Is The Ford Maverick Body-On Frame And Is It Made Of Aluminum?

The Ford Maverick is Ford's entry into the very compact truck market, and it's proven to be a very capable option for drivers who don't want or don't need a full-size pickup like an F-150 or even a midsize choice like a Ford Ranger. SlashGear has reviewed many different variations of the Maverick and found it immensely efficient and even pretty fun to drive if you opt for the Maverick Lobo.

Given that it has a bed, it's definitely a pickup truck. But you might be wondering how far that truck DNA goes. Its bigger brothers are body-on-frame vehicles, and the F-150 uses aluminum in its design. 

As it turns out, the Maverick is not body-on-frame. It's a unibody construction, meaning that a Maverick's body acts as the skeleton of the vehicle. It's actually much closer to a crossover SUV like the Ford Escape than an F-150 or Ranger. In fact, it shares a lot of components with the Escape and Ford Bronco Sport, including the eight-speed automatic transmission. 

As for the construction of the unibody, Ford notes that it's all steel. The doors and body panels are steel too, with the only aluminum part being the hood. That puts your maximum payload at 1,500 pounds. Which, for being such a small truck, put its very close to more traditional body-on-frame trucks like the Nissan Frontier which maxes out at a 1,590 payload.

So, despite the Ford Maverick, F-150, and Ranger all sharing the blue oval badge on the front and a pickup bed, the trucks aren't even on the same planet when it comes to DNA and construction. But the Maverick is not an inferior vehicle by any stretch. It gets better gas mileage than most trucks on the market, especially if you opt for the hybrid. It's also much less expensive than the entirety of the Ford lineup. So, its unibody construction is really just a different way of doing things.