One of the couples we get together with once a month, the wife had a big goose egg on her head. She said she was hit by a golf ball. I wonder how long it will be before golf helmets and face shields catch on.
A âreal pickupâ truck has a four speed manual transmission with s very low first gear called the âcreeperâ gear. The windows are opened with hand cranks. The bed has a wood floor. There is one bench seat. The gas tank is in the cab behind the sest. There is one rear view mirror-- which is round and about 4" in diameter on.a long mast on the left side of the truck. The truck is on a frame and a rear wheel drive. The truck has solid axles both front and rear. The truck does not have power steering or power brakes. The manufacturer includes a box of Preparation-H in case one has to make a trip of over 50 miles.
I owned such a pickup truck. It was a 1950 Chevrolet 3800 (one ton) pickup. I was able to haul 50 bales of hay at a time with that truck. I stretched wire fence with that truck. This was a real work truck that did real work. I donât like the vehicles todayâs trucks have become.
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I think this one meets all your criteria with the exception of the four speed, this has three on the tree.
@B.L.E. Thanks for the picture of a ârealâ truck. The spare tire is where it belongs-- not under the bed where it is difficult to get to when needed.
With front wheel drive youâre asking the front wheels to both power and steer the vehicle. For rear wheel drive vehicles those responsibilities are divided between the front wheels (steering) and rear wheels (power). Iâve only ever owned RWD and 4WD (which are RWD 99% of the time) vehicles. With that said FWD vehicles tend to better in snow than RWD vehicles. In my experience though, I prefer the way RWD vehicles drive vs. FWD vehicles, the driving dynamics of RWD are superior in most typically encountered conditions IMHO. Also fewer design compromises have to be made for RWD.
Vinyl upholstery mostly replaced by duct tape and when you look inside, you are greeted by that âold pickup truckâ smell. Sort of a mixture of gas fumes combined with a well oiled baseball glove smell. It smelled like cowboys drove it.
When I was in high school, I drove a '54 Ford F-100, 221 cubic inch six, three on the tree, push button on the dashboard starter.
Like Jed Clampettâs 1922 Buick Flatbed truck with a four cylinder engine and sliding gear transmission, it was sort of my anti-status symbol.
Not needed if you have a beefy big block under the hood.
Agree, but I wouldnât turn down power windows
No, steel will typically last longer, wood beds are mostly seen on restomoded trucks these days and nothing ever gets put in the back of those.
For a 4WD truck a straight front axle is nice to have on a 2WD truck, an independent setup like Fordâs long running I-Beam or the setup that the GM trucks had from the early 70âs up until the late 80âs is fine. The newer SLA style front suspensions seem to be more complex than needed. Even if I needed a basic work truck, it would still be 4WD. IMHO the downsides of 4WD have always been overblown, the fuel economy penalty for the past few decades has only been 1-2 MPG tops, and weâre talking about full-sized trucks, fuel economy is going to bad either way, 4WD trucks also hold their way better, proportionately speaking. Around here if you have two F-150âs from the early 90âs same mileage, same engine/transmission, same equipment, etc. and the 2WD truck is selling for $2500, the 4WD of the same truck will command a price of around $4200. Itâs something that worth getting in my opinion.
Even on my 1974 F-100 manual steering with a 390 under the hood was trying, with todayâs even heavier/larger trucks itâs a requirement. Likewise for power brakes.
You can still get a fairly basic work truck today if you want it. You can forgo power windows/locks, you can still get a bench vinyl or cloth seat, you can get a rubber floor, the only things you have to get these days that isnât federally mandated is AC , a radio, and an automatic transmission. I donât think anyone offers a manual in a full sized truck anymore.
Heh heh heh. During the fuel crisis, a guy at work and I decided to car pool to save money. He lived the next town up but on a farm. Very smart guy, double PhD, etc., and a few dollars. I drove the first week in my two year old Olds and Iâd usually have a cup of coffee on the dash. No problem. The next week for his turn to drive, he shows up with his semi restored 56 Ford pick up, with cattle sides on it, on our way to the big city. The first bump I knew it was not a good idea to have a cup of coffee along. It wasnât a bad truck, just not the level of comfort I expected on our 40 mile drive. I think we car pooled for 10-15 years though and most of the time he drove the truck until he bought an older model Plymouth wagon.
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@B.L.E. I remember well riding in a 1954 Ford F-100 when it was a brand new truck. The owner of the truck had a little shop beside his house where he worked in the evening on cars, lawnmowers, and boat motors. During the day, he was a machinist in a factory. He was also a drummer in a jazz band. At the time , my dad was driving a 1940 Chrysler that a colleague had loaned us because our family needed two cars. The Chrysler had died on the road and we pushed it into a gas station that was no longer operating. I was in 7th grade at the time. On Memorial Day, my Dad and I went up.to the abandoned station to see what we could do with the Chrysler. We didnât have any luck. I remembered seeing this shop riding home from school on the school bus. Dad drove over to this little shop and the owner was there. He had us get in his new Ford pickup and he towed the Chrysler back to his shop which was half a mile away. My dad and I couldnât believe how luxurious that 1954 F-100 seemed for a pickup truck.
A day later, he had the Chrysler fixedânew ignition points, recharge the battery and the tow in for the grand total of $4.75. On top of that, I was given a job mowing the grass around his home and shop. I got $3.75 for two hours of work. I mowed that place for several summers until my younger brother took over the mowing job. Even more important, both my brother and I hung around the shop and learned a lot about repairing and maintaining equipment. I know that this friend drove that 1954 F-100 for over 20 years. Those 221 cubic inch 6 cylinder engines, with decent care, would almost run forever.
I thought it was called âgranny lowâ 
Cons of FWD:
- Hard to work on (especially V6)
- Excessive wear rate of front tires
- Poor handling (understeer; torque steer under load)
- The CV joint setup is FAR less durable than a RWD âlive axle,â which will essentially NEVER fail at stock loadings, if you keep it lubed.
- (As mentioned) poor traction when loaded with cargo.
IMHO, the âsilliest adâ is the Rx ad for Movantix, the drug to treat âOpioid-induced constipation.â Read: youâre so excessively opiated that you canât pooâŠso, instead of doing something about that factâŠyou add in some Movantix, and thus can be pilled to the eyeballs AND capable of a decent BM!
Sad more than anything, really. I can see its use for people with terminal diseaseâŠbut if thatâs all they sold it to, they couldnât turn a profit, so it seems they market to over-medicated chronic pain patients, of which it seems there are many.
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I have also heard it called a âcompound lowâ.
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The truck I wish my dad had kept was a â46 Chevy 1/2 ton. But we moved from the farm to the city in 1960, in those days âcity folkâ did not drive trucks.
In addition to the tranny and differential, FWD makes it harder to change the right side (ârearâ) spark plugs, valve cover gaskets, and makes for a crowded engine compartment overall. Iâve never had to change axles in my RWD cars due to torn cv boots either.
Better traction in snow? Sure. But with the money Iâve spent having to pay for repairs that I could have done myself in a RWD car , I could have hired a limo to take me to work on a snowy day.
FWD? Not ever again!
What choice do you have? Except for pickups and big SUVs, most everything is FWD or FWD-based.
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I wouldnât get a FWD SUV or PickupâŠbut AWD is fine. The only mid-size SUV thatâs RWD or 4wd in the US market that I know of is the 4Runner. Itâs still body-on-frame too.
Iâve owned both types of vehicles. It depends on your needs. We donât need to tow a 5,000lb camper, or do much real off-roading - so my AWD Highlander is a perfect vehicle for my needs. My 4ruuner was one great vehicleâŠand so were my Pathfinders. They suited my needs at the time.
These days, Iâd rather have a four cylinder engine of reasonable displacement than a transverse mounted V-6, which solves each and every one of those issues.
What a coincidence! Iâve never had to change the axles on my FWD cars for any reason, including torn CV boots.
That includes my â98 Civic with almost 298,000 miles.
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It must depend on where you live. As I recall the technical term was compound low.
Also Granny low-compound low and double low down here in the south.
Before Huntsvilleâs Redstone Arsenal became a NASA base my grandfather worked there and drove from his farm to work each morning in a ârealâ chevrolet pickup. It was a few miles up a steep incline and when at the top he shifted to neutral and coasted for several miles if no one ahead of him forced him to brake. On the trip home the down side was too steep to attempt in neutral but he felt like he was saving a lot of gas every morning. That truck was as basic and dependable as anything on the road at the time. There was no starter solenoid or even a starter switch other than the foot operated plunger that engaged the bendix. When the bendix was fully engaged the battery positive cable was connected to the starter field via a large copper contact.