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It's weird to see a new vehicle announced like this that's not an EV. I wonder what it's like launching a gas truck when new battery-powered trucks are looming
by thatcherc 3mo ago
It's weird to see a new vehicle announced like this that's not an EV. I wonder what it's like launching a gas truck when new battery-powered trucks are looming in the distance (or already here).
- herbst 3mo agoThere are many great EV cars. But when you have a trailer or caravan we still talk about a heavily reduced range (and often they aren't allowed to pull at all, or weight limits get a problem, at least in Europe)
- analog31 3mo agoThe interesting thing in the US is that a lot of pickups, possibly most of them, are purchased for regular daily driving. None of the people I know with pickups have trailers.
- csto12 3mo agoI love seeing Ram 6000 Max Diesel Rampage Pros who’s sole job is going to work and Walmart.
- wlesieutre 3mo agoAnd when they pick up groceries they load everything onto the floor of the back seat because the bed is so high up you’d need a step ladder to use it
- Eueudhsbsj32 3mo agoI think the more important reasons are to prevent the groceries from sliding around in the bed and to protect them from the sun and precipitation.
- bakies 3mo agoDang, if only someone made an everyday car with a soft weather proof enclosed cargo area, possibly you could have the tailgate open up and away as well so it's not in the way. I would think Americans would love to have something more practical than a work vehicle
- antonvs 3mo agoSounds communist
- Eueudhsbsj32 3mo agoSure, I could buy a dedicated more efficient car for the rare days when there is zero risk of rain and I don't need to haul anything larger. After more than 1cm of rain, the last 500m of the steep dirt road up to my off-grid house in the mountains is completely impassable without 4wd. And I, or my family-in-law, regularly haul large trees, construction equipment, several 100kg of fertilizer, etc. in the truck bed. Buying a single vehicle, a pre-owned 4wd Ford Ranger made the most economic sense.
- wlesieutre 3mo agoStill see this in the ones with tonneau covers as if they intended to put cargo in the bed But who knows maybe it’s already full of stuff under there
- 3mo ago
- bloomingeek 3mo agoSo true! My Ram 1500 was purchased to pull our travel trailer. It has the tow package and is factory raised up some. I'm kind of old, so I keep a three-step ladder in the bed so I can easily climb into it. Because of the poor gas mileage, I always wonder at why people drive these gas guzzlers as their main transport. But each to his own. (BTW, some claim safety, but it's probably fashion.)
- lostlogin 3mo agoThe safety aspect is intersting. The driver might be safer, but they are vastly more likely to kill anything they hit. https://www.lshtm.ac.uk/newsevents/news/2025/being-hit-suv-increases-likelihood-death-or-serious-injury https://www.lshtm.ac.uk/newsevents/news/2025/being-hit-suv-i...
- pepperoni_pizza 3mo agoWhich a selfish person is definitely okay with, might even like it.
- analog31 3mo agoAnother reason is to avoid letting the inside of the bed get scratched. I lived in Texas for a while, and people were that fussy about their trucks.
- prmoustache 3mo agoAs a european I would have thought having scratches in the bed and dirt on the bodywork would be a mark of pride.
- t-3 3mo agoNope, sign of (relative) poverty. Big trucks are expensive, and having one that has obviously never seen so much as a 2x4 is very effective class signaling. The people who actually need trucks to work with buy the cheapest option that gets the job done and wring every last dollar back out of it.
- rationalist 3mo agoFirst thing I did with my truck is get a spray-in bed liner.
- MisterTea 3mo agoTo be fair it would slide all over in the bed.
- deleted 3mo ago[deleted]
- stackghost 3mo agoThe suburban people buying Ram 9001 Warlord Editions are not the target market for this truck.
- phoghed 3mo agoIsn’t the Ram Rampage a more compact non US market 4cyl variant? Like a maverick competitor?
- csto12 3mo agoI just made up a name. I know Rebel is a model that’s hilariously large. Don’t know about others.
- quickthrowman 3mo agoYes, the RAM Rampage is comparable to a Ford Maverick which is a unibody vehicle with a truck bed. The massive truck they likely meant would be a RAM 3500 HD super crew cab full size bed Cummins diesel dually rear axle with a vertical dual stainless steel smokestack exhaust kit for good measure. Which is essentially the largest truck you can get with a pickup bed from RAM, GM, or Ford; and they go for over $100,000 with options. There are even larger monstrosities with pickup beds built on top of 550/5500/Class 5 truck chassis which are basically a Canyonero from He Simpsons in real life: https://www.elevationoffgrid.com/ https://www.elevationoffgrid.com/ My favorite derogatory term for a vehicle type is ‘hausfrauenpanzer’ which means ‘housewife tank’ in German, which is used for a large SUV in Germany, lol.
- SoftTalker 3mo agoIt's honestly not that many. That's a very expensive truck for a daily driver. Most likely they have a large Airstream camper, horse trailer, or 5th wheel trailer or similar that they pull with it. Sure, some people just like a big diesel truck for ego reasons. But the cost of them limits most people's ability to endulge that.
- cosmic_cheese 3mo agoThat’s what one would expect, but in some parts of the US it’s not uncommon to see dilapidated houses with a shiny tricked out F-150 that’s never worked a day in its life sitting out in the parking lot… I think for some it’s an identity thing more than anything else.
- analog31 3mo agoI grew up in a suburb of Detroit, and when I went back to visit the family home a few years ago, every street was parked up on both sides with giant vehicles. It was a sight to behold. They weren't all the most expensive trucks, and many were noticeably older. Things in our town went up and down with the cycle of the car industry.
- antonvs 3mo ago> But the cost of them limits most people's ability to endulge that. Sounds like you’ve never been to the US. Thanks to cheap credit, every hillbilly and redneck has one of these. Which feels like about 60% of the population sometimes.
- SoftTalker 3mo agoI have lived in the US my entire life. And yes pickup trucks are part of the "country" or "rural" identity to some extent but most people who live in rural areas actually use their trucks as trucks frequently. They pull trailers, or use them to haul furniture, appliances, building materials, trash... all the stuff that has delivery services in the city but you have to do for yourself if you live in the country.
- 3mo ago
- kylehotchkiss 3mo ago“Compensation” and extreme loneliness (cannot find my tribe without spreading its dumb peacock wings so they know I fit in)
- mothballed 3mo ago4 trips a year picking up a heavy excavator or tractor so you dont have to pay a tradesman a gazillion dollars and it pays for itself. "But just pay someone to haul it or rent a truck" lmao good fucking luck down my dirt roads
- hsbauauvhabzb 3mo agoSpeeding through school zones in a maximum impact people killer sure is fun too though
- apitman 3mo agoDrug store cowboys, aka "big hat; no cattle"
- MisterTea 3mo agoBut they have a clean, covered bed and sparking clean trailer hitch that's never seen a trailer tongue - just in case.
- skippyfish 3mo agoI find it somewhat amusing that this attracts a lot of ire, but most of us would prefer a 2,000+ sq ft suburban home with a lawn when we could live comfortably in a 500-700 sq ft apartment, like people do in most European cities. Ultimately, life in highly developed countries is largely about the wants, not the needs, and different cultures emphasize different wants. The tech culture of the SF Bay Area doesn't glamorize big trucks, but it glamorizes making millions of dollars with no regard for privacy or social impacts of the tech we build.
- rationalist 3mo agoYou're not allowed to speak the truth against group think. For many people, their emotions are more important than being rational.
- thegrim33 3mo agoThat some people buy them and don't really need them has zero relevance on whether any people have need for them.
- SoftTalker 3mo agoAnd a lot of people have occasional need for a truck but don't want to or can't afford to own more than one car, so they use the truck for all their driving.
- convolvatron 3mo agosome guy left a few hundred pounds of steel in the loading area of my workshop for stupid reasons. maybe about $80 worth in scrap. he kept coming by and claiming someone was going to pick up it up, and getting really threatening about us stealing the value from him. the scrap yard is 200 ft away. he drives a big jacked up truck. after a couple weeks of this I'm like 'look, I'll cut it down, and we can throw it in that truck of yours and you can roll 200ft down the road and we'll be done with it'. he was incensed, his bed liner would get all scratched up. after that I dragged it out onto the curb for the meth addicts to sell.
- westmeal 3mo agoLol pavement princess level of nonsense
- cucumber3732842 3mo agoExactly. People are optimizing for the most capability on one car payment. And for a lot of them that looks like a pickup but it also drives what people buy in the SUV market as well. This has bee known for decades. Like it's literally defining principal behind the 4-dr jeep and the proliferation of 3rd rows in midsize SUVs. The fact that you're still getting downvoted for saying it speaks volumes.
- to11mtm 3mo ago
- copperx 3mo agoWhat do you mean daily driving? Like commutes? That wouldn't make any sense.
- analog31 3mo agoYes exactly this. The parking lot of a typical American urban workplace will be filled with a disproportionate number of pickup trucks. Our culture ties our cars to our identities.
- fultonn 3mo agoAmerican trucks are built for towing -- it's one of the reasons they are so big and heavy and expensive -- so I get where the "trucks are for towing" wisdom comes from. But it's still funny to me. Because in my mind one of the main perks of an open bed is that you can do so much before having to deal with a trailer (which are super annoying, especially in cities, especially without off-street parking). Which I guess is just to say: maybe there's a market for a truck that can't tow much, because maybe there's a portion of the market that wants an open bed but doesn't need to tow a massive camper or whatever.
- yellowapple 3mo agoGas vehicles suffer from that range reduction, too, as my brother-in-law learned the hard way last weekend during a road trip we took to Idaho and back (wherein he was towing a camper-trailer).
- nonethewiser 3mo agoI was pleasantly surprised that it wasn’t an ev. Very aggressive price point for a new IC vehicle.
- doodlebugging 3mo agoI agree though I kinda wish it was a hybrid. Maybe down the line that will happen. The price point is a valid point and it ticks all our boxes - 4WD, manual transmission, not huge. I've priced out components for one of my trucks and $21500 is not gonna buy all of the running gear. I expect that none of this truck's drivetrain will use custom parts and that all of the critical drivetrain parts will come from existing supply lines for simplicity and ease of hitting their "repair in your driveway" messaging. The guy is probably gauging interest through reservations and prepping his lie sheet (marketing data) to present to existing supply chain providers to try to earn discounts on volume orders. I hope it all works. We will likely reserve one or maybe two. Our existing small truck, a 4WD Ford Ranger with manual transmission, is long in the tooth and I'm tired of dicking around with it.
- fragmede 3mo agoKind of like the Local Motors Rally Fighter, which was a kit car that kept costs down by using parts from existing cars instead of designing their own from scratch.
- doodlebugging 3mo agoA bit like that. I don't see a new vehicle manufacturer spending the time or capital to develop drivetrain components when there are already trusted manufacturers with decades of experience and products on the shelf that already function perfectly together. I expect this guy will be looking at reliability data for various components, popular aftermarket upgrades, etc and designing a drivetrain that already uses popular components known by the automotive community to be reliable. Otherwise he will have a hard time hitting the 500k mile target I think I saw on the site. He needs a dependable I4 engine mated to a dependable 6-spd manual transmission, mated to a dependable transfer case that sends power to the wheels through dependable differentials. I bet one could pull data from off-roader forums and configure something in a couple of days for their marketers to build interest.
- greenavocado 3mo agoMy pickup truck burned 9 miles per gallon when I towed a 35 foot RV. Consider the energy flux and you'll quickly see how hopeless it would be to tow with a battery powered truck.
- otterley 3mo agoNot everyone who owns a pickup tows with it. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was a minority of owners who do. Some just need them for hauling plywood, others because they like the aesthetics.
- greenavocado 3mo agoThe Ford F-150 Lightning should be selling well, but it isn't
- ssl-3 3mo agoA Honda minivan can fit 4x8 sheets of plywood in the dry, under-roof, with the doors closed. Other times, it can seat 8.
- otterley 3mo agoUnfortunately, to Americans, that really doesn't matter. Even if they're not as fit for purpose, they prefer pickup trucks to minivans. It's a cultural thing. (I realize you're probably being responsive to the word "need" - it's more what they claim they need than actually need. They could use a Japanese kei truck.)
- Ichthypresbyter 3mo ago>They could use a Japanese kei truck. I was hearing elsenet from someone who was planning to buy a Japanese kei truck until he borrowed one. Apparently with more than about 300 lb in the bed they feel dangerous to drive- combination of instability and poor braking performance.
- jmspring 3mo agoThere is a market for it. Cheap. Good range on a tank. 4WD. I've got a 2016 Tacoma TRD Offroad. It's only got about 115k miles (bought it new). I'm not planning on replacing it - toyota hybrid numbers for their trucks suck and an in kind replacement would cost me almost 2x what I originally paid (yes new tech, blahblah). $35k in 2015, $70+k now. Gas isn't going away and rural areas (I've lived in a few) often don't have charging options.
- mgerdts 3mo agoI was at the Toyota dealership today. A TRD off-road with TRD Off-Road Upgrade Package and other goodies has a MSRP of $61k and the tag hanging from the rear view mirror said the no haggle price was $54,608. Still a lot of money and it is a huge truck for the passenger and cargo payload. https://www.smarttoyota.com/new-Madison-2026-Toyota-Tacoma-TRD+Off+Road-3TMLB5JN8TM267886 https://www.smarttoyota.com/new-Madison-2026-Toyota-Tacoma-T...
- jmspring 3mo agoMy numbers were based on when I was looking, not current Trump f’d up weird economy.
- stackghost 3mo agoI say this as someone who will be buying an EV as his next vehicle: EV proponents have a strong propensity to gloss over the very real drawbacks of battery-only vehicles: - Towing anything outside of charging infrastructure/away from the highway rest stops is not feasible because of the range reduction, which in USA/Canada is a major reason to buy an SUV/pickup. Why buy an electric vehicle that can't tow your boat to the lake where there's no charger? - Mileage goes down in the summer and way down in the winter, because the battery packs need to be cooled/warmed. - Mileage evaporates slowly, even when the vehicle is "off", making these vehicles fundamentally unsuitable for, again, going pretty much anywhere you can't plug it in. When I was a teen we used to take week-long canoe trips into Algonquin Park. Imagine trying to get the kids home from camping on Sunday afternoon, you're an hour's drive away from the nearest city but oops the battery pack is dead because it's been self-discharging and cooling itself the whole time you've been camping. No thanks. - Venturing far away from the charging infrastructure (camping, rural road tripping, jobsites/camp) is risky. If you run out of gas in the middle of nowhere, you can get a ride into town, fill up a jerrycan with gas, and then extricate your vehicle. If your battery-only EV runs out of charge in the middle of nowhere, you are completely fucked. EVs are great, and when my 2013 TDI finally quits I will likely purchase an EV, but they're just fundamentally unsuitable for some use cases.
- binkHN 3mo agoYou said it yourself, they're fundamentally suitable for most use cases. Yes, for the near future, there will be many use cases where gas is superior.
- stackghost 3mo agoSure. But I think the "near future" to which you're referring is going to be a longer tail than many EV maximalists expect. I would be shocked if IC-engined vehicles were no longer being produced in 2050.
- rsynnott 3mo agoThere will be a tipping point where production and wide distribution of petrol and diesel becomes unsustainably expensive; it really relies on massive volume to work at all.
- zymhan 3mo agoSlate already has that covered.
- rdtsc 3mo ago> I wonder what it's like launching a gas truck when new battery-powered trucks are looming in the distance (or already here). Yeah it’s interesting to see how they do. The big and award winning electric truck from Ford is already discontinued. If we’re talking about US pickups how many other ones are battery powered? If anything, I would be more worried about Slate given what happened to Ford Lightning.
- Suppafly 3mo agoThere are a ton of people that want an affordable ICE powered truck, for a variety of valid and invalid reasons. The market is there, but they're going to need to be smart about how they do this if they want to capture that market.