Chicago Preview: Suzuki bringing three Equator concepts to Windy City. Again.
Click above for a larger image of Suzuki and Truckin' Magazine's Equator concept
At last year's Chicago Auto Show, Suzuki showed off three versions of its reworked Nissan Frontier pickup, the Equator. The three concepts were the RMZ-4, Quad and Quay, which represented trucks to haul a superbike, a quad and a boat, respectively. Since then, we've driven an Equator and heard that the production truck will sell for $17,995. Flash forward to the 2009 Chicago Auto Show and American Suzuki Motor Corp. is finally ready to introduce the "all-new" Equator with – wait for it – three concept trucks. This trio of trucks, however, have been customized by 4-Wheel & Off-Road, Off-Road and Truckin' magazines.
In the case of the Truckin' concept (shown above), an Equator has been lowered and fitted with a set of massive six-spoke alloys wrapped in rather serious-looking street rubber. So-equipped, it almost looks like this trucklet might canyon carve almost as well as the motorcycle in its bed. Well, perhaps that's stretching things a bit. The concept uses a massaged four-cylinder under the hood that probably couldn't come close to keeping up with that 999cc GSX-R sportbike in the bed. But it sure looks fun! We'll be sure to cover all three concepts along with everything else worth seeing when we get to the Windy City in about ten days.
[Source: Suzuki]
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Torrent 5:09PM (1/30/2009)
Wow that's a bad Phtotoshop.
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Shooter 8:15PM (2/02/2009)
How so?
Torrent 9:04PM (2/02/2009)
Well there's really nothing wrong with it, but it could definitely be better. The headlights, for example- look like they were taken from an Equator at an auto show- with all of the glare. The grille looks really off, and when you look close, it looks like the truck was just cut and pasted to a white background in a rushing manner. Quality takes time.
Paintjob is great, though.
Chaz 5:13PM (1/30/2009)
As always it will come back to the question of why such a brilliant bike maker just can't get it quite right with cars. I know it's a Nissan, and it's just a US market hole filler, but still, let's have some Swift/Kizashi type stuff already!
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Mark 5:23PM (1/30/2009)
The SX4 was just ranked fairly highly in Consumer Reports testing and was pegged to have excellent reliability. I'd say they're doing something right already.
Chaz 5:46PM (1/30/2009)
I drove an SX4/Sedici and while it did feel well enough screwed together, and all the right boxes are checked off, it isn't all that nice a car to drive. Certainly not as nice as several competitors from Hyundai/Toyota/Honda..
Even in vanilla, there's the best, and the also-rans (Suzuki, Nissan, Kia come to mind)
IOMTT 5:27PM (1/30/2009)
I would buy the truck for $18K, if the GSXR was included...and some track days and track school!!!
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The Luigiian 5:41PM (1/30/2009)
I'm interested to see what the other two are going to look like. I personally am hoping at least one of the other two has a four cylinder turbo or diesel with four-wheel drive.
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havoc 6:05PM (1/30/2009)
i loved my vq frontier, these are just same box with different wrapper.
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Torrent 6:36PM (1/30/2009)
No, the same box with different headlights.
havoc 6:40PM (1/30/2009)
i do dig the blacked out front on this one. i understand that nissan was trying to keep some of the hardbody pick-up front for heritage but the look was not as smooth as it could have been (big chrome v bars)
Hugh 6:46PM (1/30/2009)
That truck looks like its about to buckle...
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Chris 7:42PM (1/30/2009)
So they're bringing 3 Equator concepts to Chicago again? How about they just bring 3 vehicles which were actually designed by Suzuki and not just rebadged ones from other companies.
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James Ricketts 8:27PM (1/30/2009)
who flippin cares. This thing is one ugly piece of crap. ...oh yeah nice paint job (sarc)
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socarboy99 8:58AM (1/31/2009)
Suzuki needs to secure dealer floorplan financing for it's
US dealers quickly, or they will go the way of Isuzu! GMAC
was doing the Suzuki floorplan, but that stopped in Dec '08
when the credit crunch hit. Since then, Suzuki dealers are
starting to "drop like flies" with a lack of floorplan. In the
last week the two dealers in the Charleston, SC area
(Johnnys Suzuki) abrubtly closed their doors and another
dealer in Sumter, SC closed ealier in January.
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Shooter 2:42PM (2/02/2009)
These aren't "concepts", and Suzuki never said they were. These are three trucks customized by three separate magazines with their respective audiences in mind. Oh, and the bike in the back is a 749cc GSXR.
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Frank Filipponio 2:44PM (2/02/2009)
I'm pretty sure it's a 2006 GSX-R 1000, at least that's what it said in the blurb attached to the photo. A copy of the photo they added for this chop can be found here: http://www.bikez.com/pictures/suzuki/2006/22593_0_1_2_gsx-r%201000_Image%20credits%20-%20Suzuki.jpg
Shooter 8:25PM (2/02/2009)
The bike for the chop might have been an '06 1000, but the bike for the show is an '07 750.
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wildkitty 12:52PM (2/05/2009)
That's just fugly.
Anybody else hear that the Kizashi is back on the ventilator with O. Suzuki itching to pull the plug?
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