TRUCK-SAN; Honda builds a pickup, more or less.(Honda Ridgeline)

Byline: MARK VAUGHN

A few years ago if you compiled a list of things that meant the end of the world was nigh, you might have included a Honda-built pickup. Well, here comes Armageddon, and it's riding on a unibody.

Yes, a unibody welded to a frame rail. You wouldn't expect engineering-driven Honda to build anything on a frame rail, anymore than you'd expect pushrods under a Honda hood. Yet this monocoque-welded-to-the-frame is as much a departure from the pickup truck norm as Honda's entry into the pickup truck market to begin with.

All those years in the mini-truckin' 1970s when Nissan, Toyota, Isuzu, Mazda-even Volkswagen-offered pickups, Honda had only cars. It had no SUVs for a long time, either, but a stopgap deal where it rebadged Isuzu Rodeos cured that. The next logical step was into the pickup market, a pretty big move for a company whose reputation was based so solidly on Accords and Civics.

So Honda was not about to rebadge anything for this great departure from tradition. Unlike the '70s, when American manufacturers rebadged Japanese compact pickups, Honda never intended to product-share with anyone. Indeed, Honda has gone to great lengths to emphasize the Ridgeline barely shares anything with the MDX it sort of resembles, nor the Pilot it sort of shares parts with.

"Less than 40 percent'' was the closest we could get to a percentage of MDX/Pilot parts in the Ridgeline. Of course, that counts parts completely changed; pinch, pull or pick any part, and it's suddenly all-new. Nonetheless, the Ridgeline is a distinctly different vehicle from the MDX and Pilot.

Expect it to be marketed differently, too. At the press launch Honda loaded up a Ridgeline with 500 pounds of rocks and sent us out on a slalom course. Yep, we slalomed with 500 pounds of rocks in it-and it did well, a comfort to anyone stopping at the local SCCA Pro Solo on the way home from the landscape department at Lowe's.