Towing the GM company line
If the wife were to send you to the local big box store to pick up 375 concrete blocks in order to complete that little honey-do job around the house, there’s one thing you’re going to need — a really good pickup truck.
General Motors put that task to us recently at the Silverado/Sierra Challenge in Quebec. There was a twist, however. GM brought with them the competitors to the Silverado and the Sierra, so we journalists could see for ourselves which one would get the job done. Thankfully, part of the challenge wasn’t to load the bricks into the trailers the trucks would be towing.
Bringing the competition to a given product event proves two things. Firstly, you have the utmost confidence in the products you produce, and secondly, we can really see — on even terms — the strength and weakness of each truck.
There were two classes, the light duty, which would be pulling 7,000 lbs., and the heavy duty, which would be lugging 12,000 lbs. around. The light duty had offerings from Dodge, Ford and Toyota, while the heavy duty had competition from Ford.
Keep in mind that there are no regulatory standards for establishing towing figures – it’s left up to the manufacturers to decide their maximum towing capacity. This is why you see so many ads for every manufacturer that says "highest rated in this class," or something to that effect. GM was out to prove that ads are one thing; real-world testing is something completely different. We had them all together in one place, with identical payloads ... let the competition begin!
I towed all of them around the course, including the slalom course, and this is my only chance to ever say this, so here it goes — they handle like, well, trucks!
The two GM products, the Sierra and Silverado, were actually very good. The new GMT900 series has features that really helped them in the towing department. They have a 234% increase in torsional stiffness, and a 136% increase in lateral stiffness. That, along with the new coil-over-shock front suspension and larger diameter monotube front shocks made a sizable difference in the ride quality while towing. Inside, the seating position is good, and I really liked the mirrors that let you see the trailer well as you turn corners. If you are like me, not the best tow-er in the world, it's good to at least be able to see what you’re about to hit with the trailer, or how close you came to hitting it.
Let’s face it though, towing is all about power, and the Silverado with its 5.3-litre V8 with 315 hp, and 338 lb.-ft. of torque, and the Sierra, which had a 6.0-litre with 367-hp and 375 lb.-ft. of torque, had no problems pulling the load. They felt like the truck was doing the required job without much strain. They felt easily capable of the task at hand.
The Ford F150 had the 5.4 24V V8 with 300 hp and 365 lb.-ft. of torque, while the Dodge Ram had the 5.7-litre with 345 hp, and 375 lb.-ft. of torque. The Toyota Tundra also had the 5.7 DOHC V8 with 381 hp and 401 lb.-ft. of torque.
On the heavy duty side, the GM had the 6.6-litre V8 Diesel with 365 hp and a monster 660 lb.-ft. of torque, while the Ford Super Duty, with its 6.4-litre Diesel had 350 hp and 650 lb.-ft. of torque.
The bottom line in the towing competition for me was the ride quality. In short, I didn’t want to feel the trailer affecting the ride of the truck. In this case, I really preferred the Sierra in the light duty, with a strong mention for the Tundra, which didn’t display a lot of pitch movement when towing the load. It felt like it was a little softer sprung, which really helped the ride quality.
In the heavy duty, having 12,000 lbs. behind you is going to affect the ride, but I must say that the GM did feel more stable at highway speeds with that load in tow. Through the slalom course, it felt solid on the direction changes, and under braking, you could tell that it had enough braking power to stop the load — repeatedly.
After the towing, we were treated to a demonstration of the Eaton G8 mechanical locking differential. This was shown on the Sierra, versus a limited slip differential. The way the Eaton unit works is that if you have a wheel that loses grip — in this case it was in the air — once the wheel speed increases to 100 rpm above the other wheel, the differential locks.
In the simulated "crossing the ditch" trial, the others were stuck, as the limited slip units wouldn’t lock. The Sierra made it through, once the wheel speed was raised enough to lock the differential.
We also did braking exercises and a wet skid pad, which really showed off the StabiliTrak on the GM products. Many of these systems are very intrusive when they come on. I always say good stability management should come on like someone mentioning something to you, not shouting at you. The StabiliTrak system is a "mentioner" if you will. When pushed very hard, it takes control quickly, but you still feel like you are driving the truck, rather than being a passenger until the stability system finishes doing its thing.
I think this was a great idea by GM to put this test together, and, more importantly, by reviewing the specifications on the competing trucks, it wasn’t an "our best" versus "their base" kind of deal. The trucks were real competitors in the marketplace.
This is a very competitive segment, and GM, like the others, has to stay on top of its game to keep the Silverado and Sierra competitive with the others. They have done this with the new GMT900 series of trucks. They have paid attention to all the areas, especially on the performance and comfort ends. The trucks are solid product offerings from GM, and as I can now attest, capable of competing with the best the competition has to offer.
And they’re safe!
While we were in Quebec, it seemed that some car thieves were eyeing GM’s trucks in the hotel parking lot the night before the Sierra/Silverado Challenge. When we went out in the morning to get the trucks, one had the door locks punched out, but the truck was still there. That’s what we call a real-world test! The driver’s door wouldn’t open with the punched-out locks, but GM still had its truck.
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