2009 Suzuki Equator - Road Test - Project Truck

Suzuki was nice enough to loan us one of the company's new Equator trucks to drive and give it the Sport Truck treatment. We are going to transform this truck into a corner-carving beast that will have enough power to fry the tires at will and still look good parked at the show. We're going to add a full Stillen power package, which includes an intercooled supercharger and a high-flow exhaust system. For the suspension, we're going to have Shaughn Reid and the crew at Streetshock rip out the factory stuff and fabricate a full QA1 coilover setup with a four-link out back. Max at Bio Kustomz will do his magic on the spindles for a few more inches of drop and some Toyo rubber on 20-inch MB Gunner wheels will round out the suspension. To add some flash to go along with our power and handling, Eightball Rods and Choppers and Steve Vandemon are going to sand, tape, and paint a new two-tone scheme on the truck.

Before any of that happens, we drove the truck in stock trim and were very impressed. The truck is based off the Nissan Frontier platform, so the performance is pretty much the same, but the exterior styling has been changed a bit. Suzuki decided to make the front end of the truck look a little more truck-like and we think it's an improvement over the Nissan. Powering the Equator is a 24-valve DOHC 4.0L V-6 that puts out 261 hp to the flywheel, which is backed by a five-speed automatic transmission. This combination makes for one very peppy truck that not only has plenty of power, but also scored an average of 19 mpg even with our heavy feet.