[taildragger]

"Thanks. I don’t keep up closely. I was just going on what I thought I heard from my body man last week. I have a 2010 F-150. Got rear-ended by a couple of dope-heads a couple of weeks ago and it went into the shop this morning to be fixed. My body man said they have not had very good experience with repairing the trucks with aluminum parts. He did not elaborate, so I don’t know the specifics of his complaints. But he is personally staying away from the aluminum."

Some dear friends on another coast own a large successful independent body shop. They are getting close to retirement, and the next thing they may work on in the next few years will be their golf swing. I spoke to them about the F series w/ the aluminum body. It would take a capital investment for the special tools to fix them, so given their place in life and the number / yr that come through the door it wasn't cost effective.

What goes un-discussed is that the reason for finally going to an aluminum body for mileage was they had come up with a system that is repair-able, and not cost a fortune to fix like an Aluminum Audi, Jag, etc etc.

[Spktyr]

That depends on what they were planning on fixing. With the aluminum body trucks, you’re mostly replacing panels or the entire bed as a unit, so no special tools required. The big difference between them and the aluminum Audis and Jags is that the Euro sedans are all welded and glued together and the F-150 is bolted together for the most part.