll open up the airways seriously increase efficiency and scavenging and add a throaty exhaust note.

Instead of telling you why this muffler flows so good, we thought we'd show you.

Now, this is obviously a flow through design with almost no restriction. But this muffler is quite enough at idle to meet the oe mandates for noise,

even though the stock exhaust is also stainless. This system splits off into duels that exit out the back in classic muscle truck style for better performance sound

and

well, the stainless tips, they don't hurt our eyes either.

You know, part of the whole vibe of

Rush's stage three truck is its wicked stance and it doesn't happen by accident either.

So the stock suspension on any truck is a compromise between ride quality and handling performance. Let's face it. If you're buying a stage three or building one, like we are, it's all about handling. More importantly, getting the power to the pavement and looking good while doing it.

Now, a lot of the sock suspension parts are gonna be replaced by the rouse system. So now that we've got the truck up in the air and all this great access, it's a perfect time to remove some of these pieces, box them up, get them ready for the internet auction

after the break. It's time for a much better ride with a little suspension. Worry

stick around.

Hey, welcome back to trucks

and thanks for sticking with us while we show you how to transform a stock F 150 into a rouse stage three street fighter.

And we've already taken care of throwing some famous rouse muscle under the hood with their root style blower free flow induction system and their high flow stainless steel cap back exhaust system.

And we've given ourselves enough power and torque to go toe to toe with just about any lightning.

Now, we're gonna get this thing into the weeds, get some of that 5000 odd pounds into a lower roll center. So this truck will handle out back. It's pretty easy to get about three inches a drop from a set of dr springs and we can stiffen it up pretty good with some custom tuned shocks.

Right. Yep.

Even with three inches of drop,

there's still plenty of room in the wheel. Well, for suspension travel. So you can still haul cargo just a whole lot faster. Now.

Now, up front,

it's a little more involved but still doable in your drive with jack sands and hand tools. Now, this system comes with specially valve shocks to rouse his specs coil over springs and this monster sway bar to help get rid of some of that crazy body roll we got with the stock set up.

Now, you'll need to reuse your stock upper and lower

spring mounts to assemble your new coil over, but don't just start on bolting things. There is a lot of stored energy in this coil spring and you could get seriously hurt, releasing it all at once. Now, in case you don't have a spring or struck compressor, here's an easy way to swap out springs on a system like this without fancy tools.

So with the stock strut assembly bolted in support the lower control arm with the floor jack and compress it a few inches,

disconnect the steering knuckle at the ball joint and remove the center nut on the strut from the top

and slowly lower the floor jack to release the tension and separate the strut from the upper strut mount.

Now, as you can see, these springs are gonna give us some drop about two inches according to Rausch.

And since they're progressively wound, they'll give us a good balance between ride and handling

with the lower spring seat, removed the base for the new spring slides onto the new shock, followed by the seat,

the cap and the bump stop. And finally the new Coral spring drops onto the seat.

This is actually just a little more work than if you had a struck compressor, but a good struck compressor can cost hundreds of dollars

and you can do it this way in your driveway.

And do it safely

between the lower center of gravity on the truck and this giant sway bar body roll should be a distant memory.

The stock F 150 has room for twenties. They'll just look a lot cooler with our truck lower down like it is. So we're using these cast aluminum chrome plated 20 by 8.5 inch wheels wrapped by these respectable 2 85 55 R 20 inch BF Goodrich directional tires. Now, this is the wheel and tire package that you get on a route stage street truck, but with 500 ponies under the hood, it's anybody's guess as to whether these things are gonna hook up me, I'm betting against the tires

up next. The right performance has gotta have the right look.

So we'll finish off our truck when we get back.

Hey, welcome back.

Now, if you're installing your own rouse charger on your vehicle, they'll provide you with an overnight prepaid package so you can send your agent's PC M back to rush

for a re flash turnaround time is only about 48 hours. And for us, they were right on time.

Nice.

Now, you guys know a truck is really just a solid hot rod platform with V8 power to rear wheel drive.

And here's your proof. A blown 445 horse F 150 using Rush's

stage three set up or 500 horsepower using their smaller pulley upgrade like we are,

but it's still needs to look as tough as it is and Rausch has it covered there as well.

Everything that Rausch offers, they molded parts, they're painted pieces, all of it is handled in house and guaranteed to fit your vehicle with. No worries. So, making a visual statement strong enough to back up Rausch performance reputation,

no problem here.

Now, they really thought through the appearance package they use in the stage three trucks.

And although these parts technically do little to nothing for performance.

The addition of just a few bolt on items really transforms this truck and gives it an aggressive attitude

without sacrificing function.

And speaking of function, the navigation system takes about five minutes to install, doesn't interfere with any vision

and it'll find us a great restaurant at lunch time

and fire it up soon it sounds like.

Oh, yeah.

Well, it sounds good. It looks good. Kick it, see what it'll do.

Well, if Ryan ever comes back with a truck, we're gonna take you guys with us next time we drive it, pay it off proper. See what that stage three will do. Stay watching. Come back, Ryan.

Hey, how many times has your tailgate slipped out of your hands and come crashing down? Well, Dey

has a solution for you. It's called the Easy Down and check this out.

Now, these simple but effective kits include the damper, the hardware and even the tools needed to install them.

You can get one of these on your truck in about 10 minutes. They've got them for full size dodge, Chevy and Ford pickups and they only set you back about 50 bucks.

The price of fuel just seems to keep going up and up and up. But here's five easy things that you can do to get better fuel economy that won't cost you anything. Air is free, but an underinflated set of tires can rob you of a couple of

MPG just driving around. And did you know that for every 500 pounds of extra cargo weight that you're carrying around in your pickup? Well, that can rob you of 2 to 5

MPG. So if you got some stuff bouncing around in the back of your truck, unload it and save some money, a

dirty air filter will rob you of a mile per gallon at highway speeds. And if you're pulling a big load, put it on a trailer and don't stack it up high on your truck. Decrease wind resistance is increased fuel economy. NASCAR proves that every week and lastly, you don't have to warm your vehicle up, start it up, get the oil circulating and then get on the road because remember if you're not moving, there is no

MPG. Thanks for watching trucks. We'll see you guys next week.