I thought for a moment, as I read this story, that I was perusing The Onion. Alas:
For the driver looking for more of a pickup -- one that dwarfs the Hummer and the Ford F-350 -- Navistar has just the ride for you.
The new CXT -- short for commercial extreme truck and built from the same platform as the heavy truck maker's typical tow truck or cement mixer -- will be sold starting this week by Navistar's International Truck & Engine subsidiary.
At 258 inches, or 21-1/2 feet long, the CXT's about 4-1/2 feet longer than the new Hummer H2 pickup, and about 2 inches longer than the F-350 Crew Cab.
But how it really towers over what's on the road now is in height. At 108 inches, or 9 feet, the CXT stands only a foot below a basketball rim and more than two feet above the Hummer or the F-350.
Nine feet? To borrow a phrase from Gunnery Sgt. Hartman, I didn't know they stacked shit that high. Do you need a commercial license to drive one of these beasts? What about heavy vehicle training?
I can already predict they'll overwhelmingly be manned by middle-aged white men, either under 5' 5" in height or prematurely bald.
"It's not going to fit into the standard garage," said Mark Oberle, a spokesman for Navistar, based in Warrenville, Ill., outside Chicago. "We can see it a as a vehicle for business people who want to make distinct impression. For personal use, it's for people who want to make a statement.
A variety of statements spring to mind, but all run along the lines of, "The contempt I feel for the safety of my fellow motorists and the preservation of our natural resources is rivaled only by my intense feelings of self-loathing."
Seriously, if you ever discover that you've plopped down a hundred grand (the price ranges from $93,000 to $115,000) for one of these monstrosities, do us all a favor and drive it over a cliff.
Buyers will also have to have a fair amount of money to fill it up -- it's projected to get between 6 and 10 miles per gallon of diesel fuel.
The vehicle weighs about seven tons empty and can carry another six tons in its truck bed.
A hippopotamus, by comparison, weighs five tons. It's only five feet high, though. And it gets better mileage.
What Navistar doesn't see is the vehicle being mass-produced. It expects to sell only about 50 this year and doesn't expect it to challenge the market niche of the H2 sport/utility vehicle, which saw sales of 34,529 last year.
That's a depressingly large number of H2 buyers, even when you eliminate professional athletes and hip-hop artists. A man needs something he can drive to the pharmacy to pick up his Viagra, I guess.
God, I hate H2's, and Hummers in general. I just flip them off as I drive by. What's a real kicker is that there are WOMEN in my area driving these monstrosities!
I don't want one, but I think my wife might.
Draw your own conclusions.
Like there's ever been any question about who wears the pants in your house.
Due to the dearth of good penises these days, I find myself actually considering the purchase of one of these beauties. ;-) (Less mess, no disease!)
I guess it just never took off, Michael.
So, it's nobody's Unimoggy now.
Yes, this gargantuan vehicle has the distinctive nickname FUBAR and deserves every letter of it. Who would have thought The Simpsons (remember the SUV episode?) would be so prophetic?
What really pises me off about these monstrosities is that they still are taxed as a truck and that they can be written off as a business expense by dillweeds who obviously don't use them in that capacity. Pretty much all SUV's, H2, and this monstrosity should be taxed as luxury vehicles unless you are hauling around heavy goods for a legitimate business (and no, picking up groceries for the family or normal sport parents' activities such as taking the brood to the staurday soccer games are not considered a legitimate business endeavor).
Oh yeah, as long as I am ranting, owners should have to have mandatory parking classes so that they can get into a parking space in under 10 minutes.
Canyonero!
Jeebus K. Reist.
I once had the joy of riding in one of them huge-ass Ferruzzi mobile container loaders. Sumbitch weighed 163 tons and each wheel was six feet in diameter. It could pick up a half dozen of these new Navistar CXT's easily. For that matter, it could eat 'em up and crap 'em out (as Humvees, perhaps).
But I wouldn't want to be driving one on the Katy Freeway at rush hour. What is the matter with people today?
So, whatever happened to the Unimog from Freightliner? Is this bigger or smaller?