All new 2014 Silverado/Sierra launch airing live 12-13-12 at 9:30 EST

Larry

Bigassgas Explorer
For those GM truck freaks and geeks, we will finally get to see the wraps taken off GM’s latest full-size truck offering Thursday, December 13th at 9:30 EST. You can catch links to the live revealing on the Silverado or GMC Facebook pages. There are also links to the live reveal from both Chevrolet and GMC websites.

I know I am anxious to see the all new GM trucks and even more anxious to see the 2007 to current GMT900’s come to an end. The GMT900’s have been a huge disappointment in exterior design and body quality, not that the GMT800’s before them were all that great either. The current Silverado look like a horrible cornucopia of ill-fitting Chinese counterfeit aftermarket body parts smeared over a pickup truck silhouette, while the GMC Sierra is only slightly better. The body panels are paper thin with horrible body stamping witness marks noticeable on just about every panel on the truck, front inner fenders that constantly fall down into plain sight and my biggest pet peeve….the lack of a rocker panel to protect the door bottoms.

Hopefully, GM can redeem themselves (at least in my eyes) with their latest offerings. We’ll see! Check out the live launch tomorrow morning. It should be fun to watch or poke fun of after. Hopefully the first.

GMC Reveal link. Pretty sure this link will be for the Silvy too.
 

digitaldelay

Explorer
Cool! Thanks for the heads-up. Between these new trucks and the new Corvette, I'm hoping for some big improvements from GM.

Jason
 

Mark Harley

Expedition Leader
Can't wait to see what GMC has to offer. My 2002 2500HD has been a great truck.
GM did think when they built it and made working on it somewhat easy.
It has held up well on the Pennsylvania pot hole, Salt loaded roads.
 

gmcpimpin

Observer
I'm with you my 2002 Silverado has been a great truck, but when I went to test drive a 900, it just didn't feel right. I hope they can do better.
 

gmcpimpin

Observer
Well, just watched to live stream. Very underwhelming. I like the led lighting under the rails, and I wonder how different the new V6 is. Otherwise they look like slightly updated GMT900s. New rearend in the half ton dosn't look like the old AAM 8.6, looks more like the AAM 7.6 (Colorado) although I'm sure its a larger ring and pinion.
 

Mark Harley

Expedition Leader
Wow!
Thanks GM for saving me $40,000.00 I will keep my 10 year old Sierra 2500HD.
The 2014 did not change enough for my interest, Looks like a dodge from the side and ford from the front.
What is with the "Family Truckster" front end I wonder if they will offer it in green with wood grain sides?
Oh boy! and intergrated bumper step, anouther dirt catcher to harbor rust.
The Big three keep pushing me away with their designs, Maybe they should ask what the truck guys want.
 

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Larry

Bigassgas Explorer
I actually really like them although I think the GMC fenders are a bit over-designed although I do like the GMC tail lights better. Even at that, I still think the Ram brand owns the best full-size truck design language right now. If you look closely you can see a lot of Ram in the new GM twins. The door frames fully enclosing into the cab are very Ramish and even Titanish. If you don’t know any better the interior center stack looks pretty much like Ram as well. Especially the new ’13 Ram.

Early on in the GM truck development there was a lot talk how Ram had the most influence on the new GM truck design, which makes perfect sense as studies, as well as Polk data, have shown Ram has stolen more customers from GM than any other including Ford. As a multi generation life-long GM fan that has owned 7 new GM products since 1997, 4 of which were trucks, I too have felt abandon by GM in 2007 when the GMT900s launched as they were such a horrible execution of a truck. If I were in the market for a new heavy duty pickup today it would be an easy decision of a Ram Power Wagon.

Everybody has their own opinions but in my opinion GM has always owned the gas market as they have always had great rock solid dependable gasoline powertrains. I am a huge fan of the technology behind direct injection but am also worried these new DI engines may follow the unreliable and expensive to repair ways that the modern diesels engines have gone. Time will tell. Ram’s Hemi engines are a close second but it is no secret Chrysler has never done an outstanding job with fine tuning their engine calibrations.

As with my comments regarding the ’07-’12 GMT900 body design and quality this is one example of what I was talking about. For whatever reason, GM decided to not encapsulate the door bottoms in rocker panels. This caused a lot of road noise, doors that didn’t operate correctly when packed with snow, ice, dirt, etc. and the door bottoms are much more susceptible to rusting. When a door edge is parallel to the road surface like below, it chips much easier than a flat surface of a true rocker panel. This was a huge mistake on GMs part to ever release these to production. Once it chips rust soon follows. I travel around the country a lot and have seen many GMT900 trucks in the salt belt with significant rust already growing on the door bottoms. Not only where the GMT900’s prone to door rust, they are flat out ugly with less than sterling body assembly fastening methods, spot welds, stamping, etc. Glad to see GM at least fixed the door bottoms on the new 2014’s!
4498276049_52e2c1e801_z.jpg


I find this the most hilarious….:Wow1:

2014 GM interior.
Chevrolet-Silverado_High_Country_2014_800x600_wallpaper_0b.jpg


2013 Ram interior. Close resemblance, no? If you can’t beat them join them.
Dodge-Ram_1500_2013_800x600_wallpaper_46.jpg
 
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plainjaneFJC

Deplorable
Definitely not digging the family truckster front end. One of my trucks is an 08 with the 4.3 It get 12mpg. I hope the new one does a lot better. I think in the domestic war that Ford and Dodge are kicking Chevys butt.
 

rkj__

Adventurer
They took the previous truck, and refined it. No dramatic revolutions, and I don't see anything stupid either.

I'd still like to see an off road package that offers more than carbon fiber trim and different shocks. The front bumper is just so low.
 

Buliwyf

Viking with a Hammer
Well, it looks like GM has addressed ZERO of my complaints with the previous truck. No, thanks. I'll stick with my old truck.
Deosn't appear to me that they improved anything?

My previous complaints:
-door chime bongs all the f'n time
-turn signal stalk is designed by a retard, no flash to pass function. Have to click high beams on, then off again, and repeat.
-auto light controller makes it a serious pain to use lights to signal "trucker style".
-blinding high beam and cruise lights shining on the dash are actually brighter than the headlights. My GM work truck has it's idiot lights covered with electrical tape so that I can actually see at night in the rain.
-mirrors don't adjust wide enough to actually see anything.

-passenger side mirror is no longer "object in mirror are closer than they appear". Now they actually farther away! And it looks like fuzzy walleye vision. That mirrors field of view is so narrow now that the blind spot is 10 times bigger. Backing a trailer on the passenger side is impossible with just the mirrors. Sucks if your in a cargo van or have a slide in camper.

-backing a trailer up and to the right in the rain at night with no lights, snow, or full moon is impossible. Passenger mirror is so bad i have to mention it twice.

-Chevys don't come with shocks anymore. They have an interesting "simulated shock tubes" under the truck now. It's as fake as the hood scoops on a 03 Mustang GT. They might actually have a shock piston and some oil in that fake shock thing, but your average radio control car has more damping than a GM truck. Get Bilsteins right away or risk dieing.

-bent pregnant guppy frame prevents offroad use
-DEF tank hanging low prevents off road use
-traction control and stability control turn back on once you get up to 20mph. (is this federal law now or something) Truck handles better offroad with both off. So every timeyou accidentally go too fast, you have to pull over and park to turn off the stabilicrap and TC.

-the fact that they have excellent (best in class until 2012) gas engines pisses me off even more.
-interior is far worse than a Korean car.
-IFS with worse ride than a F350 Ford with the Plow springs! (GMC 2500 model)
-IFS in general
-the fact that the GM 2500 and 3500 can weigh allmost 1000 pounds less than a Superduty. That's a nice thing on paper, until you see where they lost the weight!
-some of them have a huge, super fat, view of the road blocking rear view mirror. Becuase it's super important to have a massive amber banner alerting you to the ppassenger side airbag status. I ripped that mirror off and chucked it out the window on the freeway at a car with communist politics stickers all over her car. LOLz.

GM hasn't made a good truck since 1986. I miss those rusty, olde school, box shaped trucks with little or no creature comforts to break down. Imagine if GM brought back the 86 truck. With the strength of a modern drivetrain, no rust, some real LSx horsepower!

I once talked to a Ford rep, that told me something I heard just a year before from a BMW rep about the X5. "Sometimes you need to make a crappy ugly car to be a sales success. Good cars don't allways sell. When the Mustangs switch to a new body style, they're made a bit Fugly on purpose, then they refine them every year to keep the platform fresh until the next style change." "Dodge neons sold well, and they were uber junk far worse than import econoboxes." "Geo Tracker? Who ever thought that thing would sell? It did! Sometimes people want junky unreliable cars."

BMW guy: "Not all Americans have good taste in cars. We made the X5 for those people."

LOLz. This might be the pickup version of the X5.
 
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Whew, not a whole lotta love for the new GM trucks from this group. I'm not totally enamored with the new styling up front either but who knows, it may grow on me. I hated the looks of the 2nd gen Dodges when they first came out and look at what I've owned since '96. I couldn't agree more with Larry. I think GM is really making strides with their gassers. A 6.2 with cylinder deactivation? That has got to be a winner. We have a 2010 Suburban with the 5.3 and cylinder deactivation and it just plain works. We get better MPG in that vehicle then we ever got in a Honda Pilot and the Sub is 3x the vehicle the Pilot was.

My big issue is that the new trucks are too nice...I'd be afraid to really take them offroad while making payments. Anyway, I'm going to wait until they come out with the tow/haul/payload numbers before writing it off. :sombrero:
 

Larry

Bigassgas Explorer
My big issue is that the new trucks are too nice...I'd be afraid to really take them offroad while making payments. Anyway, I'm going to wait until they come out with the tow/haul/payload numbers before writing it off. :sombrero:

Exactly, they are getting carried away with making these trucks too nice. Not only GM, but Ford with their Platinum edition F-series as well as Ram with their Longhorn. You think these new GM trucks look pimped out now, ha…they get worse in the ways of more bling. The GMC Denali and Chevrolet High Country super luxury packages haven’t been shown yet. The super zoot trucks just seem stupid to me but the experts claim that is where the customer demand is….Luxury Trucks. Who knew the demand was that strong for 50K+ trucks when fuel is at an all-time high? I had a hard time believing people really wanted overly loaded trucks until you start reading various forums dedicated to the GM launch where people are moaning and groaning because they don’t have automatic butt wipers. The things people say in those forums are idiotic and just make you shake your head, like some in this thread. My opinion is the majority of these people buying this stuff should be driving CARS! The only thing good about the super lux trucks is they are very profitable for manufacturers. I for one am glad to see the US auto manufactures make money on something because the reality is manufacturers make horribly low margins on little efficient cars and hybrids. We need these manufactures around to support the economy no matter how ridicules some of us think their method of madness is to make an almighty buck. They are wh0res too.

Don’t worry, the more watered down trucks like most of us in our hobby/sport/addiction (or whatever you want to call it) prefer will arrive after the launch. Manufacturers always launch their cream of the crap first then the stripped models later. The good ole "truck guy trucks" with rubber floor mats, crank windows, manual shift transfercases, etc. will Debut at the Detroit Auto Show (NAIAS) in January then a few more variations will be shown at the Chicago Auto Show which is traditionally more truck and fleet and commercial oriented.

I actually don’t mind the new ’14 K2XX trucks. They’re still not as sexy as the current RAM but certainly better than the GM offering since 2007….those were horrible!
 

Larry

Bigassgas Explorer
http://media.gm.com/media/us/en/gm/.../news/us/en/2012/Dec/1213-2014-silverado.html

According to this,

the 4.3 will get an aluminum block and have enough power to push a crewcab with trailer?


Sounds like I've found the replacement 4.3 for the 06 in a few years.

Yes, the new 4.3L shares absolutely nothing with the old 4.3L. The old 4.3L from 1985 to 2012 was based on the original small block Chevy engine architecture from 1955. The new 4.3L is based on the Gen IV LS engine architecture but now with direct injection. This new 4.3L will have more gonads than big blocks did in the early 80’s. Technology is amazing. I am anxious to see how the new 4.3L drives. V6’s typically exhibit a lot of NVH over their V8 brothers. The old 4.3L was quite the vibrating machine even with a balance shaft, hopefully the new one won't be.

I do think GM did an outstanding approach with their new 4.3L V6 where they based it off of a truck engine whereas; RAM is using a 3.6L V6 for 2013 in their 1500 series. While the 3.6L DI V6 is a great performer in a minivan, Charger, Challenger and even Jeep Wrangler one just has to wonder how durable that small car derived engine will prove to be in a large RAM truck. It might just get worked to death in a heavy truck. Ford’s overhyped Turbo V6 is also car derived where durability may be taxed in the long run to motive a full-size truck. Time will tell!
 

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