Higher elevation areas are particularly flooded with larger trucks and SUVs, because of the power that they provide in steep, snowy and icy areas. Also, many people find them convenient for their towing capacity, attaching trailer hitches and a trailer lock and using them to haul boats, ATVs, and recreational vehicles. Another major consumer of large SUVs, are the soccer mom types — those who don’t use them for their power or towing and likely have no idea what a rapid hitch is — who find them convenient for hauling their children around town. Many family-oriented people are proponents of SUVs because of the extreme versatility and spaciousness. Their convenience in size is a trade-off, obviously, for their tendency to guzzle gas, and their higher levels of emissions.

Additionally, they tend to offer more safety — due to their size — than their smaller, more fragile counter parts (rollover tendencies notwithstanding). Safety ratings, however, are usually based on vehicle class, so it is difficult to compare a compact to an SUV or a mid-size to a sports coupe. But the general consensus is (particularly in multiple car accidents) that larger vehicles can better withstand accidents and therefore are more likely to protect the occupants within. Many people would also argue that larger vehicles present more versatility than smaller ones. How often do sedan owners have to rent or borrow a truck to make a move across town? A larger vehicle allows for day-to-day transportation as well as the versatility to act as an emergency vehicle of sorts when more labor intensive tasks become necessary, the idea being that large vehicles can do anything that smaller ones can do, but smaller ones can’t necessarily do everything that large ones can. Whether or not you endorse or despise the “bigger is better” notion, it is becoming obvious that large vehicles are not going anywhere and that, despite absurd prices in gasoline and potential detriment to our environment, SUVs and Trucks are going to continue their influence as a major part of our roadway traffic.

Some wonder why such a rigid shiny tube on the side of a truck is called a nerf bar. Sometimes people refer to them side steps or chrome tubes because they cant grasp the concept of Nerf Bar as being a hard shiny stainless steel object. Nerf material, like the material used to make soft footballs, baseballs & frisbees you may have thrown around as a kid, doesnt really relate to some hard chrome tube you would use to step on to help you step into your truck.

So here it is. The nerf bar was a tubular device that was originally intended to be fitted to the side of a race car, often single seaters like a midget race car that competes on a race track. Nerf is also a racing term that refers to a small bump (rub) between two vehicles. When one driver bumps the other car in order to pass it, they call it nerfing. Nerf bars protect the sides of both vehicles and keeps their tires from rubbing together. Without them, the fast spinning tires can come in contact with each other causing the cars to lose control, or flip over. Sometimes having nerf bars on your truck is a good way to help protect your wheels and body kits, however if you rub your stainless steel nerf bar up against a concrete barrier, you can expect to need to replace it. Ill have to say sometimes I wish I had the old style nerf bars, because Id occasionally like to bump into a few people myself on the freeway, but I guess that wouldn’t be too nice.