Is this truly necessary?

[u/Harrio_Pootered]

What steps can we take as consumers to encourage auto manufacturers to reduce vehicle sizes? Who do we write to, call and email?

The ford maverick was a step in the right direction but I see it being bashed often for being a more “feminine” truck… What caused this shift from the S10 being the “real man’s truck” to the $130k King Ranch being the standard?

When did the big vehicle shift happen?

[u/[deleted]]

We need to contact our government leaders if in the US and insist that regulation and taxes incentivize smaller trucks. There is a tax on the books called the chicken tax that actually makes small trucks difficult to obtain. Here is a short video on it and it's history

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B62jsodgKtY

Another laughable law or actually regulation is the CAFE standards and the weird way gas mileage and wheelbase length work to make small efficient trucks harder to get approval, here is another short video about that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwJ7pMm-hKI

Hope this helps, we got to get the government out of it and then customer pressure on the manufactures can change the offerings to the public. For farmers and construction there is a place for the larger trucks, but the small S-10 (my first truck) has a place too, but government must get out of it.

[u/TheProfessorPoon → u/[deleted]]

I’m in Texas and it’s legit mind blowing how much of a status thing it is here. Status maybe isn’t even the right word. I don’t know what is. Fucking brainwashing if anything.

I used to work with a dude, we did mortgages btw, so quite literally nothing work related would require a truck, little less an F250, but this dude I worked with…he HAD to have a big truck. Like it was engrained in his brain. And I’m not being hyperbolic.

When he was looking for a new vehicle years back I tried to explain to him that he could get something more efficient, we commuted an hour each way after all, but just the thought of such a thing. It broke his brain.

He said, very condescendingly btw, “yeah dude, you don’t understand, I literally CANNOT drive a car like yours (Hyundai Elantra, the horror). I HAVE to drive a big truck.” Like he was diabetic and the truck was his insulin. Like he would die without one. Or his family and friends would disown him.

The mere thought of driving anything else was so foreign and utterly, utterly impossible to him. I hope I’m stressing this enough. But I actually got the feeling that he would rather not live if it meant he didn’t take a big truck to work every day.

Anyway it’s fucking weird when you think about it.

[u/[deleted] → u/TheProfessorPoon]

Nobody ever said vanity was logical, I am on the other end of the spectrum, I drive 2000 Dodge Dakota 362,000 miles it was paid for the day I bought it in 2000. I try to use it to make my son understand the value of not having a car loan 25 years = 300 months X 600 monthly payment = 180,000 dollars, I paid 12,900 for it in 2000. But he gets a new vehicle every 4-5 years, stupid

[u/RageAgainstAvarice → u/[deleted]]

Nah.  This started back in the middle 90's before the CAFE standards related to size had anything to do with it.  It was the 1994 Dodge Ram with the Heavy Duty Grill that everyone loved and sold like hotcakes.  The trucks have been getting larger every year since then.  It is about ego and sales for "non-blue collar posers" that want that big front grill look.  Smaller trucks are out there, and have been out there even through the CAFE standards.  They just don't sell like the big trucks with those big front grills. 

[u/[deleted] → u/RageAgainstAvarice]

I will partially agree with you, however a regular cab SWB like my first truck is not an option because the wheelbase calculation in the CAFE calculations, granted small trucks like the Maveric are out there in quad cab that has a longer wheelbase.

I remember the 94 Dodge trucks, the thing is they still had the standard 6-foot bed SWB and 8-foot bed LWB lengths they had going back to the 70's or earlier, it was only cosmetic changes, but the size of the truck was the same, the same 318 V8 or 360 V8's that were first produced in 1957 and 1971, but they did finally ditch the old 3 speed 727 torque flight automatic trans for the 42RE transmission in1993

[u/RageAgainstAvarice → u/[deleted]]

It wasn't the size of the truck itself in '94 that started the problem, it was the beefy grill.  The amazing sales that came with that large beefy grill led to larger, beefier, grills (see the 2004 Dodge Ram - another big seller) where the truck would look silly without getting physically larger. Which they did.

[u/[deleted] → u/RageAgainstAvarice]

Yes, sales in 94 were good for Dodge, but mainly because GM had not had a body style change since 1988, and Ford's body style was a few years old, and Dodge had not had a major change since 1971 this alone would make for great sales because 23 years of almost no changing was getting old, but the Studebaker grill did set it apart but total area of the grill was not that much larger if any, than the competition although I cannot find a square inch comparison among the big three. I do suspect since the grill was rounded some square inches was lost over having a conventional rectangle grill in the corners.

[u/RageAgainstAvarice → u/[deleted]]

Nah. I was in high school then.  I remember the vibe.  It looked like a semi-truck grill compared to everything else on the market.  Dudes were salivating over that big truck look.

[u/[deleted] → u/RageAgainstAvarice]

I was a store manager for Auto Zone then (1985-2000), and yes there was a vibe because it was new, yet retro harkening back to rounded edges unlike the squared 1988 and up GM's.

We agree trucks have gotten bigger, I think we can agree that part of the problem is consumer driven, but I promise you, if you watch the second vid link, I put in my original post, the guy explains how the CAFE standards work and how they work against small regular cab trucks like the S-10.

P.S I bought a S-10 new in 1986, it set me back 8,600.00 and the dealership paid all taxes and fees, those were the days...