Wondering whether the upcoming new Volkswagen Amarok range will be topped by a Ranger Raptor-based flagship? Well, a Ford engineer says it’s not part of the deal…

Unless you’ve been living under a rather sizeable rock for some time, you’ll know the second-generation Volkswagen Amarok will be based on the new Ford Rangerand likewise built here in South Africa. But will the German firm’s new bakkie range include a Raptor-based performance model?

Ian Foston, T6 chief platform engineer, suggested toDrive the Raptor is entirely off the table.

“The deal was for a mid-size pick-up programme. The new Amarok is a fully differentiated sibling vehicle, however the arrangement is for the core models. Raptor for us is considered a separate sub-segment, and it’s not included in the sharing deal,” Foston told the Australian publication.

That would suggest the Blue Oval brand’s twin-turbocharged 3.0-litre V6 EcoBoost petrol engine, which makes a whopping 292 kW and 583 Nm in the new Ranger Raptor, won’t find its way into the upcoming Amarok.

So, if VW has any intention of creating a high-performance version of its new Ranger-based bakkie (Amarok R, anyone?), it’ll seemingly have to develop such a machine without relying on the American automaker’s assortment of bespoke Raptor parts.

However, we do expect the latest version of Ford’s 3.0-litre V6 turbodiesel – which makes 184 kW and 600 Nm in certain derivatives of the new Ranger and likewise box-fresh Everest (which seemingly also won’t receive the Raptor treatment)– to be offered in the as-yet-unrevealed Amarok. This six-cylinder oil-burner would form a useful base for the Wolfsburg-based automaker to exploit should it wish to differentiate a high-performance Amarok from the petrol-poweredRaptor.

The outgoing Amarok, of course, is available with the VW Group’s burly V6 turbodiesel unit, which generates a heady 190 kW and 580 Nm (with 200 kW on overboost). The new model will be revealed later in 2022 before production kicks off at Ford’s assembly plant in Silverton.

Further Reading

2023 Volkswagen Amarok – More details confirmed