Haven't driven it. This is the first look, I can dig more, but there's plenty to work on here.

Body fits:

1) Door Gap & Flush - Generally good.
2) Hood Gap & Flush - Uneven. Driver side gap narrows considerably from windshield to front. Passenger side is dead straight. The two sides are uneven relative to each other.
3) Wheel Well Cladding - Passenger side extends further down from wheel well than driver side.
4) Bed - Exposed steel break edges at front corners. Yuck.


Interior:

1) A Pillar Trim - Generally good.
2) Door Flags - BIG gaps to A pillar at top on both sides, both are loose. The fastener is seated, but Tinnerman clips aren't cutting it.
3) Door Trim - Visible parting line at top of map pockets. Rat hole at rear of passenger side switch plate. Fit to sheetmetal is generally good.
4) B Pillar Trim - Big rat holes at rear of driver side to window seal. Big rat hole to seals at BOTH the front and rear of the passenger side. Both are relatively loose - fasteners are seated, but can't exert enough pressure to keep it trim seated well. Both seat belt exits (lower B pillar trim) have visible flash.
5) Steering Wheel - Again, the molded in Bowtie on the face of it looks cheap, PLEASE dress this up. Visible parting line flash on one of the spokes.
6) Center Console - In a word, TERRIBLE. It feels hard and cheap, because it IS HARD AND CHEAP. It rattles. Lots of side to side movement, and once again there are parting lines you can feel on the lid.
7) C Pillar Trim - BIG rat hole at rear of driver side, BIG rat hole at front of of passenger side to the window seal. Feels loose (same deal, the fasteners ARE NOT retaining the trim well enough).


Seats:
1) Loose front recliner handles.
2) Lumbar actuator is good, with low efforts to turn.
3) Front seat back trim is terrible - on a new vehicle it is already displaying "quimbys".
4) Rear seat cupholder rattles. Feels cheap.
5) How about a rear seat armrest?


Carpet:
1) The little cut-out flap over the seat belt fasteners is literally the worst looking thing I have ever seen done with carpet. Little flaps are cut out over them. It looks TERRIBLE. Trim it out for the love of God. Put a plastic cover over them. DO SOMETHING!


Headliner:
1) Loose. The christmas tree fasteners can't retain the darned thing. Screw it down and use cover plates if you have to to hide the screws. Christmas trees DO NOT CUT IT on a big headliner like this.
2) Overhead Lamp - Good fit, all the way around.

More to come if I get the chance to drive it for a while...

 

Sort of makes you wonder where this improved interior quality is.

How does this compare to Ford's F150 interior?

At the moment, I think Ford's F150 is the best made truck interior on the market... and this includes Nissan & Toyota.

 

Haven't diseccted an F-150 or Titan yet - and remember, I'm an engineer - so the aestetics are kind of lost on me. Looks good/doesn't look good is kind of out of my core competency. Fits/doesn't fit are more my speed.

Betcha I'll finish with roughly 50,000 man hours of work before I'm done though.

 

I saw one at the Houston autoshow. I have to admit that I really liked the way it looked, which surprised me. Ford better update the Ranger soon!

 

My sister (20 y/o) was in the "back seat" of the ext cab at the auto show. And she was trying to do something to the seat and broke the lever. We ran like there was no tomorrow.

 

LOL! Yeah, most of the manufacturers pull the gear shift and A/C **** off. This year only two cars didn't have the battery disconnected, lol.

 

What is a "rat hole"?

From an aesthetic point of view the F-150 looks great inside IMO. The the overall build quality seems to be very good, although still improvable.

The Tundra definitely has the best build quality out of all the trucks available right now, but man the inside of those things is boring enough to put my grandmother to sleep. It looks very very similar to the old style F-150 in terms of aesthetics, which is not a good thing.

I like the way the Silverado/Sierra's interior looks and functions, but it most definitely is cheaply made and put together IMO. I realize that this isn't important for a 'work truck', but I have news for those who constantly harp in this point... the large majority of 1/2-ton trucks on the market are sold for daily driving purposes... not as commercial vehicles and work trucks. If GM's 1/2-ton truck and SUV sales were mainly limited to commercial sales, they probably would be in the red right now.

 

A hole formed at the edges of two parts when they don't fit together cleanly. Common places are in three-sided corners, where two or three parts are coming together to a point. Commonly happens where pillar trim interfaces with the seals or the headliner.

Darndest thing is, for minimal money every problem noted could have been fixed on that truck. If done right the first time, the cost to produce the truck would have gone up may $20-$40.

The other frustrating thing is all the money that GM spends on quality folks, who don't catch this stuff and raise hell about it. I know assembly plants have problems at times, but this stuff needs to be fixed.

PS - I can shred a Toyota.

 

What do you mean? You can point out flaws in QC? I'm sure you might be able to... nothing is perfect, but the Tundra does a damn good job of leading the way to perfection IMO.

 

First, quality control and bad design are two different things. A quality department can never make a part any better than it was designed in the first place.

Toyota has significant problems with fit and finish because they don't use SPC. They do what is called a functional build, which is good, but the fact is that the body build degrades over time.

Second, there are just dumb mistakes Toyota makes with interior fits. Panels want to go together in certain ways to give good fits.

Third, the Japanese manufacturers do not use GD&T - big mistake in tooling and gaging. So, when you have a problem, you can't track it down.

Here are some quick ones I got off of a Tundra in the parking lot:

1) Hood gap uneven, side to side, front to rear.

2) Front headlight gap match to hood uneven.

3) Door gap variation, side to side.

I'll look at it some more and see what else I find - this was anything but complete. I just looked it over real quick.

 

I think the F150 has the best interior out of any ford or merc and some lincs sedans or trucks.

 

Keep in mind that this truck was co-designed with Izusu. It is a great driving little truck, however.

 

Have you driven the I5/5-speed combo yet? That would the setup I'd be looking for, but not if it drives like a gravel truck.

 

Sadly, not yet. Only the 5cyl/auto combo. Very respectable powertrain. I've heard from some other dealers that the stick is pretty quick.

 

For us non-engineers learning as we go, what is "SPC" and "GD&T"?