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April 3, 2008 http://www.thecarconnection.com/fullreview/chevrolet_avalanche_2002

  TheCarConnection Team
 TheCarConnection Team

by Dan Lyons

You review the 2002 Avalanche

With SUV popularity showing no signs of waning, manufacturers are hunting for more niches of this category to exploit — and this year’s big niche is the full-size, sport ute/pickup hybrid. Ford got there first with the Explorer Sport Trac; and now Chevy is following with the Avalanche, a transformer go-bot of a truck that might have trailed Ford out of the gate, but looks to pass Sport Trac with a bigger package laden with a truckload of versatility.

Eye of the beholder

The Avalanche is a styling polarizer. This is either one cool truck, or a styling collision between cladding and sheetmetal. Whether you like the look or not depends on how you feel about plastic body trim.

And yet, the Avalanche looks like exactly what it is – a cross between a big sport-ute and a big pickup. Up front, it’s dominated by quad headlights and an underslung, beefy bumper, with recessed fog lamps. In back, it’s a short-box pickup, with liberal amounts of plastic, from the wedge-shaped sail panels angled off the back of the cab, a wraparound bumper with multiple steps built-in, and a lockable, accordion design, three-piece hard bed cover. The side-on view shows high, square-cut wheel openings, full-size doors front and back and what looks to be a 50/50 mix of metal and plastic.

Inside, it’s a tale of two portals. Open the front door, hop up into the cabin, and you take in a nicely detailed interior, worthy of any good pickup or sport-ute. All switchgear is easy to find and use, and the optional six-way power seats on my test truck were capable of suiting just about any size driver and front passenger. A center console splits the bucket seats, and storage spaces large and small are found just about everywhere you look – on the dash, in the console, on the door panels.  Hop in back and you know you’re not in a pickup anymore. Full-size doors yield to seats big enough for full-size people - as many as three across.

by Dan Lyons You review the 2002 Avalanche With SUV popularity showing no signs of waning, manufacturers are hunting for more niches of this category to exploit — and this year’s big niche is the full-size, sport ute/pickup hybrid. Ford got there first with the Explorer Sport Trac; and now Chevy is following with the Avalanche, a transformer go-bot of a truck that might have trailed Ford out of the gate, but looks to pass Sport Trac with a bigger package laden with a truckload of versatility.Eye of the beholder The Avalanche is a styling polarizer. This is either one cool truck, or a styling collision between cladding and sheetmetal. Whether you like the look or not depends on how you feel about plastic body trim. And yet, the Avalanche looks like exactly what it is – a cross between a big sport-ute and a big pickup. Up front, it’s dominated by quad headlights and an underslung, beefy bumper, with recessed fog lamps. In back, it’s a short-box pickup, with liberal amounts of plastic, from the wedge-shaped sail panels angled off the back of the cab, a wraparound bumper with multiple steps built-in, and a lockable, accordion design, three-piece hard bed cover. The side-on view shows high, square-cut wheel openings, full-size doors front and back and what looks to be a 50/50 mix of metal and plastic. Inside, it’s a tale of two portals. Open the front door, hop up into the cabin, and you take in a nicely detailed interior, worthy of any good pickup or sport-ute. All switchgear is easy to find and use, and the optional six-way power seats on my test truck were capable of suiting just about any size driver and front passenger. A center console splits the bucket seats, and storage spaces large and small are found just about everywhere you look – on the dash, in the console, on the door panels.  Hop in back and you know you’re not in a pickup anymore. Full-size doors yield to seats big enough for full-size people - as many as three across. by Dan Lyons You review the 2002 Avalanche With SUV popularity showing no signs of waning, manufacturers are hunting for more niches of this category to exploit — and this year’s big niche is the full-size, sport ute/pickup hybrid . Ford got there first with the Explorer ...