Are trucks made better? Are they purposely made better?
Do the engineers sit around a table talking about how they want to do this or that to make a truck more sturdy against wear and tear of being used as a “work truck”? I realize that a truck is built with the underlying assumption of an extra ton or so of weight being towed around, so naturally they will last longer when not having those loads. But, I am asking about the overall quality, such as cooling systems, ignitions, alternators, batteries, seals & gaskets, bearings, as well as suspensions and transmissions.
Maybe the marketers realize that a lot of professionals are going to use their trucks, so they better be better designed and assembled than the cars which are being used merely by families and such?
Maybe the designs in trucks are older and more “tried and true”, thus yielding better reliability? (Example: 2.3l engine in the ford rangers & mazdas, which has been around since the 60’s.)
Any engineers want to comment on the overall quality of trucks vs. cars?
Of course, many of the design features that make trucks more durable than cars also result in them being less confortable than cars. For example, trucks typically have heavier shocks, which give a less smooth ride, but allows them to safely carry much more weight. That’s considered an acceptable tradeoff by truck buyers, who are mostly looking for a working vehicle.
Of course, if you just want to look like a tough guy in a truck, but really want it as comfortable as a car, there are lots of vehicles like that around too.
Added to the above, trucks are also built with less consideration to weight saving due to the more lax fuel economy specifications applied to this class of vehicles. Therefore they can be built with ‘heavy duty’ components. Which usually means heavier.
(SUVs are included in the ‘light truck’ category when they are blatantly performing a ‘car’ role, i.e. transporting passengers on roadways. See Keith Bradshers High and Mighty for a good rant on this)
I’m not saying that lighter components are per se less reliable, just that newer technologies (eg glass reinforced nylon intake manifolds, carbon driveshafts) take time to mature and reach the levels of reliability associated with older style parts.
I too, am curious about what the OP meant by rubber gaskets, and his percieved “rubber gasket gap” between trucks and cars.
One of the most important design constraints for any automotive gasket is the differential expansion of the metals it must seal.
Aluminum and cast iron, two metals commonly joined at a gasket face in a modern engine, expand at different rates. If there is any general trend or difference in gasket design to be observed between cars and trucks, it is likely due to the fact that production “cars” adopted the wholesale use of weight-saving aluminum parts (e.g., cylinder head, oil pump and water pump bodies, etc.) long before “trucks” did.
The other obvious difference between “cars” and “trucks” is the transverse engine/front wheel drive layout that has become all but universal among cars, and the longitudinal engine/rear drive layout of trucks. The former allows greater design flexibility and is generally safer in the hands of inexperienced drivers, but forces the front wheels to handle all the tasks of supporting the engine, powering the vehicle, and steering the vehicle.
Automotive engineers are an incredibly creative and industrious bunch, and had solved most of the major problems of the transverse engine front drive layout by the mid-eighties. I personally disagree with statements like “trucks are better made” or “more durable” than cars. Each vehicle is designed to serve its intended purpose, and if properly cared for will easily return 100,000 miles or more and many years of service.
If you wish to get picky, yes there are obvious features of trucks (mentioned previously in other posts) that are “overbuilt” and inherently make them stronger when the vehicle is used for everyday transportation, but considering the intended use of the vehicle these should not be viewed as “extra features” of trucks, they are absolutely necessary for the purposes a truck is designed for (i.e., hauling loads).
A lot of non-load parts (engine, interior, etc.) are the same in light trucks and cars. One of the big differences is the usefulness of the truck not being related to style. It may make perfect sense to put a new engine and transmission in a 10 year old truck with 150,000 miles on it but few people would do that for a 10 year old sedan.