Chevy Trailblazer vs. Ford Explorer vs. Toyota Highlander

Chevy Trailblazer vs. Ford Explorer vs. Toyota Highlander Chevy Trailblazer vs. Ford Explorer vs. Toyota Highlander
Comparison Tests

Ford versus Chevy. The classic duel. And when both brands introduce all-new versions of their mainstream personal transporters, we instinctively lock and load the test gear.

Explorer versus TrailBlazer. It even sounds heroic. Battle of the titans! Listen to the crowd roar!

But this is the new millennium. Ford versus Chevy is just a prelim now. The world is smaller, and automakers from around the planet bring their best ideas to slug it out here in the U.S. arena.

Sport-utility vehicles are the heavyweights, 3.4 million sold last year, 19 percent of the total car and light-truck action. Think of it: One of every five vehicles off the dealer lots is an SUV. The Ford Explorer ranked third in the most-popular-vehicle poll, once again outselling each of the cars on that list.

Competition goes where the customers are. Toyota has sized up the players on the U.S. scene, and it has groomed a contender of its own. Explorer? TrailBlazer? The names swagger with rugged derring-do. Would a canny hopeful try to outderring the old pros? Not if he had imagination.

Enter the Toyota Highlander. No, we can't explain the name. Maybe market research revealed that soccer moms have bagpiper fantasies. We aren't going there. But the vehicle behind the name is a calculated end run around SUV strengths. Rather than match the truck-tuff hardware of the Detroiters with more of the same (the 4Runner already plays to that crowd), Toyota took a car platform and dressed it in a lumberjack shirt. You get the look of a high-riding outdoorsman with the manners of a butler.

It all comes down to this question: What do customers really want? Ford, Chevy, and all the others, in fact, stumbled into what has become the SUV market. Originally, the vehicles were heavy four-wheel-drive pickups, go-anywhere machines with enclosed bodies instead of open beds. They had crude back seats. Folks bought them. Then came four doors. Folks bought more. Better upholstery was added. Folks bought more still. Then Ford ran the formula through the blender one more time and poured out the Explorer in 1990. The market went crazy for it. When two-wheel drive became the standard version, thereby lowering the price, demand ramped even higher.

Since the Explorer showed the way, the industry has been building a succession of ever more fashionable and comfortable trucks, and the customers have been happily driving them away as soon as the paint dries.

But inquiring minds ask this nagging question: Do the customers really want trucks? Or are they merely latter-day station-wagon pilots who are rebelling against the bovine virtue of minivans?

Let's not be too literal about the term "truck." either the new Explorer nor the TrailBlazer has many parts in common with pickups. But they follow the truck concept of a separate body on a ladder frame. They have truck clearances underneath and room for truck tires in their fender wells. Moreover, they're engineered to survive truck endurance schedules at their respective proving grounds. So they're robust in their construction; read, heavy. And they ride high above the pavement.

Do folks really want all that heavy-duty hardware--and the stiff-legged handling and poor gas mileage that come with it--just to avoid being seen in a minivan? Maybe. But our hunch is that they've never been offered the right choice before. The Explorer and the TrailBlazer represent the latest thinking in passenger trucks. The Highlander is a tall station wagon with the all-weather capability of four driven wheels.

Here's what we think: People want what works. Simply put, they need a beast of burden--that's the utility part of SUV--but it ought not be a donkey to drive. Off-road capability? Nah. But bad roads? Sure, they lead to interesting places. The freedom to take the path least traveled is the sport part of SUV. Against those expectations, with a budget in the $30,000-to-$35,000 range, can a car stand up to trucks? We're going to find out.