Mysterious ‘Top Secret’ Ram Pickup Teased For April 25 Reveal
A new Ram pickup is blowing into town.
Ram has posted a video to social media teasing the release of a “top-secret” new model.
A narrator whispers “I hear the storm is coming” as the covered vehicle is revealed on a trailer hitched to a Ram HD.
The shape of the truck suggests it could be a compact pickup similar to the Ram Rampage that went on sale in Brazil last year.
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The Rampage is similar in size to the Ford Maverick that’s powered by turbocharged four-cylinder engines and built on a unibody chassis related to the one used for the Jeep Compass.
Ram executives have been discussing the possibility of adding a small pickup to the lineup, which currently only features full-size models.
The UAW last year said that a “mid-size” pickup would be built at the Belvidere, Ill., factory that was slated for closure, but saved during the negotiations between the union and the automaker.
The “storm” quote suggests the vehicle may use a different name than Rampage, which previously featured on a two-door, car-based Dodge model that was sold in the U.S. in the 1980s.
However, it may also be a reference to the upcoming “Twisters” movie, which will be featuring Ram trucks, much like the original “Twister” of 1996 did.
The truck under the sheet appears to have the wide stance of a performance truck, like the upcoming Ram 1500 RHO, which is slated to take the Ram 1500 TRX’s slot in the lineup this year with a ‘Hurricane’ inline-six-cylinder engine under the hood. Then again, the point of the cover is to disguise what’s under it.
There is also the chance that a Jeep Gladiator-based, body-on-frame Dakota midsize pickup revival is in the works, although the Belvidere factory most recently produced the now-discontinued Jeep Cherokee, which was a unibody model.
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The Dakota was sold across three generations by Dodge and Ram from 1986 through 2011.
