'94 Toyota Truck vs. Ford Ranger vs. S10

[slosurfer]

The wife and I have been slowly getting rid of some of our collected junk. One of the things has been to go through our collection of magazines, figuring out which ones to keep and which ones to donate/recycle. I started today on my offroading and dirt bike magazines. I kept all my 4wd toyota owner mags, but got rid of all my Dirt Rider mags from '93 and went through my Peterson's 4wheel and Offroad Collection. Mostly from '93, '94, and some from '06. I cut out a lot of back cover toyota ads from the '93 and '94 ones. Pretty funny how much they talk up what is now known as the 3.SLO It was still pretty cool to find a back page ad for my 4runner. I also looked at the features to see if they featured any toyotas. Not many, but the ones they did were hilarious by todays standards. Most were built for show and mud.

I ended up getting rid of all of them minus some back cover ads and I kept two. One had a feature on Surprise Canyon with some pics of Marlin's truck coming down one of the falls, so I kept that one since that trail is no longer open. The other one had a truck shootout for the best 4x4 between a '93 Toyota truck, a '93 Ford Ranger, and a '94 Chevy S10 (the chevy was the only one with any changes, hence the other ones being '93's). Well, I just had the time to sit down and read it. Guess who won???

[slosurfer]

No guesses? Okay, well, they chose the Chevy S10. Thought it was pretty funny considering how many '94 S10's you see on the trails today.

[Good Times]

what's a S10?














[sarcasm] GM must have been payin $$ for some advertising. That's probably the only way it would have won!

[YotaFun]

yeah I was thinking the same thing lance.
I have had the privilege to drive all three and I still would have chosen the Toyota even with the 3.0...

[4runnerchevy]

yeah I was thinking the same thing lance.
I have had the privilege to drive all three and I still would have chosen the Toyota even with the 3.0...

I don't think you were old enough to drive or reach the gas pedal in 1994. If you drove them later, then you were already a Toyota fan. Most Toyota guys put down other vehicles, without knowing about them. The 3.0 will go down in History as possibly the worst motor ever made, from any company, besides the Ford 2.8.

[slosurfer]

I don't think anyone is even remotely saying that the 3.0 was the best powerplant out of those three vehicles. I think it's funny that the vehicle they chose as the overall winner in a 4wd mag is hardly seen on the trail compared to the toyota or even the ranger 15 years later. Heck, I bet there are more toyotas with that 4.3 chevy engine in them on the trail then there are actual S10's on the trail. If they were right and the S10 was the best out of the three, wouldn't you think 15yrs later, you would see more of them on the trail.

[4x4mike]

They get out on the trail. That doesn't mean that they do well though.
S10 variant

[YotaFun]

yeah I was thinking the same thing lance.
I have had the privilege to drive all three and I still would have chosen the Toyota even with the 3.0...

I don't think you were old enough to drive or reach the gas pedal in 1994. If you drove them later, then you were already a Toyota fan. Most Toyota guys put down other vehicles, without knowing about them. The 3.0 will go down in History as possibly the worst motor ever made, from any company, besides the Ford 2.8.

My test drive was my ore toyota days when I still had a car and was a gm fan still.
I never like ford, granted there growing in me. The chevy was meh, and the tpyta was slightly better.
But dirt roads with pot holes evry 5 feet in various spots is not really a true test drive

[slosurfer]

They get out on the trail. That doesn't mean that they do well though.
S10 variant

Oh man, that's a predicament right there. That must have sucked!

I too have seen them on the trails, just not a whole bunch of them. I do see some of them out at the dunes though. 94 was when they changed the body style and made it bigger, I seem to see more of the older ones out on the trail with the body style like what you posted Mike.

[Good Times]

dang how do you undo that!? that's some body damage I sure as hell don't want to encounter!