If you like your off-roading with a side of swamp, Ford has created a Bronco variant just for you. Called the Everglades (presumably, Bronco Bog and Bayou didn’t track too well in focus groups), it comes standard with a snorkel to help with water crossings and integrated Warn winch to haul you out of the mire.
Or, to simply show off at the trailhead. Your call.
Retro-filled shots to the arm are a popular way to endear a car company to its fan base, especially us pickup truck wonks who pine for the so-called ‘good old days’ when things weren’t really good at all. Nevertheless, it generally only takes a stripe-n-wheel package to get some fans all hot and bothered – and Nissan has tapped into this with gusto at the Chicago Auto Show.
Americans like their SUVs – and for some customers, bigger is better. One need look no further than parking lots filled with Tahoes and Grand Wagoneers for confirmation, not to mention their extended-length brethren like the Suburban and upcoming Grand Wagoneer XL.
Toyota has been in this game as well, albeit with an offering older than Methuselah. That changes for 2023, with the introduction of a new Sequoia.
Don’t listen to certain talking heads who are trying to tell us that all hands are busy switching to electric transportation pods and there’s no market for enormous SUVs. In Japan, where they’d have you believe streets are tighter than two coats of paint and no one drives anything bigger than a Kei car, Toyota is apparently running up against lengthy waitlists for its new Land Cruiser.
How long? Try four years.
After plenty of speculation and spy shots – plus a healthy dose of rumor – Ford has whipped the sheets off what they’re calling the most powerful street-legal Bronco ever to roll out of a Blue Oval factory. Shod with FOX shocks which permit yawning wheel travel, 37-inch all-terrain tires, and heavy-duty bash plates, this thing is ready to jump a few dunes and tear across wide-open spaces.
Under the hood is an engine not currently found in any factory Bronco – and it isn’t the mill your author thought would be residing between these flared Raptor fenders.
Well, that didn’t take long. Mere minutes after our post this morning about the upcoming Cadillac Escalade V, the brand dropped official images of the thing – much earlier in the day than expected. But if you think TTAC had anything to do with that decision, we’ve some bridges in which you may be interested. After all, no one at RenCen reads TTAC, right? Right? (*nudge, nudge, wink, wink*)
As for the upcoming Escalade V, it promises to be a ground shaker.
If you’re part of a weird Venn Diagram that’s been trying to figure out whether to pull the trigger on a CT5-V Blackwing or a new Escalade, it seems Cadillac is about to make your decision a whole lot easier. Later today, the luxury brand from Detroit will haul the covers off a powerful new variant of their biggest SUV.
It’s one of the industry’s worst-kept secrets that a new Toyota Sequoia is on the way within twelve months or so, likely sharing much with the just-released Tundra pickup truck. The company has now shared a typically shadowy teaser image of the upcoming rig, one which may not be as slab-sided as its forebear.
People tend to have some pretty strong opinions in this neck of the woods, ranging from thoughts about this year’s crop of NHL rookies to unsolicited sentiments about how Uncle Walt really should have added a ledger board when he built that new deck last summer. Hey, at least the thing is still standing. For now.
While the works of us are largely united on the subject of winter tires – it’s broadly accepted that driving aids such as pedestrian detection and lane centering and even the basics like stability control aren’t of much use if those four fist-sized patches of rubber on each corner of the car have less traction than pork at a PETA picnic – there’s still plenty of debate over the usefulness of studded winter tires. One group swears by them while the other swears at them.
This author was in the latter group – right up to the moment I bolted a modern set of studded tires to my Cherokee Trailhawk. Turns out, a lot has changed in two decades.
Builders of half-ton trucks in this nation are perpetually searching the upper limit of what customers are willing to pay for a new rig, with the moneyed set having plenty of choices when looking for a leather-lined and luxurious pickup. For the last few years, Toyota has had the 1794 Edition as an arrow in its quiver to compete against the crew from Detroit. Now, with their recently refurbished pickup truck, they’re going a step further. Meet the Toyota Tundra Capstone.
While the full-size Bronco might be one of the hottest games in town, its performance in some key safety measures failed to wholly impress the IIHS crash test dummies. Their major beefs? Headlights and whiplash.
You may recall the brouhaha surrounding the Ford Bronco hardtop, a piece of the SUV that held up the initial rollout of the much-awaited model before causing a recall thanks to odd wear patterns. Specifically, certain roof units had a manufacturing deficiency which caused them to discolor and expose a honeycomb pattern after being subjected to particular levels of water and humidity (read: everyday conditions for some types of customers).
Now, it appears Ford is done like dinner with the issue, electing to destroy every single hardtop collected through the recall.
Thanks to Toyota’s glacier-like design cycle, a new Tundra is something most of us will experience only a few times in our adult lives. How long was the last generation around? Well, George W. Bush still had nearly three more years in the White House when the XK50 Tundra was unveiled at the Chicago Auto Show in February 2006. Yeah, it’s been a minute.
All that changed when the curtain dropped on the ’22 Tundra earlier this year. While the mighty and burly TRD Pro has gotten a lot of the press (and most of the promotional photos), there are actually about half a dozen trims on offer, some of which can be layered with options and packages.
Despite what we’d all like to think, America isn’t always the first to receive a particular new vehicle – even when it is made by one of our largest automakers. That was the case with the current Ford Ranger, a pickup truck which was on sale in other markets before it showed up on our shores. Even now, other iterations (Ranger Raptor, anyone?) are not found in North American showrooms.
Such is the case for the next-gen Ranger as well, it seems. Ford launched the revamped mid-sizer in an online event last night, showing off a trio of trims and detailing several powertrains that are unlikely to be options in this country. One thing’s virtually assured, however – it probably won’t take Ford as long to drag this Ranger across the pond as it did with the current model.
Our fancy-pants Managing Ed. is currently enjoying the sunny and rocky environs of Moab, sampling different variants of the new-for-’22 Jeep Grand Cherokee. His impressions will appear on these digital pages in due time but, until then, let’s examine what might just be The Right Spec of this popular SUV.
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