truck market tanks
 

I didn't even notice this until recently. I am selling my truck for a little extra cash and to get out of that payment. In trying to do so I have found that the market for trucks, in general, has gone south fast.

this add says it all to me.

https://www.modernautomotive.com/ou/w...ge=a_exclusive

I am not endorsing them or recomending that anyone go and buy a truck. I just know what trucks usually run price wise and this is plum craziness.

I have also heard that ford and chevy are converting some of their truck making plants into car making plants.

being a truck owner for almost 10 years, I just don't understand it. I mean I do in a way, but I didn't think it was this bad.

It's just that the people that bought trucks/suv for looks and not cause they needed one are dumping them in favor of more economical cars. Give the economy a couple years to recover from the housing idiots and get used to the gas price and trucks will be popular again.

Why not? I don't know about Ford, but most of GM's truck production is on lines that made cars up until the mid 90's when the demand for trucks & SUV's started to climb. Then when GM discontinued their full size lines (Caprice, Roadmaster, Fleetwood, etc) all those lines were converted to truck production as well.

Another thing to note is that the US Gov't is partially responsible for the rise of trucks and vans on the American roads. Because there are different emissions and safety standards for passnger vehicles (cars) and light trucks (pickups, vans, and minivans). Because of this it was cheaper to discontinue the larger stationwagons which did get far better economy and most full size wagons also had the gov't's highest crash test rating available. Not true of the minivans that immediately replaced them. Early minivans had poor crash ratings, and got worse mileage than the large wagons. You could have bought a full size Ford Crown Vic wagon that turned high 20's on the highway with a fuel injected 302, seated 8, and had an excellent safety rating, OR you could have bought a 1st gen Dodge Caravan with a 4 cyl or an optional V6 that was lucky to get 20 on the highway.

Because the Caravan was not required to meet the same safety and emissions requirements as the wagon they were able to make & sell it cheaper than the wagons.

The bright side is if you need something big, bargains can be had. That was my boat. I'm pretty happy.

trucks are useful but they need to make smaller compact pickups again!!! the retards at GM decided to kill off one of the best selling small pickups after a great 20+ year run...also they got good FE for what they were, (newer s-10 on highway can achive 30 stock, add a few mods and some get low 30's)

the ranger and colorado are still around but really the colorado is larger and boxier than the last s-10's and dont get near of good as milleage. the ranger claims to get 28 which is good but personally i think the rangers after the boxy 80's kind were ugly...

The Colorado/Canyon are a big fail. In real world fuel economy they don't do any better than the full size 5.3l V8 Silverado/Sierra, and people aren't satisfied with their performance. The only contenders in compact pickups are Ford, Toyota, and Nissan now, unless you count the Ridgeline or Baja as "pickup"...which I guess depends on exactly how you intend to use it.

GM does a lot of stuff right, despite what is often heard from the naysayers and closed minds, but abandoning the compact pickup to take on the Dodge Dakota mid-size truck was not a good move IMO.

I had looked at the Colorado/Canyon when I was looking at the Beast... I had determined that they did get similar mileage, and I'd rather have the big truck if there were no mileage gains to be had from buying the small one. Plus, being a used model, the Beast was a fully loaded 4x4 vs a stripped down 2wd Canyon for $4,000 more. Plus there was a certain amount of charm (at least for me) in buying a truck with one of the last 350's in it.

I forgot about purchase prices...IIRC, the Colorado/Canyon start at about the same price as a base "Work Truck" edition Silverado/Sierra.

Edit: There's a couple grand difference.

At the time I bought the Beast the base model Canyon was a few thousand more than the base Sierra "work truck". Here's the vehicles I looked at when I was at that dealer...

2004 Sierra work truck with a/c and cruise. Leftover model at end of year. Would have been $14,000 & 0% financing.

2002 Sierra (used) extended cab 4x4 with absolutely everything on it... ~$20,000

2005 Canyon - looked at several of these... The ones I looked at ranged in price from $16,000 to $19,000. 0% financing

1998 Sierra extended cab 4x4 with everything except leather - they were asking $13,500 but I talked them down to $12,000 and paid cash.

All the vehicles got realtively the same mileage, but once I drove the Beast it was all over... It was so comfortable I had to have it, and since it was the cheapest of all the vehicles I looked at it wasn't that hard a decision.

-Jay