5 Massive Street-Legal Trucks That Are As Close As You'll Get To Driving A Tank
People are bonkers for monster trucks. On almost any night around the country, you can attend an event showcasing these enormous beasts. And it appears that truck manufacturers have noticed because massive street-legal trucks that wouldn't look out of place at a Monster Jam event are readily available.
We're not talking about a Ford F-250 Super Duty, Dodge Mega Cab RAM 3500, or a ho-hum Humvee. While those are indeed big, there are much, much larger. In fact, someone could just as easily swap out these on our list because so many "monster" trucks are being made. Apparently, there's no such thing as too big.
To help parse the data and keep this list as clean as possible, we're taking the literal approach and only picking trucks. Getting SUVs involved would make things messy and confusing. Take, for instance, the Mercedes-AMG G63 6x6. While technically a unibody on a truck frame, it's still based mainly on the G63, an SUV.
Given that, these behemoth trucks must be as massive as a tank, and if they look like one, all the better. Our street-legal tank's overall height and width are as crucial as the size and power of its engine.
Mercedes-Benz Unimog U5000
Mercedes-Benz is known for its luxury sedans, so it might be shocking to discover it also makes not one but two of the biggest rigs on the planet, only one of which made our list. First up, the Unimog U5000. Unimog stands for "Universal-Motor-Gerät," or universally applicable motorized device. They're built on a flexible, ladder-type offset frame with welded tubular cross members allowing axle articulation of up to 30°. MB claims it can climb grades of up to 100%.
It has a chassis length of 17.5 feet, so it's not the longest rig on the street, but Unimogs are also over 8 feet wide and 8.5 feet high. Gross vehicle weight ranges between 16,535 and 27,558 pounds and can haul up to 16,500. Not enough for razzle-dazzle? Armor plates can be added to the cab if you like making it more like a tank.
An air intake pipe located at the cab roof level lets the Unimgo plow through nearly 32 inches of water, and if you install the fording system, it can easily wade through four feet of water. The TireControl system lets the driver adjust tire pressure and contact surface based on the terrain in real time.
The U5000 comes with a 4.8-liter OM 924 LA diesel engine producing 218hp with 597 lb-ft of torque. With a top speed of just 65 miles per hour, it won't get you anywhere fast, but it will get you there.
Apocalypse Juggernaut
We debated whether to allow "costume" conversions on the list, but they are so cool we had no choice. Apocalypse Manufacturing in Fort Lauderdale, FL, is known chiefly for taking Jeep Wranglers or Gladiators and turning them into vehicles you might see in a "Mad Max" film. Since Jeeps aren't technically "trucks," they aren't allowed on our list. Fortunately, Apocalypse did the same thing to a Ram 1500 TRX, which is a truck.
At almost 23 feet long, the Juggernaut is one of Apocalypse's most extended vehicles. The bed alone is over eight feet long. It has 40-inch tires, a 20,000-pound towing capacity, and comes with the "largest cab ever produced," capable of seating a 7-foot-tall person.
You can get it with a 100-gallon auxiliary gas tank too, which you'll probably need based on what's under the hood of this six-wheeled beastie — a 6.2-liter supercharged HEMI Hellcat V8 that produces an astonishing 850 horsepower. If you're curious, that's an increase of 148 hp over the stock Ram 1500 TRX engine. Apocalypse claims the Juggernaut ran the Gumball 3000 from Toronto to Key West and averaged over 100 mph throughout the race.
The Warlord is another Ram 1500 TRX conversion from Apocalypse, but at 258" (21.5 feet) is shorter than the Juggernaut but over 8 inches taller (93.6" vs. 85.5"). Despite being the Juggernaut's "baby brother," it could still be included on this list. The Juggernaut will set you back $249,999, while the Warlord is "only" $220,000.
International CXT
International made the CXT ("Commercial eXtreme Truck") between 2004 and 2008, and when it first appeared became the world's most colossal production pickup. It's so big that many still consider it to hold that distinction even by today's standards.
It's 22 feet long (with a 153-inch wheelbase), tips the scales at 14,000 pounds, and stands over nine feet tall. It comes with rear dualie wheels, a 73-gallon fuel tank (because it only gets 8 miles per gallon), and, if you were so inclined, an optional 8-foot "tilt" bed was available to make it look like a proper pickup.
The beast has a gross vehicle weight rating (GVWR) of 25,999 pounds, a mere 16 ounces under the cutoff of 26,000 pounds, which would have bumped it into another class requiring a special license. Its gross combination weight rating (GCWR) is 42,000 pounds, while the chassis alone is rated to carry a little under 12,000 pounds. The CXT is powered by a 7.6-liter Detroit Diesel (DT) 466 I-6 intercooled turbodiesel engine making 220 hp and 540 lb-ft of torque.
There's an interesting backstory to the CXT. Motor Trend wrote about a giant red truck it spotted on International's test track in 2003. As the story goes, the reader response was so great that International Muckety-mucks decided to build a production version of the test truck and sell it in the United States. If bigger is truly badder, not many trucks are badder than the CXT.
Hennessey Mammoth 1000 TRX 6x6
Since we included Apocalypse's custom rides, we must add Texas-based tuner Hennessey. Whereas Apocalypse goes bonkers modifying the outward appearance of its vehicles, Hennessey takes a much more understated approach. If we're being honest, though, they look rather dull when parked next to the other bad boys on this list.
Hennessy makes the Mammoth 1000 TRX, considered the world's most powerful truck. It doesn't look like anything like a tank and might not even be looked at twice when it blew by you on the road. The same can't be said for the 6x6 version of the Mammoth, though.
The 6x6 takes the base four-wheeler, stretches it, slaps on another axle, and a set of 20" 10-spoke wheels (fitted with 37" off-road tires). Under the hood sits a 6.2-liter supercharged Hellcat V8 kicking out 1,012 hp with an incredible 969 lb-ft of torque. If that's not impressive enough, it also has a high-flow 2.65-liter supercharger, fuel injectors, and a high-flow induction system.
All of which gets the Mammoth up to 60 mph in 3.2 seconds and through the quarter-mile in 11.4 seconds (at 120 mph). Hennessey only produced twelve of these 6x6s. An even more limited edition (only three) included a "Hellephant engine" boosted to 1,200 horsepower.
To coin a phrase from everyone's favorite scruffy-looking nerf-herder, the Mammoth 1000 TRX 6x6 may not look like much, but she's got it where it counts.
Ford F-650/750 Supertruck
Many trucks could take this last spot, including the International CV515 strapped with a 6.6-liter V8 turbocharged diesel engine making 350 hp and 700 lb-ft of torque. Instead, we're giving some love to Ford's F-650/750 line.
In recent years the F-650 has become a hot "super truck" choice in that they're relatively inexpensive and, maybe more importantly, still being made. There are four 2024 versions of the 650 (two gas, two diesel) and two (one gas, one diesel) of the 750.
The gas engine is a 7.3-liter 2V DEVCT NA FPI V8 with 335 hp and 468 lb-ft of torque, while the diesel is a 6.7-liter PowerStroke V8 turbo with 300 hp and 725 lb-ft of torque. Another diesel engine version boosts horsepower to 330 and torque to 750.
Ford sells these trucks without a bed — just a stripped chassis. Before the bed is added (by registered Ford upfitter Extreme Supertrucks), the vehicle already weighs 10,000 pounds. Speaking of cabs, the standard cab length is 114.4" while the super cab runs 135.4", and the crew cab is almost 150 inches (12.5 feet) long (based on model). Wheelbases can run as high as 281 inches (23.4 feet) on some models.
If you're curious, the wheels are so big they don't fit inside the wheel wells. These Fords are plenty big enough to be on this list.