As since eternity, pickup truck competition wars have been hard fought battles between the Detroit 3 automakers in terms of sales and how tough each manufacturers’ truck is.

The Japanese automakers, and certainly never the Korean automakers at any point in time-have any place in building an American style Full-Size pickup truck for American consumers.

Neither the Japanese nor the Korean automakers would also have any place in building a traditional Full-Size, frame-on-body passenger car similar to vehicles on the GM B-platform and the Ford Panther platform.

It’s just like how Toyota doesn’t have any place in competing in NASCAR, and neither would any other Japanese or Korean automaker would ever have any place in competing in NASCAR.

General Motors doing this just makes me think of the competition in sales and in advertising of which manufacturer’s truck was tougher between the GMT400 pickups in 1988, the 1980-1996 bodystyle of Ford F-Series; and the D/W-Series Dodge pickups (by now, the oldest of the bunch with a design that dated back to 1972) not standing a chance to GM & Ford’s newer designs.

Then, when Chrysler had introduced the T300 Dodge pickup in 1994; when Chrysler had changed the rules for how pickup trucks were styled, how pickup trucks drove and handled; and how tough pickup trucks were designed; GM & Ford both felt sorry for themselves over their own pickup trucks until Ford had brought out one of the worst generations of F-Series in the entire history of the Ford Motor Company-the PN-96 generation F-Series that was in production from 1996 (for the 1997 model year) until 2004; and General Motors had produced the worst 2 generations of GM truck in the entire history of General Motors-the GMT800 and GMT900 trucks produced in a time spanning from 1999-2013.

Not to mention that General Motors had added fuel to the fire with regards to how awful the GMT800 and GMT900 trucks are by introducing the H2, Escalade, and Yukon Denali; discontinuing the 2-door Tahoe, and no longer offering a diesel engine in the Suburban. And General Motors changing the name of GMC’s version of the Suburban to the Yukon XL had also added fuel to the fire with regards to how awful the GMT800 and GMT900 trucks are.

Dodge, with parent company Chrysler merging with Daimler-Benz (you all know about how awful and gruesome Chrysler’s merger with Daimler-Benz) was began to produce the worst Dodge trucks in the entire history of the Chrysler Corporation that were the complete opposite of the T300 trucks that they had replaced-the DR Dodge trucks that were produced from 2001-2009.

It wouldn’t be until the DS Dodge trucks that Chrysler would once again produce a pickup truck that’s emotionally pleasing as the D/W-Series and the T300 trucks were.

And it wouldn’t be until the K2XX pickups that General Motors would produce a pickup truck that’s emotionally pleasing as the 1973-1991 and the GMT400 trucks were.

The K2XX Suburban and 4-door Tahoe are almost as emotionally pleasing as the 1973-1991 K5 Blazer and Suburban and the GMT400 Suburban and 2-door Tahoe, but would be as totally pleasing as these two earlier generations of GM truck under one condition-GM builds a 3-quarter-ton version of both the current-generation Suburban and 4-door Tahoe and makes them available with a diesel engine.

Chevrolet released two videos today demonstrating the customer benefits of the Silverado’s roll-formed, high-strength-steel bed floor. In laboratory testing, as well as 26 real-world demonstrations, the impact strength of the Silverado’s bed consistently outperformed the stamped aluminum bed of the competition.

Source: Chevrolet Silverado Impact Strength Engineering Overview and Demonstration Methodology