Ram 1500 TRX Falls from Assembly Line, Lands on Side

Ram 1500 TRX laying on its side at the Sterling Heights Assembly Plant was posted on Instagram.

The 2021 Ram 1500 TRX is built at the Sterling Heights Assembly Plant and the Michigan facility has been producing the 702-horsepower super truck for the past few weeks. According to The Drive, it seems that on Tuesday morning, one of the supercharged pickups was involved in some sort of incident that resulted in the TRX laying on its side towards the end of the assembly line.

There has been no official word from FCA, presumably because many of their people are off for the holidays, but the image above was posted to Instagram by the sinister_lifestyle account. That account is run by a Detroit car enthusiast named Kyle, who has some friends at FCA. Over the past few years, Kyle has shared pictures of not-yet-released models, but this time, his connections got him a picture of the most anticipated vehicles of the year literally wrecked on the assembly line.

Wrecked Ram TRX

In the image above, a 2021 Ram 1500 TRX is on its side along the Sterling Heights Assembly Plant production line. The truck appears to be Granite Crystal, with blue protective film over the bulging fender flares and white protective film on the tailgate and bumper. The TRX appears to be fully assembled, so we believe this to be at or near the end of the line. The tram TRX is laying on its driver’s side, but there is damage to the passenger’s side bedside, with the flare partially ripped away from the body. There is also no taillight on the passenger’s corner, but the truck in front of the damaged vehicle has its taillights, so we believe that the taillight was lost during the incident.

The TRX is laying on its driver’s side with extensive damage on the passenger’s side, so we believe that something hit the passenger’s side, causing the half-ton Ram to fall off of the left side of the assembly line carrier. The trucks don’t move along the line with enough speed to tumble, so it likely flopped into this spot. If that was the case, then the right side damage had to have happened leading up to the situation shown here.

The 2021 Ram 1500 TRX is remarkably tough, but we would imagine that there is extensive damage done to the driver’s side of the truck as well.

Fate of This Beast

There is a possibility that the damage to this Ram TRX is all cosmetic, so it could conceivably be repaired if it were already owned. However, would you want to pay $80,000 for a truck that has already technically been wrecked and heavily repaired? This really woudnt be all that different from a truck falling off of the shipping truck and being repaired, and we imagine that most people would shy away from a truck like that.

Fiat-Chrysler Automobiles

The chatter on the original Instagram post includes information from an unnamed source claiming that the truck shown here will be dismantled and scrapped. If that is the case, this exact Ram TRX will be reloaded as ordered into the build schedule. In short, this will cause a delay for whoever ordered this truck, but we imagine that FCA will make sure to get this build back down the line right away.

With any luck, when the folks from FCA get back from the holiday break, they will have some information on what happened with this Ram 1500 TRX.

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Patrick Rall

"Before I was old enough to walk, my dad was taking me to various types of racing events, from local drag racing to the Daytona 500," says Patrick Rall, a lifetime automotive expert, diehard Dodge fan, and respected auto journalist for over 10 years. "He owned a repair shop and had a variety of performance cars when I was young, but by the time I was 16, he was ready to build me my first drag car – a 1983 Dodge Mirada that ran low 12s. I spent 10 years traveling around the country, racing with my dad by my side. While we live in different areas of the country, my dad still drag races at 80 years old in the car that he built when I was 16 while I race other vehicles, including my 2017 Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat and my 1972 Dodge Demon 340.

"Although I went to college for accounting, my time in my dad’s shop growing up allowed me the knowledge to spend time working as a mechanic before getting my accounting degree, at which point I worked in the office of a dealership group. While I was working in the accounting world, I continued racing and taking pictures of cars at the track. Over time, I began showing off those pictures online and that led to my writing.

"Ten years ago, I left the accounting world to become a full-time automotive writer and I am living proof that if you love what you do, you will never “work” a day in your life," adds Rall, who has clocked in time as an auto mechanic, longtime drag racer and now automotive journalist who contributes to nearly a dozen popular auto websites dedicated to fellow enthusiasts.

"I love covering the automotive industry and everything involved with the job. I was fortunate to turn my love of the automotive world into a hobby that led to an exciting career, with my past of working as a mechanic and as an accountant in the automotive world provides me with a unique perspective of the industry.

"My experience drag racing for more than 20 years coupled with a newfound interest in road racing over the past decade allows me to push performance cars to their limit, while my role as a horse stable manager gives me vast experience towing and hauling with all of the newest trucks on the market today.

"Being based on Detroit," says Rall, "I never miss the North American International Auto Show, the Woodward Dream Cruise and Roadkill Nights, along with spending plenty of time raising hell on Detroit's Woodward Avenue with the best muscle car crowd in the world.

Rall can be contacted at QuickMirada@Yahoo.com

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