The fastest double cab bakkie in South Africa can now resist bullet too. Picture: Mark Jones
The bad guys are in for a tough time. The Ford Ranger Raptor has just added another accolade to its collection by becoming the country’s fastest rapid response double cab courtesy of SVI Engineering.
South Africa’s leading specialist manufacturer of armoured products now equips the go-anywhere, high-performance bakkie with a B4 level discreet armour kit. And The Citizen Motoring got to road test it.
The bullet-resistant, B4 discreet package for the Ford Ranger Raptor means that you have comprehensive 360-degree protection against handguns, right up to a 44 Magnum for the entire passenger cell. And this includes 21mm armoured glass curved to original-equipment specification. And precisely cut-and-bonded Kevlar sheets for the body.
In addition, armoured-steel plates are used in various smaller, otherwise typically more vulnerable areas, like the pillars. Armour concealed in the front fenders protect critical powertrain elements. And certain under-bonnet components also receive bullet-resistant protection.
If you ignore the SVI signage and security-specific flashing lights, which are operated and smartly integrated into the Ford OEM toggle switch cluster in the centre of the roof panel, you will not recognise that this Ford Ranger Raptor is bullet resistant. It’s only when you open one of the doors that you will feel the extra weight and safety that you now have surrounded yourself with. Even when you jump in, there is nothing obvious that gives the game away other than that neatly covered armoured-steel reinforced B pillars.
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As you should know by now, the Ford Ranger Raptor runs a potent 3.0-litre V6 twin-turbo petrol engine that produces a very real 292kW of power and a full 583Nm of torque. This is good enough to get the unarmoured version from 0 to 100 km/h in just 6.90 seconds while hitting the electronic speed limiter of 180km/h in less the.
Thanks to SVI’s lightweight armouring solution only adding 280kg to the overall weight of the Ford Ranger Raptor, we got a 0-100km/h time that was a fraction slower at 7.16 seconds. But remarkably the limiter still came into play before passing the 1km mark.
For the record, the armoured Raptor is still miles ahead of the previous gen 190kW VW Amarok, which clocked 8.14 seconds.
The gap to the current V6 Amarok (9.13) increases by almost two seconds, with the V6 Ford Ranger Wildtrak even further back at 9.29.
The fastest production Toyota Hilux The Citizen Motoring has tested is the GR-Sport which ran a time of 10.32 seconds. And the fastest Isuzu the D-Max V-Cross which clock 10.59 seconds.
The average person is not going to feel the difference in the armoured Raptor. And even when loaded with bullet-resistant armour, the Ford Ranger Raptor has no performance rivals on tar. As the cutting-edge FOX suspension system is retained, this rapid response bakkie is as fast and as capable as ever on dirt and off-road. I know it shouldn’t be as much fun as it is, but I absolutely loved my time spent with the SVI Ford Ranger Raptor.
SVI’s Qualified Vehicle Modifier (QVM) status with Ford means this armouring package for the Ranger Raptor is available from any Blue Oval dealership in South Africa. The bakkie’s standard warranty and any selected service or maintenance plan remains intact. In addition, Ford Credit can finance the entire package which includes the purchase price of the bakkie and the cost of the armour.
Ordered via a Ford dealer, the 360-degree B4 armouring solution for the Ford Ranger Raptor double cab costs R545 121 (excluding VAT) and takes three months to install. The list of options includes items such as roof armour, a PA system and heavy-duty run flat rings for the tyres, along with security-specific items like a siren and flashing lights.
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