ute

I miss the El Camino every day. The car/truck combo known as a ute is a huge missing piece of the puzzle for truck-loving Americans. As Ford revives its small truck line, Jeep gives us the Gladiator, and Nissan just gave its Frontier a major overhaul; the carmakers understand the people want trucks but not …

It important that we understand that Wishlist Wednesday is a living document that is meant to ebb and flow in dynamic ways to remain an ever-changing representation of the joys of the motoring world. What does that mean exactly? It means, you never know what will show up on this list, but you can bet …

The Subaru Baja pickup truck. A historic desert running, mountain climbing flash of genius brought to us by Subaru. Fans weren’t abundant, though, and it didn’t last long. In fact, there were many who thought it was downright ugly. Unfortunately, there wasn’t enough interest in this embodiment of automotive adventure. The Subaru produced the Baja …

Back on May 24th, we covered how Elon Musk, the head of Tesla, was riding in the electric Tesla Cybertruck with Jay Leno in an episode of Jay Leno’s Garage. They discussed the need to make the Cybertruck smaller to fit in a standard garage. After the show aired, Mr. Musk tweeted that making the …

Since the launch of the Tesla Cybertruck, Elon Musk, the head of Tesla, has had people working on making it into a smaller package so that it could fit into the average garage. This adjustment involves shrinking as much as 5% of the Cybertruck’s presence. Over the weekend, he changed his mind. In a tweet, he …

The United States is truck crazy. We love them. We lower them. We put lift kits and big tires on them. We race them. We jump them. Lately, however, our love of trucks has been tempered by their ever-increasing price points. Additionally, our awakening of environmental impact has made many reconsider the truck. So, car-based trucks of the past may …

Chevrolet introduced the El Camino in 1959. It was Chevy’s response to the Ford Ranchero, which had been selling well as the lone representative of the big three American manufacturers in the ute niche. The El Camino would go on to dominate the niche, even with increasing competition. It would eventually be named the clear winner of the ute category …

As pickup trucks have grown, there’s been a demand resurgence for trucks that scale closer to cars. Car-based trucks, aka ‘utes’, like Chevy’s El Camino, once formed a popular segment, though it’s been dormant for some time. Chevy first attempted to bring it back with the SSR. Honda and BMW then made some functional one-offs …

It’s beginning to look like we should prepare for a flood of new small pickups to hit the market. Ford car-based truck test mules have been spotted running around Australia. Kia is allegedly planning a similar-sized pickup for release there, too. While no pickup version of Ford’s baby Bronco exists officially, there’s a good business …