LAS VEGAS, Nevada: In 1996, the big brains in charge of Dodge marketing commissioned a study to find out what the public attitude was to 4-door pickup trucks.
The reaction to that survey was so overwhelmingly positive that the big brains thought the results must be wrong, since no other car company had already entered the market. So they decided to do the survey again and got the same overwhelmingly positive result.
The other decision would have been to fire all the big brains associated with Dodge pickup marketing at that time. After all, the 4-door pickup is one of the most obvious body configurations to come along in some time and if being able to spot that big a trend that big isn't a prerequisite for a job in marketing, what in the world is?
A 4-door pickup is the common ground between a pickup and a sport-utility vehicle, which are only two of the hottest vehicle segments in the world today.
And let's not even talk about why it took Dodge three years to get a new body style onto the market.
Maybe the Dodge boys get to keep their jobs because they did manage to beat just about every other car maker on the market, or maybe because the Dodge Dakota Quad Cab that they finally got managed to bring to market turned out so well.
The Quad Cab turning out so well should not surprise anyone, really, since the Dakota itself has a lot going for it. Specifically, that would be a size somewhere between compact and full, a striking front-end appearance, a good interior package, and an engine range that includes two V8s.
Dodge says that adds up to a trio of attractive attributes of the people, power and payload persuasion, and it's hard to argue that. Dakota has more room, carrying ability and power than the compact pickups but isn't quite the challenge or expense to drive around that the full-size pickups are.
Adding a pair of real doors (it already came with those pseudo-doors that have been all the rage, the ones with no exterior handles) and keeping the bed short only adds to Dakota's charms.There will be folks who might have argued for the longer bed, the 78-inch one, but most of the people queried correctly understood that 63 inches would be enough to suit most modern demands and still let them park in their garage.
This particular configuration also provides for the best exterior design, since the longer bed distorted the proportions significantly.
This style issue is not to be brushed off, since the Quad Cab is likely to be an important statement vehicle. Dodge expects it will speak to a crowd that is younger, better-educated, more well-to-do, and includes more married men and more women in general than the existing Dakota does.
It allows them to be among the first into a new segment and enjoy the status that comes from being at the front rather than the rear of a herd. It also shows that they have active lifestyles and they're capable of looking after themselves and stuff like that and I guess that's all commendable.
Along with eliciting the admiration and/or jealousy of the masses, there are a lot of real positives that come with the Dakota Quad Cab.
It's easy to see (like it was back in 1996, but I beat a dead horse) how this package will suit a lot of folks who are in the grey area between pickups, compact SUVs and mid-size sedans. So Dakota Quad Cab does offer flexibility that is pretty much unmatched in a reasonably compact vehicle.
It must be pointed out, however, that Dodge is stretching reality by saying that Quad Cab's capable of carrying six adults. This vehicle is ideally suited for four adults or two adults and two kids who are siblings.
Dodge says that Dakota Quad Cab is more of a small-bed pickup that seats four than a 4-seat sport-ute that's had it's closed cargo bay replaced with a small pickup bed, and they are right.But Dakota Quad Cab is a lot less rough and ready than your traditional pickup, and that's a good thing.
It has been suspended and tuned to suit the environment it will occupy for the vast majority of its life -- paved surfaces. Consequently, it is fairly pleasant on good pavement and not prone to letting the shock of every surface fault vibrate into the cabin.
The resulting quiet and calm in the cabin will be quite welcome on a day-to-day basis, yet the Quad Cab should still be capable of picking up a load of loam or gravel or peat moss or whatever it is that cottagers buy and hauling it up to Sleepy Hollow or wherever.
As for engine choices, it is possible to see how you could go with the 3.9-litre V6 and not have small children laugh at you when you drive by. Indeed, this is an extremely capable engine, delivering 175 horsepower at 4900 rpm and 225 pound-feet of torque between roughly 2500 and 3500 rpm. It should well suit a couple who rarely take extra people anywhere, who value fuel economy over performance, and whose cargo-hauling needs are limited to new love seats and the like.
For the ultimate oomph, there's the 5.9-litre V8 with its 250 horses at 4700 rpm and its earth-rumbling 345 pound-feet of torque between 1000 to 4000 rpm.
My own personal taste would be for the 4.7-litre V8 that's new to the Dakota line, since I am distressingly addicted to the ability to be faster away from a stoplight than other people but do object to paying as much for a fill-up as the 5.9 causes.
This engine serves up 235 horsepower at a peak of 4000 rpm and 295 pound-feet of torque at 2400 rpm, with most of that amount on hand for a wide range of engine speeds.
In the real world, the 4.7 works extremely well with the Dakota Quad Cab the way most people will use it -- which means mostly with a couple of adults and some stuff, or a family of four and a little more stuff. It's quick and aggressive in all situations and gives off a nice rumble when pushed.
A 4x2 Dakota Quad Cab lists at $23,800 and a 4x4 Dakota Quad Cab lists for$27,540. Those are Canadian prices in Canadian dollars.
With the correct engine to suit your needs and tastes, the 2000 Dodge Dakota Quad Cab will provide excellent pragmatic service for a wide range of customers. Why a vehicle that does that needs to be studied by marketing firms at all, let alone twice, is beyond me.