GMC Canyon is tout-worthy towing champ
Midsize pickup defies declarations that market is dead
The GMC Canyon midsize pickup is a conventional-wisdom slayer. Before the Canyon and its corporate cousin, the Chevrolet Colorado, went on sale in 2015, conventional wisdom said the market for midsize pickups was as dead as the VCR.
Customers disproved that the moment they saw the new pickups. The Canyon and Colorado sold beyond expectations, won a slew of awards and made General Motors’ product planning department look like the smartest kids in class. GM sold 84,430 Chevy Colorados and 30,077 Canyons in 2015. It’s looking for ways to boost production this year.
Canyon prices start at $20,995 for an extended-cab rear-drive model. I tested a loaded 4x4 short box SLT crew cab that stickered at $43,440, a $4,125 premium — $3,730 for the engine, the rest for goodies such as lane-departure alert and an integrated trailer brake — over a gasoline version of the same truck. An automatic transmission comes standard with the diesel.
At that price, the diesel is for committed fans, particularly since prices for the fuel in the USA vary widely from one part of the country to another and are often higher than those for the regular gasoline other pickups use.
The Canyon and Colorado compete with midsize pickups such as the Nissan Frontier and Toyota Tacoma. The new Honda Ridgeline will join the pack when its goes on sale. Ford is likely to rejoin the midsize market with a new version of its Ranger pickup, but that’s not likely before 2018.
The larger and more expensive Ram full-size 1500 Ecodiesel may compete with the Canyon marginally, but the GMC’s easy-topark size probably appeals primarily to different buyers.
Canyon prices are competitive with those of other midsize pickups, but the diesel package lifts the GMC to the top of the class. The diesel Chevy Colorado costs a bit less and has fewer features than the Canyon. The two GM midsizes are otherwise very similar in looks and identical in power, towing and fuel economy.
The diesel premium gets you a 2.8-liter 4-cylinder engine that produces 181 horsepower and 369 pound-feet of torque. The horsepower is no great shakes — the Frontier and Tacoma’s gasoline V-6s whip it by more 80 and 97, respectively — but the torque output is a whopper: 104 more than the Tacoma’s 3.5L V-6 and 109 above the Frontier’s 4.0L. Outsized torque figures are typical of diesels, as is the fact that the Canyon’s peak torque is available from just 2,000 rpm — ideal for towing.
The 4-wheel-drive Canyon’s 7,600-pound towing capacity tops the Frontier by 1,500 pounds and the Tacoma by 1,200. That’s like hauling an extra 16-foot Lund Fury bass boat or more — a big deal for sportsmen.
The Environmental Protection Agency rates the Canyon 4wheel-drive version at 20 miles per gallon in the city, 29 mpg on the highway and 23 mpg com- bined. The combined figure is a whopping 6 mpg more than the V-6 Frontier and Tacoma. At current fuel costs, the Canyon will save an owner $450 a year over a Frontier and $200 compared with a Tacoma.
The Canyon diesel is louder and prone to more vibration than the gasoline V-6s, but the difference is not enough to dissuade a shopper with gear to haul.
Sales of diesel cars have taken a beating with Volkswagen’s fall from grace, but the GMC Canyon and Chevrolet Colorado pickups give a new set of buyers a reason to choose the powerful and fuelefficient engines.