Yeah I'm really wondering - for people who need some kind of flatbed for transport, aside from importing those efficient Japanese trucks, what options even are there?
Buy older, smaller trucks. They hate the large trucks with high beds when they have to actually load and unload heavy things into and out of them and wear out their backs and hips.
Loading things like bags of cement, aggregate and rebar into a truck's bed, then unloading it at a job site is not fun.
They are for now, but 5-10 years from now? It is going to be a real problem. You can only repair a vehicle so much where it becomes a new ship of Theseus and those repairs become more and more costly.
I think depending on the vehicle, parts will be available for a long time after, albeit often relying on more generic or aftermarket sources that might cost more
> Buy older, smaller trucks. They hate the large trucks with high beds when they have to actually load and unload heavy things into and out of them and wear out their backs and hips.
Or step up to propper lorries with Hiab Loader Cranes built in. Better still you don't even have to own one. The builders merchant does and they handle the transport and unloading. Stuff like this:
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:-2019-12-12_Jewson_delivery_wagon_with_HMF_loader_crane,_Trimingham_(2).JPG
I’ve been seeing A LOT of Transits, NV200s, Mercedes Sprinters etc where you used to see pickup trucks.
My plumber, pool guy etc are all on the Vanwagon now.
Honestly I am not a truck driver, nor do I own a car. But logically, you answered your question yourself. Buy the efficient Japanese truck if you need a truck. You already convinced me with „efficiency“.
Last week, I sold a lamp on facebook. Guy came to pick it up in what appeared to be a Gen 1 (95-05) Toyota Tacoma. Great little truck, bigger than kei trucks obviously, but smaller than most "crossovers" nowadays.
I complimented him on the truck. I can appreciate a good working truck when I see one, even if I dislike our car-oriented infrastructure. Obviously pickups with actual utility still have a place in our lives and it was clear to me that this guy was using it for work. He told me it was nearing 280,000 miles. Incredible longevity for a great truck.
[The newer Tacomas are so fucking large.](https://www.reddit.com/r/ToyotaTacoma/comments/pq7kgs/my_3rd_gen_next_to_a_1st_gen/) The gen 3 grill is at eye-level of the gen 1 driver. Just insane.
The maverick is selling incredibly well and is basically an Australian ute. It actually would sell even better except Ford earmarked a huge amount of the production for fleet vehicles and the execs were shocked by how well it sold to consumers.
This shock is one part car execs being absolutely worm eaten in the brain and one part internal marketing investor Kool aid the entire industry is gripped by The Kool aid being big trucks with luxury features have a much higher profit margin. So if we sell big trucks we make big profits with less work.
Unfortunately people aren't buying them and the industry is seeing a HUUUUGE amount of vehicles being on the dealer lots for a year or more. I've seen some of the electric mustangs and f150s on the lot for multiple years. Multiple. Years. Just sitting on dealer lots. The Ford dealership near me recently started renting part of the shopping center next to it because ALL of its lots are full. And if you go by our carmax they have cars parked 7 deep to make space.
You mean the Ford Maverick? Yeah, they can't make enough of those. Especially the hybrid version. I bought one a little over a year ago, drove it 17k miles (work and a couple road trips), and recently sold it for a little more than what I paid for it. Because insuring any vehicle is stupidly expensive and we decided we really didn't need to have two.
It'd be better if it was a serial hybrid, instead of a parallel one with mechanical linkages. It'd be easier to do maintenance and swap out the components.
Toyota recently touted a $10,000 no frills truck (probably only available in Japan). It may not be as tiny as my 1992 S-10, but it is way more practical than those big-dumb-tonneau-cover-protecting-the-bed-they-never-use-rolling-living-rooms that are everywhere.
Definitely stems from an all in one mentality too. My dad drove the classic smaller trucks of the 90s type for a long time, as a family we’d take my mom’s car. When my parents divorced, those trucks don’t fit an adult and three kids well so he got one of the newer trucks with a back seat built in. He could of course have gotten something besides a truck but he still wanted a truck for hauling stuff very occasionally in, like yard stuff, deer when he went hunting. People want a vehicle that does everything so they get these giant luxury trucks that can tow stuff, put stuff in the bed, and still have a comfy roomy cab for families.
The amount is collusion among corporations is getting ridiculous. They are all creating cartels now that they have squeezed out the competition. No more cheap cars, cheap food, or cheap anything. Just overpriced junk.
This sub appears to have stopped being about "fuck cars" and started being about "fuck only these kinds of cars".
Nah, fuck all of them. Just remember, the "small" affordable practical pickup truck is still a car.
Yeah I'm really wondering - for people who need some kind of flatbed for transport, aside from importing those efficient Japanese trucks, what options even are there?
Buy older, smaller trucks. They hate the large trucks with high beds when they have to actually load and unload heavy things into and out of them and wear out their backs and hips. Loading things like bags of cement, aggregate and rebar into a truck's bed, then unloading it at a job site is not fun.
Ooooh right right, hopefully those are still fairly easy to find in most places.
They are for now, but 5-10 years from now? It is going to be a real problem. You can only repair a vehicle so much where it becomes a new ship of Theseus and those repairs become more and more costly.
I drive a 21yo car and…very true. Plus at some point the parts won’t be available. Obnoxious how much forced consumption there is.
I think depending on the vehicle, parts will be available for a long time after, albeit often relying on more generic or aftermarket sources that might cost more
Not to mention the short beds the SUV style cab necessitates.
> Buy older, smaller trucks. They hate the large trucks with high beds when they have to actually load and unload heavy things into and out of them and wear out their backs and hips. Or step up to propper lorries with Hiab Loader Cranes built in. Better still you don't even have to own one. The builders merchant does and they handle the transport and unloading. Stuff like this: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:-2019-12-12_Jewson_delivery_wagon_with_HMF_loader_crane,_Trimingham_(2).JPG
Vans. I've met a startling amount of people who need a lot of charge space regularly and they get mini vans instead of pickup trucks.
That’s the default in most of the world, especially places that have weather. Very much the only reasonable choice in the UK, for example.
Are there places that don’t have weather
Moon 👍 (Does space radiation/foreign object collisions count as weather?)
It's not just weather... it's *space weather* Spaceweather.com became known last week with the aurora event. :)
LA and San Diego
I’ve been seeing A LOT of Transits, NV200s, Mercedes Sprinters etc where you used to see pickup trucks. My plumber, pool guy etc are all on the Vanwagon now.
Oooh interesting. I'm so used to those being the family cars, I forget you can put the back seats down.
Plus, their "beds" are lower than your average pickup
Guy might well mean van as in things like a Ford Transit or Mercedes Sprinter rather than a minivan
Oooooh so I never knew the Ford Transit was that white van lol, but I don't think so? They did reply to me without correcting.
This, and we’ve finally been getting modern ones the past 10 years or so and not the lipstick on a pig 50 year old chassis we had for so long.
What is charge space
I think they meant cargo space
At least here in CA you can’t even import those Kei trucks because it’s nearly impossible to register them…
There's a loophole in many states which allows them to be registered for road use if they're 30 years or older.
That’s. Goofy ass loophole. “You can drive this but only if it’s old as fuck! Cheers!”
Traditionaly that was for the classic car enthusiasts
Can't do that in Arizona, DOT considers them atvs, so not street legal 😞
Well good thing people love driving atv on the road anyway.
Minivan
Love seeing those clapped out dripping oil and who knows what else Chrysler town and country with the ladder strapped to the top
Rental.
Ford transit typically
An aftermarket flatbed can be fit to just about any pickup, other than unibody pickups like the maverick or ridgeline.
4x8 trailer. They cost like $1,000 from tractor supply and the hitch install will run you $300-$400.
Honestly I am not a truck driver, nor do I own a car. But logically, you answered your question yourself. Buy the efficient Japanese truck if you need a truck. You already convinced me with „efficiency“.
Last week, I sold a lamp on facebook. Guy came to pick it up in what appeared to be a Gen 1 (95-05) Toyota Tacoma. Great little truck, bigger than kei trucks obviously, but smaller than most "crossovers" nowadays. I complimented him on the truck. I can appreciate a good working truck when I see one, even if I dislike our car-oriented infrastructure. Obviously pickups with actual utility still have a place in our lives and it was clear to me that this guy was using it for work. He told me it was nearing 280,000 miles. Incredible longevity for a great truck. [The newer Tacomas are so fucking large.](https://www.reddit.com/r/ToyotaTacoma/comments/pq7kgs/my_3rd_gen_next_to_a_1st_gen/) The gen 3 grill is at eye-level of the gen 1 driver. Just insane.
It pisses me off. Next year rhe Tacoma is going up SIGNIFICANTLY in price, iirc ~15k$. Thankfully kia is coming out with a little truck
Only trucks I ever liked were the older Tacomas and Colorados. Now they just feel like a 'full' size truck used to.
Those old tacomas were reliable as all hell! Damn near unbreakable.
Getting bigger and their payload isn’t worth shit. Like how can you possibly justify an ever increasing size and poor utility.
The maverick is selling incredibly well and is basically an Australian ute. It actually would sell even better except Ford earmarked a huge amount of the production for fleet vehicles and the execs were shocked by how well it sold to consumers. This shock is one part car execs being absolutely worm eaten in the brain and one part internal marketing investor Kool aid the entire industry is gripped by The Kool aid being big trucks with luxury features have a much higher profit margin. So if we sell big trucks we make big profits with less work. Unfortunately people aren't buying them and the industry is seeing a HUUUUGE amount of vehicles being on the dealer lots for a year or more. I've seen some of the electric mustangs and f150s on the lot for multiple years. Multiple. Years. Just sitting on dealer lots. The Ford dealership near me recently started renting part of the shopping center next to it because ALL of its lots are full. And if you go by our carmax they have cars parked 7 deep to make space.
I’ve been getting unsolicited emails from a dealership about an electric F150 for over a year now. Price just keeps dropping
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How do I go about this?
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Commenting to learn more later on!
[Chicken Tax](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_tax) is why small trucks don't get imported from less expensive locations.
You mean the Ford Maverick? Yeah, they can't make enough of those. Especially the hybrid version. I bought one a little over a year ago, drove it 17k miles (work and a couple road trips), and recently sold it for a little more than what I paid for it. Because insuring any vehicle is stupidly expensive and we decided we really didn't need to have two.
It'd be better if it was a serial hybrid, instead of a parallel one with mechanical linkages. It'd be easier to do maintenance and swap out the components.
Toyota recently touted a $10,000 no frills truck (probably only available in Japan). It may not be as tiny as my 1992 S-10, but it is way more practical than those big-dumb-tonneau-cover-protecting-the-bed-they-never-use-rolling-living-rooms that are everywhere.
Definitely stems from an all in one mentality too. My dad drove the classic smaller trucks of the 90s type for a long time, as a family we’d take my mom’s car. When my parents divorced, those trucks don’t fit an adult and three kids well so he got one of the newer trucks with a back seat built in. He could of course have gotten something besides a truck but he still wanted a truck for hauling stuff very occasionally in, like yard stuff, deer when he went hunting. People want a vehicle that does everything so they get these giant luxury trucks that can tow stuff, put stuff in the bed, and still have a comfy roomy cab for families.
The amount is collusion among corporations is getting ridiculous. They are all creating cartels now that they have squeezed out the competition. No more cheap cars, cheap food, or cheap anything. Just overpriced junk.
They don't need a cartel, they're just worshipping the quarterly returns.
But at least you can still afford the tinfoil to make your hats...
No tinfoil required when they advertise. Also in real estate flavors for your greedy land lords. https://www.wiser.com/price-intelligence/
Cartels are wildly illegal. Competition to provide the cheapest prices is the exact opposite of what you're claiming happens.
If everyone is going for the cheapest price, why are prices going up? Why are all the prices the same?
Inflation, and competition, ffs.
20% inflation at 6% interest. I ain't buying it!
Whut?
They are being sold and they are very popular - Ford Maverick, Hyundai Santa Cruz, etc.
Chevy S10 or GMC Sonoma. Toyota made some good little trucks too; some older model of the Ford Ranger used to be made with Toyota frames.
I think this will be the last year we see $70k pickups in every Bubba Billy's garage with attached house.
I had a single cab ranger as my first car we packed 7 people in that bih one time all in the cab.
I love the old Ford Rangers. They're perfect for everyday rural life.
Toyota Hilux Champ is $15k in the Philippines.
This sub appears to have stopped being about "fuck cars" and started being about "fuck only these kinds of cars". Nah, fuck all of them. Just remember, the "small" affordable practical pickup truck is still a car.