Hendrickson360

Wow this was one wild mix of metal sheets! No data on the boxed section, but the rear: 223x58x?? for the base, then a huge 288x73x7.6mm extra sheet, going down in size to 190x58x?? + 270x73x7.6. Weird but definetly strong. I guess compared to that the modern day chassis caps is kinda sortet.

Hello! i guess those beasts will become more and more rare these days, but i would like to know if anyone got the measurements of the boxed front and open C rear for comparision with the more modern day Chassis Caps. This is the best picture i could find and weirdly enough it looks like this old frame was more like 3 pieces, with a boxed front, a medium sized open c middle and a bigger open c rear. https://www.sopkjh.top/ProductDetail.aspx?iid=294000726&pr=57.88 Maybe someone owns one of those old beauties that in terms of gvw even outclassed its modern day successors? Kind regards Marcus

Thx that's what i always thought it would be!

Hello, i recently hear that apparently, the frame under the Suburban/escalade/1500 Silverado is the same (beside the rear independant suspension mounts) as the heavy duty frame under the Silverade 2500/3500? Would be interesting and also somewhat massivly overbuilt right? Since the Expedition "only" uses the F-150 frame? Kind regards Marcus

Hello and thank you again! What is really weird: I checked an old Terrastar-Doc of mine and apparently the frame was pretty much the same, but they did for some reason a downgrade in terms of PSI rating! Now of course i would be really curious about that chassis cap frame, if it kinda sits between them and how the boxed front end and open c rear are connectet...

Hello, Since there is no data for the 3500 chassis caps, maybe there is something for the 4500 one? I guess the frame would be the same for 4-6500? Kind regards Marcus

Hello, thank you very much for this document (and thx to the rest to for the info!) So interestingly enough, both the dimensions and steel quality did not change since 2022, but well, it was best in class since then. The 2017+ Ford Frame has even more height (or depth by those documents) but "only" 50k PSI steel, so similiar nowadays. What i wonder: Since the C-channel frame of the Chassis cab is so much larger (or used to be) how are they put together? And are they still of diffeent steel quality? Seems kinda weird. Ford upped they steel with the Cchassis Caps to 50.000k too, but the dimensions are much smaller. Or maybe the boxed front end of the GM is also different from the first half of a pickup frame in the first place...

Hello! since i cannot find info on this like its possible with Dodge and Ford, maybe someone here can help. So with the older model lines, there was a big difference between the Pickup Frame and the Chassis cap frame. The Pickups was fully boxed from 2011 on and hat a profile of around 8.4x3.4x0.18“ made out of 60k PSI steele, which was far ahead oft he competition at the time. Did this change in any way? The Chassis Cap apparently had a gigantic profile of 11x2.5x0.5!!! Now this one was obviously an open C, however i dont know if the entire frame was open c, like it is with the modern day 4-6500, or it was a mix of boxed front from the pickup version with an open C rear end, like Ford und Dodge are doing on their chassis caps. I also dont know i fit was a layered frame, but i’m pretty sure it was. PSI rating was only 36k. Did this change in any way? Kind regards Marcus

Hello, anything new on this? Did the Chassis Cap frame change? Or the boxed version? The links the the data are still gone unfortunatly. I guess the new 4500-6500 frames are a completly different thing, but are those always the same one just wih different axles/springs?

Does anyone know if the rear end of the 3500 chassis cab is still this extreme huge piece of metal? The number on the link above: http://www.gmfleetorderguide.com/NASApp/domestic/graytabcontroller.jsp?graytabtype=7&rpoid=36178&vehicleid=12793&section=oi_def are no longer there, so maybe something changed. I guess with this massive rear end and the solid front end, the Chassis Cab frame is probably as strong as a HMMWV-Frame. The rear axle would probably be stronger than the IRS on the Humvee, which leaves only the front suspension as a weakpoint, so maybe with some front upgrades you could built a narrower offroad vehicle from that beast, that could rival a humvee in strenght....

Well as you can see i am collecting Datas about these trucks from each major brand. Why? Because it is very hard to get your hands on one of these trucks over here, so i can not measure for myself and this kind of information is pretty hard to get. Since i am planning to use the truck offroad and it might get pretty tough, the frame is a very important part and as you can see, it differs more than one would expect it to do in this close competion market. Data about the axles, the transmission and the suspension is much easier to get and most of those parts are quite easy to upgrade, but you're not allowed to tuch the frame. Of course you can not just compare the outer measurements, as i described above, the entire design is important. From the sheere numbers the Chassis Cap frame is much stronger, but since i have no picture of the part where the rear and front frame is combined, it's hard to tell what#s really going on. If the hydrformed front part is exactly the same the entire frame is not really stronger offroad, because it will twist at the front then and if the thickness is generatet by using 2 layers, it is not as strong as one solid piece of metal. In case of the F-550 the boxed front part is also much stronger as the front part of the lighter trucks, so ford designed an entirely stronger frame, but this is of course a class 5 truck, so it's uncertain weather or not chevy did the same. So since the normale fully boxed frame is already really strong and features those nice pipe-crosmembers, it may be the better way to go. Greetings

Well yeah ok but that's a quite theoretical number, when it comes to offroading bending and torsional stress is quite important and at this point the crossmembers are as important as the main rails. The boxed 2500/3500 frame (i guess it is the same frame there?) has those nice pipe-shaped crossmembers which are weldet trough both the inner and outer metal of the boxed frame, this is the way to go. This method is used by the mercedes g-wagon, the mercedes unimog (some models do have a boxed frame for the military), the Mowag Duro, the MAn Kat and so on etc. But the chassis cab, sadly, is using those pretty simple boltet crossmembers which are shaped like pretty simple sheets of metal, ford and dodge do the same thing with their chassis cabs. Does anyone here own a 3500 chassis cab of the new generation and can take a picture or two where this insame material thickness is? are there layers? Is the height only in the topkick area and how is the boxed front part added to the open c-rear? Greetings

oh and what's rbm?

Hello, thank you very much for this quite detailed answer! It is very interesting that compared to that, the Dodge boxed Frame looks pretty weak! Less height (depht in gm's words), little less width and little less material strengh. I guess this height(depht) is measured at the biggest part between the two axles, becaise normally at the end and front point it's much lesser in size. Well the chassis cap is of course pretty different, since i guess it is an open c from the first door to the rear? Sadly i do not have the data from the Dodge 3500, but it is definetly bigger than the Ford f-350 chassis cap, (which is only 195mm in height and 77mm in width, so a little more width but far less height) but how the **** did they rech 12mm thikness??? this has to be some sort of double layer! The only truck i know with this kind of frame is the ford f-550 in the 19500lbs version which has to layers , both the same dimensions (195height, 77mm width) and with 7+8mm thickness adding up to around 13mm. But why using an even bigger c-profile of that insane thickness for a 3500 truck? this frame, if the data is correct, would be strong enough for 19500lbs at the least, if it is not combined with the normal boxed 3500 front end, which would be a weak point conidering the overdimensioning of the rear part... Greetings

Hello, since i've read that GM will use the 2011 boxed HD frame a little while longer i think about getting one and i really like to compare it to some other frames i owned or know about. As far as i know the Dodge HD frame is around 190mm in height, 70 mm in witdh and the metal is 4mm thick. Ford uses a similiar boxed part front but sadly remains using an open c in the rear, which is also 190mm in height and 70mm in withd but of course a lot thicker, around 7.6mm to my knowledge. So how about the silverade HD frame? It looks pretty tough, got some nice slid crosmmembers, which seems to be welded more carefully trough both the inner and outer part of the boxed frame than the ram cross members, but how about the sheere frame height ans especially thickness?? Greetings