 |
We're in our motel room on the 22nd floor of the Hyatt-McCormick Place Chicago and we're stranded. The upper Midwest is being hammered with a major snowstorm that has paralyzed the region with up to a foot of snow. We can see a couple of miles of headlights on Lake Shore Drive. They're not moving... ...Neither are things at the airport or most anywhere else for that matter. The Four Wheeler Midwest Bureau is only 120 miles away, but it might as well be 1,200 miles because 4-foot drifts have closed the road leading to our rural offices and visibility is near zero as 30 mph winds howl.
But hey, we were blissfully unaware of all of these things for most of the day because we were immersed in the media days of the Chicago Auto Show and there were some big rollouts. First off, there was the Hummer H3T (see photo 1 below). Based on the H3 we all know and love, it has even more to love with 14 inches of stretched frame and an honest-to-goodness fullsize cargo box measuring 59.3 inches in length and 50.5 inches in width (both measurements at floor). In this image you can see a KTM dirt bike in the back and that'll give you a perspective of its size. There wasn't a moment all day when there wasn't some media-type going ga-ga over the H3T. It could have been the most photographed rig of the show next to Dodge's new Challenger. Over at Suzuki things got real interesting real fast when they rolled out the '09 Equator. This is Suzuki's first entry into the midsize pickup market. The Equator is a joint effort between Nissan and Suzuki and is based on the Frontier. The Frontier is a great vehicle, so Suzuki chose well. The Equator shown below (photo 2) is the Quad concept with a two-and-a-half-inch front suspension lift and custom matte paint. The Equator will be available in the fourth quarter of '08. GMC rolled out their new 2-mode hybrid Sierra pickup (photo 3). A true Hybrid, the Professional Grade guys say it gets 40 percent better fuel economy in the city than a standard Sierra. We're down with that. They tell us that the hybrid function works in four-wheel-drive, unlike the hybrid powertrain GM previously used in their half-ton pickups. Also part of the Big Show at GMC was the Denali concept (photo 4). This sexy rig is powered by a new Active Fuel Management 4.9L V-8 with Two-Mode Hybrid technology. They say it'll get 50-percent better fuel economy than comparable small pickup trucks. It has an air-ride IFS/IRS suspension and rolls on dubs plus three. We think it'll look great pulling a 5th wheel trailer. Finally, there was Ford. They rolled out an option package they call Ford Work Solutions. This system will be available in '09 on F-150, Super Duty, E-Series and the funky new 2010 Transit Connect vans (photo 5). Basically this system uses a dash-mounted computer to offer Internet capability and a whole bunch of other stuff. One of its neat features is Tool Link which uses RFID chips and readers to alert you if you're missing a tool from the bed of your truck. In photo 6 you can see one of the black box RFID readers on the side of the cargo box. We can think of a million uses for the Tool Link. Just think, if you have lots of kids you could just slap an RFID chip on the young 'uns and you'll never have to ask if everyone's in the truck again.
So there you have it. Tell us what you think of what the manufacturers trotted out. We'll have much more Chicago Auto Show coverage in the June issue of Four Wheeler.
|
Share This
|
|
|