Trucks vs. Cars: The Difference in Collision Repair Equipment

America’s love affair with trucks continues. Month-over-month pickup sales are outpacing declining car sales. In fact, sales of light-duty trucks are up 8 percent year-over-year through August 2016. In that same time period, cars are down 8 percent. So what does that mean for you and your shop? You need the know-how and the right equipment to repair collisions on these increasingly popular vehicles.

Whenever a frame is damaged, it requires special attention. That goes doubly for trucks. Structural frame damage to these larger body-on-frame vehicles—including diamond and twist—impacts the entire truck. This kind of structural damage can exaggerate any damage on the ends. That means you need to return the center section to square before trying to repair any other damage. Once the center section is square, the structure will be properly aligned for sectioning or cutting work on the ends.

When it comes to pickups, vans and SUVs, center section repairs are better performed using a frame rack instead of a bench for several reasons. Frame machines provide:

• Bigger working surface for larger vehicles
• The ability to anchor one rail tightly, while allowing you to pull a damaged rail back to square in the center section
• Multiple simultaneous pulls with equalized pressure to prevent ripping, tearing, bending or rolling of the steel
• Greater pulling power necessary to straighten advanced steels
• The possibility of holding the vehicle in multiple places for more working surface during repairs on the ends of the vehicle 

Of course, we make a frame rack that lets you do all of this and more. So if you’re in the market for a new frame rack, please stay tuned. And if you’re not in the market, stick around just to feel a slight tinge of jealousy for those who are. Here we go.

The Chief Goliath™ is the widest frame rack on the market, and you can use it to repair diamond and twist frame damage on trucks weighing up to 12,000 pounds. At just over 7 ½ feet wide and 22 feet long, you won’t need to remove the wheels from even the widest dually. And with a variable deck height from 19 to 40 inches, your techs can find the perfect working height regardless of their own height. 

The pulling system on the Goliath provides 360-degree pulling from anywhere around the deck perimeter and ten tons of pulling power at the hook. It features an electric-over-hydraulic pulling system to equalize pressure to all towers in use. And it’s compatible with our LaserLock™ Live Mapping™ measuring system that can simultaneously measure up to 45 individual points on a vehicle. 

In short, the Goliath is the biggest and baddest pulling rack for the biggest and baddest vehicles that are getting repaired at the biggest and baddest auto collision repair shops. Actually, you don’t even need to be the biggest collision repair shop. But if you install a Chief Goliath, you’ll definitely be among the baddest.