A few weeks ago, I fell in love with a machine when I was least expecting it. I just needed something to transport a couch from the Pasadena area about 20 miles back to my new apartment in Studio City. So I rang up U-Haul and dropped $20 on a pickup truck. What I got was one of the most perfect modern pickups I’ve ever driven.
I still have a lot to tell you all about that party at my house, and about my move, but for now, it’s President’s day and I need to go off-roading with Kristen Lee and Jake Thiewes (from Out Motorsports). As such, I must bang out some quick, but important (!) content. Namely, I need to tell you about an excellent truck that you too can experience for just a few Andrew Jacksons and a 15 minute trip to your dealer of white and orange moving-vehicles.
The reason why I’m comfortable calling this machine “one of the most perfect modern pickups I’ve ever driven” without worry of damage to my flimsy car-journalist reputation is that this truck is honest.
With so many modern pickups having short beds, fancy interiors with copious of electronics, and complicated suspensions and engines, this Silverado feels like a breath of fresh air. It’s a true work truck, and that’s saying something in 2023.
It has a long eight-foot bed, a regular cab, and a bench seat. Granted, it’s a split-bench and if someone sits in the middle they’ll sitt strangely tall due to the stiff cushion, but it’s a bench nonetheless. Plus, the floors? VINYL (or rubberized or whatever Chevy’s calling it these days):
Under the hood is a 335 horsepower 5.3-liter V8. That’s right, a pushrod-equipped small-block LS engine just like the truck gods ordered. Bolted to that motor is a Ypsilanti, Michigan-built (Edit: Actually, it was built in Toledo starting right around the Great Recession) six-speed automatic with a column-mounted shifter.
You can see the column shift in the image below showing the dash, and while I’m sure many of you will say “Is it really a rough and tumble work truck if it has all these screens?” the fact is that the infotainment screen is pretty damn small, and the important controls like HVAC and radio volume/channel are all physical buttons or knobs:
And if you look at the dashboard, you’ll see a fantastic set of gauges showing coolant temperature, oil pressure, and battery voltage, in addition to the basic stuff you’d expect in any other vehicle.
What’s more, the truck rips! I mean that with sincerity. The 335 horses from that V8 sound amazing, and they scoot the two-wheel drive work truck down the road with vigor:
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Why am I so in love with a U-Haul pickup truck? Why was it so hard to drop it off that night, never to be seen again? Is it because it’s been a while since I’ve been in a modern truck that felt anything like my old and beloved Jeep J10? Or is it because it’s new and therefore 10000% more comfortable and quick than anything I own? Or it because I’m just a bit tired from this move to LA? It’s probably a bit of all of that.
But I don’t think I’m wrong for loving this truck.
I started looking into what it’d take to get a hold of one of these bare-bones V8 work-rigs, and the answer is: not a whole lot! U-Haul actually sells its trucks on “trucksales.uhaul.com,” and these things all have very, very few miles on them — both of the pickups below have fewer than 13,000 on their odometers:
Pricing doesn’t seem amazing, and it’s only a couple of grand below MSRP, but it looks to be roughly the market rate for such a truck. Still, the point is that there are lots of fantastic work truck available to purchase or, if you just want a quick, loud, sweet bench-seat equipped pickup for a drive-in movie date, you can just rent the thing for $20 + mileage. And that’s just awesome.
[Mercedes Note: U-Haul doesn’t just sell off its pickup trucks, but its box trucks, too. Have you ever wanted to build a stealth camper or wish you had a truck to carry your toys? You can find old U-Hauls for sale at corporate locations and they get as big as those 26-foot GMC Topkicks. Sometimes, the equipment will be so old that you might find a late 1980s International S1600 with a manual transmission and a 7.3-liter IDI V8 diesel! -MS]
I love how the last few DT articles have been “THIS {x} is AMAZING!1!!” where {x} is not a Jeep. I think with a reduction of Fe2O3 in his bloodstream, the Chrysler-product Stockholm Syndrome might be finally wearing off!
Just think of how many different people have farted on that seat when you buy a used rental, particularly on those you can rent by the hour.
Are hourly rental user gassier?
Before sitting on the leather seats in a brand new car and enjoying their fartlessness have a think about what bulls do to cows, and think about how the fields cows lay down in don’t have a separate adjacent toilet fields.
If only Ford made a 2 Door Maverick Hybrid with a 3 seat bench. U-Haul would almost certainly by a ton of them and Ford would sell as many as they made!
As much as I hate not having a manual transmission in an ICE vehicle I’d buy a 2 Door Maverick Hybrid with a 3 seat bench.
I appreciate the honesty of a two door truck, but I wouldn’t give up the practicality of my crew cab Ram for one, but then I use it for road tripping so it fits my needs better than a reg cab or quad cab ever could. That said, it seems like whenever people actually drive half ton trucks, they end up getting why they’re so popular. Mixer trucks have becomes so l, so good and they can pretty much do it all. And V8s will always be intoxicating. My Bighorn is the perfect spec to me. Not too fancy but not bare bones either. That said, the same truck that cost me around $50k back in 2020 is around $60k now.
You’ve explained why I purchased my Jeep Comanche, because it is a very usable single cab truck. I needed, a truck, I wanted 4×4 and a stick shift. I was never going to need lots of power or a ton of payload, so a small easily maneuverable truck was what I was looking for. Even though it’s a small truck, I’ve still hauled between 3k to 4k lbs to the scrap yard half a dozen times with no issue. I once put so many rocks in the bed that it was riding 1/2″ from the bump stops.
The big single cab trucks are the ultimate of utility, I wouldn’t own one due to the shear size, but I can fully understand their versatility.
There are only two of us these days, kids are gone and moved out. We camp. We ski. We paddle a ton. I want a slide in camper (light! Nothing fancy! More than a cap with a mattress in back) and I want to toss my skis or bikes and boats there. I’d take a minivan (fine, mattress in back) but a classic regular cab truck has an appeal and ease that nothing else does.
Many years ago, my then 70 year old mom, who lives several hours from the rest of our family had some storm damage to her home. She needed to scramble to save some of her possessions. The local u-haul franchise was also a storage facility (smart concept). While we were making our way to her to help, she went to rent a truck and a locker. Many other in the community had been hit too, so when she got there they only had one truck left. They offered it to her with the caveat “nobody wanted this truck, it’s a manual transmission, you ok with that?”
By the time we got there she had already moved a few loads herself.
I got all excited about the possibilities of owning one of these until I remembered that every time I rent a vehicle, I turn into one of the Duke boys.
Don’t be gentle it’s a rental
It blows my mind when people are like “I don’t see what’s so damn special about a V8”. THIS! This right here! You can throw one in a damn single cab RWD pickup and it’s still pure sensory bliss when you mash the throttle.
Off-roading isn’t an activity that I’d immediately associate with “Fancy” Kristen.
Yachting? Sure.
Croquet? Most definitely.
But creeping a Jeep through mud? Not so much.
Still, I hope you kids have fun and stay safe!
This is a Good Truck. But I still carry a torch for my 2007 Sienna CE, which can do much of what people who need a truck for, better. No I can’t haul 2000lb of gravel. But I have hauled 1200lb of vinyl plank flooring. And I have hauled 8 people, which no truck can do (legally, at least).
In some states, it would be legal in a pickup lol. I hear you though. My best all around car was a minivan. Damn thing did everything.
I rented U-Haul Ram Pickups when our van was stolen. Local only though. They wouldn’t rent one way.
I liked the trucks but that rotary dial shifter was from hell when backing a trailer.
I went from a stick shift to the rotary dial and have never had an issue with it. I don’t know who people hate them so much. Now the monostable in some Chryslers and the new GM trucks, however, THAT is absolute garbage.
Monostable gear shifters can be fine… when properly executed. My BMW w/!DCT has a monostable shifter. When the engine is running & the driver’s door is opened, it shifts to park, whether you want it to or not, so no running over the driver who fails to manually put it in park. Shut off the engine, it goes to park (fortunately I always set the parking brakes, so when I shut off my F-150 w/o putting the trans in park, no bad things happened.
I don’t have much available near me. No pickups, no box trucks. Just chassis & cab setups. Didn’t even know they sold those.
You can grab one and get to coachbuildin’. 🙂
If only UHaul would sell their motorcycle trailers – why nobody has copied their perfect design is beyond me.
I’m looking at their tow dollies and thinking about how to retrofit one to carry two bikes. Some basic weather protection on the front would be nice as well.
How hard can it be? 🙂
Ditto! 800 pounds, basically no sway, that built-in wheel chock, built to last, I’d buy one in a heartbeat!
These to me look like what a truck should be. You want to haul stuff around, you don’t need a cowboy Cadillac that costs $75k and has full time AWD and a towing capacity of eleventy bajillion tons.
Heck,compared to the trucks I grew up with, these things are luxo boats. If David buys one, he’ll start to feel like a fancy man.
This post makes me wonder what David would buy if he ever sells the site for DeMuro level CarsandBids money.
Considering his affection for iron oxide, I feel like he’d purchase the planet Mars.
Elon would never allow it. ;P
This seems a definite COTD contender right here. Only problem I see is the strong possibility that he’d lose all his vehicles there: couldn’t distinguish them from the landscape
But not the capacity to tow infinite mass.
Also, this probably goes without mentioning but inspect these thoroughly. I have never overloaded a truck as much as I have a uhaul rental truck. That long bed fits in way more topsoil than the suspension can handle.
One summer back in the 1990s, I needed a U-Haul box truck so I called them and made a reservation. The reservationist asked if I could drive a manual, to which I chuckled and said “Of course!”.
I arrive to pick up the truck, and it appears to be a beast from the 1970s. It had a genuine old-school bench seat covered in black vinyl, IIRC an AM radio, and no AC – with a gezzaline V-8 and a 4MT. Except the 4MT had a granny first gear + three usable gears. (I’m aware that was a fairly common transmission for a work-type truck but AFAIK atypical for a rental.)
It was functional, but all things considered I would have preferred a more modern version.
Now to go look at trucksales.uhaul.com…
That would be the SM465 4 speed manual (if it was a Chevy/GMC). Believe it or not, it was still available until 1990 or 91 – my 1989 Chevy pickup has one. Tough as nails, but yeah, if you’re not used to it, it’s a beast. And that granny gear is not synchronized.
My DD at the time was a 5MT so it wasn’t a big deal, but the U-Haul clutch was a little grabby. I messed around with granny a bit (ha!) and then figured out that almost dumping the clutch in 2nd while starting to apply pressure to the accelerator gave the smoothest launch.
I was pretty proficient by the end of the trip. Was still happy to give it back, though. 🙂
I have the Ford version with the 4 speed NP435 in my 92 F250. The non-synchro granny gear is only used for starting on steep hills, maneuvering around tight parking lots, or pulling stumps. Love it on the farm or around town. Curse it on the highway when it’s all wound up and getting 13 mpg with the 300-6.
That sounds like the truck my sister rented in 1987 to get home from a road trip because no one rented cars to under 21. The truck was a mid 70s F350 with a 330 V8 and a 4 speed with a crawler low. It was slow and thirsty but still drove OK.
I wonder if we are slowing their servers a bit. They also show service history for each vehicle. It seems this Cab-Chassis with the 8.1 Vortec had/has a radiator issue. Being sold at 165k.
4/26/2021 RADIATOR, 8.1 LITER ENG 154,814
5/25/2021 CURVED RADIATOR HOSE 9064 154,814
9/24/2021 RADIATOR, 8.1 LITER ENG 160,597
3/11/2022 RADIATOR, 8.1 LITER ENG 164,433
5/20/2022 RADIATOR – SUB TO PR1600 – 8.1L 165,546
5/20/2022 HOSE, RADIATOR, UPPER 165,546
I wonder if we are slowing their servers a bit. They also show service history for each vehicle. Was looking
Look at that front bench seat, so beautiful and useful. It’s a split bench, OK, but the middle section actually folds down to act as an armrest with cupholders. What’s not to love?
These were available in the extended cab version so you could fit 6. So, the RAM ev concept can take their “seats 6” and shove it. It’s already been done and without a third row.
You can still buy new Silverados and F-150s in these configurations.
Customer: I want a full-size, long-bed, regular-cab pickup truck.
Dealer: Go back to Massachusetts, Commie!
the trick is to go to a dealer that does a lot of commercial or fleet sales. They tend to have these since they actually have buyers for them.
Yeah, I don’t think I’d want to buy a low mileage U-Haul anything. Those are used without any finesse or care by people who’ve never driven trucks before.
Yeah the description David gave was basically the one of the F-250 I drove at work.
Disclaimer: as a man living on the old continent, that is the one and only pickup truck I ever drove.
Only on paper. Good friend tried to buy a Silverado like that. Order was on hold for months waiting to get a build date. GM finally came back and just cancelled the order. They just weren’t going to build a simple work truck at that time.
As was said, need to get in with Commercial or Fleet sales.
The front bench is no longer available.
The front bench is still standard on the 2023 trucks…
I am not sure if Marrying a prostitute is always the best plan, but you do you.
2021 is the year to get though. 2021 Silverado 1500 and 2021 Sierra 1500 pickups equipped with L82 MYC 6-speed and L84 MQE 8-Speed will be produced without Active Fuel Management/AFM (L82), or Dynamic Fuel Management/DFM (L84).
The truck everyone says they need and no one will buy. It’s not a real truck until you break $60,000. I went through the same thing a few years ago. I rented a Ram from U-Haul fully expecting to hate the overly large beast. It was equipped very much like this one. By the end of the day I was a convert and wondering if I needed to add one to my life. I got over it but was surprised by how quickly it won me over. Like you said, I think I loved it because it was just an honest work truck.
They can sell the vinyl as a luxury item and say it is vegan leather.
There is a basic honesty in a real pickup that is lacking in the 4 door, less than short box show boats that masquerade under the “pickup” label.