IF YOU WANT TO SEE THE FUTURE OF THE full-sized pickup, have a look at the GMC Sierra C3.
   Like its SUV and minivan cousins, the standard, garden-variety pickup is getting more car-like with every model year. Look closely at the C3, for example. It has the increasingly popular four doors, leather everywhere inside, OnStar, a 30-channel Homelink transmitter and power everything.
   But look under the C3 and you'll see a viscous center differential in place of a manually operated transfer case. A feature once reserved for some minivans and a handful of passenger cars, the viscous differential makes C3s like our test vehicle "all-wheel drive" instead of what was once generically termed "four-wheel drive." Owners loved the automatic character of the new differential, which provides full-time four-wheel grip with no input from the driver.
   Granted, the C3 is just one of many variations on the full-sized truck theme available from GMC and Chevy. Traditional four-wheel-drive systems with big, meaty transfer cases are still much more common in the lineup. But the C3 is the one out there on the luxury end of the scale trying new things that may someday trickle down to the full line.
   Despite GMC's bragging about the C3's "Performance Biased Driveline," its suspension performed no better than most competitors in our 490-foot slalom. Despite a claim of "a level of poise unprecedented in half-ton pickups," the C3 managed only 38.8 mph through the cones. The Ford F-150 got 39.28 mph, the Dakota Quad Cab got 39.2 and the purpose-built Ford SVT F-150 Lightning got a speedy 41.6. We haven't tested the all-new 2002 Dodge Ram yet, but the current Ram posted a 36.1-mph time.
   The C3's slalom speeds should get a boost when the '02 model, called Sierra Denali, arrives in showrooms at the end of this year with GM's new Quadra-steer four-wheel steering system. Quadrasteer uses conventional power steering in front combined with electrically powered steering for the rear wheels. Like earlier systems that came and went 10 years ago in passenger cars, Quadrasteer turns the wheels in opposite directions at low speeds for getting in and out of tight spaces and in the same direction at higher speeds to distribute cornering forces to all four wheels.
   Both C3 and Denali come with GM's 6.0-liter V8. And though the engine makes 325 hp and 370 lb-ft of torque, the C3's 0-to-60-mph time of 7.88 seconds was slowed by the truck's whopping 5013-pound curb weight, among the heaviest on the market. Nonetheless, in straight-line acceleration, the C3 beats competitors like the Dakota Quad Cab (9.22 seconds), the 4.6-liter F-150 2wd regular cab (9.29) and the current V10-powered Ram pickup (8.56).
   The C3 has a towing capacity of 5000 pounds and a payload capacity of 1787 pounds, numbers the majority of owners we spoke to loved. While they appreciate the luxury touches and four-wheel power delivery, they also want the towing and hauling benefits that draw buyers to pickups in the first place. In both cases C3 delivers.
   (Autofile)
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