Although there are many aftermarket tuners in the industry who can customize your vehicles brilliantly, people are skeptical about going to them as it may void the factory warranty and who knows, maybe even mess around with insurance claims in worst case scenarios. I’m not talking about big shots like Hennessey, Roush, and the likes. It’s the other smaller, inexpensive players. But, if the mods are done at the factory or dealership level, there is less hesitation. So, here’s one such Ford dealership which goes by the name of Long McArthur. The dealership is offering a ‘Sidewinder’ package on the Ford F-150, and from our initial impressions, this is an absolute steal-deal.

Exterior

The 2019 Ford F-150 Sidewinder doesn’t look drastically different from the stock F-150. The changes mainly focus on making it more off-road friendly than it already is. Upfront, the F-150 Sidewinder wears a black mesh grille with a thick border surrounding it. The Blue Oval logo is slapped in between. It comes with the stock C-shaped headlamps but there are LED Daytime Running Lights. The sturdy bumper follows the same design as the face of the truck. Fog lamps are placed deep inside the bumper, as they should be, to avoid any physical damage to them.

The side profile is where all the difference is seen. Let’s get the basics out before we get to the changes. The mainframe of the truck has been left untouched. The doors, side of the truck, and the bed are all standard affair. Below the doors is a running board that looks sturdy and is much needed on the Sidewinder F-150 because the truck is raised by two inches. It rides on 17-inch wheels borrowed from the Ford Raptor wrapped in 35-inch BF Goodrich TA K02 All Terrain Tires. The wheels are not overly done and suit the subtle personality of this modded truck. The wheel arches are finished in Matte Black Style Flares that we’ve seen on plenty of other trucks before. Moving to the side of the truck bed, it features a ‘Sidewinder’ sticker and is more than prominent.

Move to the back and you won’t notice anything extraordinary. The cab’s rear comes with a high mounted stoplight. There is another ‘Sidewinder’ sticker here. If you have keen attention to detail, then you’ll even notice the raised stance and new tires from the rear. The truck bed, however, is sprayed with a Rhino Pro Spray-in Bedliner to protect it from scratches, dents, and create a skid-free base that helps keep things in place. The truck also comes with a Class IV trailer hitch. To make parking easier, Ford also offers a rear-view camera on this as standard.

Interior

On this inside, the Sidewinder does not come with a whole lot of changes. In fact, they are merely related to stuff that comes with this package. Long McArthur offers the Sidewinder with Tray All-Weather Mats as an addition. Yes, that’s all. Nothing else is new here. In terms of storage, space and seating, things also remain untouched. Interestingly, there are no Sidewinder stickers on the inside. Doesn’t the dealership want to offer the ‘feeling of pride’ to the owners? This is no Hennessey, but people are spending money on the package; oh, wait…are they paying for the Sidewinder package? Check out the pricing section to get details on this.

Drivetrain

The drivetrain on the Ford-150 Sidewinder is stock with no change in power figures whatsoever. Although it's used in the smallest F-Series truck, the upper block cylinders on this mill are made of the same compacted graphite iron used in the 6.7-liter, Power Stroke Turbo Diesel mill from the Super Duty series. The engine also features a dual-injection system that helps direct power to the wheels in a better, linear manner so you don’t feel underpowered at any time.

The engine is mated to a 10-speed automatic gearbox that not only helps you stay in the powerful mid-range all the time where all the power lies, but it also helps in keeping the engine efficient. To put it into numbers, the F-150 returns 19 miles to the gallon in the city and 24 miles per gallon on highways. With this engine under the hood, the Ford-150 can tow up to 9,000 pounds and comes with a payload rating of 2,470 pounds. Speaking of the lift job on the truck, the Sidewinder package comes with a two-inch suspension level kit. Suspension kit jobs are not very sophisticated and are simple to install as well. The modern truck these days are raised a little higher at the back than the front so that the truck bed doesn’t hit the road when it tows to its full capacity. So, leveling kits raise the front end to match the rear and to accommodate bigger tires on all the four corners. This, in turn, increases the ground clearance as well.

This way the stock-stance is retained as it is. Some are usually made up of a metal puck that’s bolted to the truck’s front strut assemblies. The struts are then put back on and you have the desired result. These are generally limited to a maximum raise of two inches. Another change involves the recalibration of the speedometer. Since the truck rides on bigger tires, the accuracy of the speedometer changes thus resulting in false data that is displayed. To sort this out, Long McArthur Ford offers Hypertech Speedo Recalibration. The Hypertech Calibrator makes use of USB cable and a CD that contains the software to recalibrate without using other tuning features.

Pricing

Now comes the best part. According to the dealership, the actual price for the Ford F-150 Sidewinder was $54,785. However, the dealership is offering a $10,000 discount on the truck. This brings down the price to $44,785, which happens to be even lesser than the actual price of the stock truck. The sticker price of the truck here is $46,190, which means the F-150 with the Sidewinder package is $1,405 cheaper than the standard F-150 without the mods. How cool is that! Long McArthur is also offering a 3-year/36,000-mile warranty on the F-150 Sidewinder. So, you don’t need to worry about the additions hampering the warranty.

Final Thoughts

At this price point, the F-150 Sidewinder is a steal-deal. The changes that the Sidewinder offers on the truck increase the off-roading prowess at best. It does not look any better in terms of design, but a raised stance and beefier tires do add to the butchness of the F-150. It makes no sense to opt for the standard F-150 over this unless you really don’t want or like the additions. Any non-takers for this here?

Further Reading

Read our full review on the 2018 Ford F-150.