I have been looking for a used F150 2011-13 and I cannot believe the amount of used vehicles within a few hundred miles of where I live (South Bend, IN) that have come out of Canada. I'm not sure why this is, I even talked to a larger used car dealer in our area and he admitted they have been getting a lot of trucks out of the great white north. I'm concerned about salt damage & rust being covered up on the undercarriage, I have seen too many of these Canadian trucks with clean (too clean) and shiny undercarriages. I wonder if whoever is importing these things is covering up any potential rusting issues. It also seems that Canadian exports are getting a white gauge overlay converting the speedometer from KPH to MPH. At first I thought this was a Canadian option, but after seeing so many trucks coming out of Canada with the white gauges and never seeing one from the US with them, I think that is what's happening. Just wanted to make you all aware.

 

I found a bunch of them down here in TN too when I was looking.

 

I see you picked up a '13 Screw 5.0, I sent you a PM.

Some of them are nice looking trucks, but here are my concerns, let me know if I am worrying booths too much.

1. Rust underneath, not sure now much salt the use up there, I'm sure it varies by region, but I think who ever is bringing them in is covering it all up with undercoat because some of these are too clean

2. Any issues with the kilometer to miles conversion and who is opening up the gauge cluster to install these overlays

3. they are being transported quite a ways, lots of opportunity for damage in transit and lot/transit guys flogging on the trucks

 

I had one. No issues with it

 

Because of the oil price crash the auctions up here are full of fleet trucks and repos. I've heard the same, that most of this is being loaded up and sent south .

 

Hmm, fleet trucks and repos. Is this good enough reason to stay away? Carfax doesn't say much about Canadian history.

 

My neighbour approached me the other day about buying my 2013. It turns out he is doing just this. Shipping our trucks to the States. He explained it as a shortage in the used market down there combined with good exchange rate means money in his pocket.

 

Salt is not used across all Canada.. reason is salt is no longer efficient. (Something like < -15c or -5f)
West of Saskatchewan and all northern provinces do not use salt..
Around here trucks/cars are not rusted at all... but if you're used truck came from Montreal.. ouch, you're SOL, eh?

 

When I started looking for a truck a few months back a local Ford dealership had 5-6 Canadian XTR package trucks on the used lot. I test drove one and was curious about the XTR designation so I did some research and went back and took a closer look once I found out it was from Canada. It had definately been through a nothern winter with a lot of rust on the under carriage, and it was missing a few things compared to the US XLT package so I ended up passing on that one. Apparently I wasn't the only one as those trucks stayed on the lot for a while then disappeared as a group. Having grown up around the car business I called some friends and asked about the trucks and found out that they had been bought at auction at a significant discount in the hopes of making a higher profit in what is a strong used car market in my area.

 

Ford Trucks undercarriage can typically be covered with rust coming off the lot new. I'm in Canada, I see rust under there but it's just some surface rust on stuff that will outlast the truck anyway. Rocker panels, door seams, etc are more important to look at and my 2011, a daily driver in the city, has nothing more than superficial spots. I rustproof. I don't think I've seen any F150s around here from the 2008-2014 era with any significant sign of body rust, but I'm sure there is some on the vehicles where owners didn't clean the right spots or rustproof.