Comment by mrexroad
25 days ago
Bingo.
Sprinter vans, utility vans, or even minivans are far, far more useful for trades than modern pickups. Heck, my minivan was the goat for home renovations—it’d easily fit a dozen full 4x8 sheets of drywall/osb/ply/mdf/etc and I could still close the rear gate. I always got chuckles from guys awkwardly wrangling/securing sheets onto a pickup’s bed at the supply yard when I’d easily slide the sheets off the cart directly into the van by myself.
A heavy duty pickup makes sense when you have regular towing, or large bulky transport, needs. While on this topic, I’ll take a moment to lament the demise of the light duty pickup that provided a bit of extra utility while still fitting in a normal parking space.
> I’ll take a moment to lament the demise of the light duty pickup that provided a bit of extra utility while still fitting in a normal parking space.
I miss the hell out of my '82 Chevrolet S10 with extended cab and two-tone paint job. The extended cab isn't going to be used for hauling the soccer team, but I could put it was plenty of space for "inside only" cargo. Damn thing threw a rod and cracked the case, and I never could convince my parents to keep it and put a new engine in it. I'd like to think I'd still own it today if they had.
You could run a single issue presidential campaign on bringing the S10 back (all it would really take is patching some weired emissions regulations mistakes). A better truck from a better time.
My pitch to the people near me who have no connection to the auto industry is that an electric Ranger (90's style) would have been a huge hit. I get the feeling that the Lightning came about because Ford managers don't really know how to make vehicles that regular people want.
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That new Slate pickup looks pretty cool.
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A fun-sized six speed pickup with a turbo four banger? Sign me up.
Educate me: How is the Canyon, Ranger, or Frontier not a modern equivalent to the S10? All small(ish) trucks available in a two door or extended cab configuration with basic options.
The Frontier is massive compared to what it used to be. 90s Frontier was a small pickup truck. 2010s Frontier is the size of a 90s F-150.
Product of mfrs cheating CAFE standards.
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They're substantially larger in all around size. Like comparable to a Dodge Dakota. A Maverick or Santa Cruz is comparable to a historical Ranger or S10, with the caveat that they're only available in one cab and bed configuration.
I'm taking my 1st gen Tacoma 5-spd to the grave
Buy a Ford Maverik hybrid. Similar size, great mileage.
Except it's a Ford and not a Chevy. If you think those things don't matter, you're just fooling yourself.
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> I’ll take a moment to lament the demise of the light duty pickup that provided a bit of extra utility while still fitting in a normal parking space.
Remind me of my favorite article title: In the land of the free, why can’t we have mini-pickup trucks like the Taliban and ISIS?[0]
[0]: https://www.kansas.com/opinion/opn-columns-blogs/dion-lefler...
You can buy a hitch for any vehicle and a brand new 8 foot trailer for < $2k.
For the "I need to sometimes pick up large objects" use case it's hard to beat.
I have 3 vehicles, an old project jeep, an old truck, and a sedan.
Sedan handles 99% of my driving, but can't really tow anything. Truck handles all of my towing stuff, but gets ~14mpg which hurts so I don't drive it.
Jeep is a jeep, it's always being worked on, but when I use it I'm using it to go ride around on dirt paths or for camping. It gets 17-20mpg when I'm driving it but I don't want to drive it often.
If the jeep was a 2000's series jeep I would totally just get a small trailer for the occasional towing things that I do with the pickup and downsize to 2 vehicles. I know I could rent a uhaul from time to time for about what I pay for insuring and titling the truck, but the $100 annual difference is worth it for the convenience of not having to deal with uhaul 4 times a year.
But I said all of that to say, that a hitch isn't a perfect solution for everyone. I would feel very uncomfortable towing an empty 4x6 trailer behind my sedan, not to even mention the occasional couch or dresser or bunch of boxes from helping a friend move.
> I would feel very uncomfortable towing an empty 4x6 trailer behind my sedan, not to even mention the occasional couch or dresser or bunch of boxes from helping a friend move.
Why? 1500 lbs rated tow hook on an average sedan should be no problem at all. And that's more than enough for a 4x6 with a couch and a couple of boxes. Might even get a slightly larger trailer so you don't have to take the couch apart.
I've towed 14' sailboats including all gear behind a Corolla, didn't even feel the trailer was there.
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2001 Wrangler owner, I do some towing (particularly like the flexibility of UBox for borrowing a box on a trailer for a few days to store items at my house or leisurely pack up for storage).
The 2 door model unfortunately has a pretty weak tow rating of 1 ton, and I'm fairly certain I have gone well over that a few times. IIRC the four door models a few years later took that up to 5000 lbs because of the extra length.
We bought our first minivan in 1998, a Ford Windstar. It was purchased to run our teenagers to activities, but I quickly fell in love with all the other things it could do, including what you've mentioned above. We put a ton of miles on it before trading it in. Next was a 2007 Town and Country with two sliding doors! By this time we were running grandkids and it was perfect.
After deciding to replace it, we struggled to decide what kind of vehicle to upgrade to. For our lifestyle and the side projects I like to do, another minivan was the obvious choice. Now it's a 2018 Pacifica and we're retired. The quality is outstanding, with 112K miles on it, I expect to put on another 100K before seeing what's available for the next upgrade. None of these vans ever gave us any engine or transmission trouble, despite the high number of miles I was able to put on them.
I have a 2018 Forester and it holds a surprising amount of furniture or 8' lumber. My only regret is that it won't fit 4x8 sheet materials well - if only they had designed the interior plastic cladding a little better it would be a great workhorse.
I remember my 1982 Toyota Corolla wagon had an obvious cut-out in the plastic interior, that was just a hair wider than a 4x8 sheet. I still miss that car.
Yep, my parents had an old Honda Odyssey (minivan) that exactly fit a 4x8 sheet of plywood. Comical that some pickups can't quite measure up.
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Try buying a compact Toyota pickup without the extra row of seats. The last one was made in 2015. They sell for more than the price of new for mileage < 100k.
I think there's basically one 4x4 van on the market in the US right now. So you're making a pretty bad generalization here. In the Bay Area, it's probably true that a van would work well, although I lived in a mixed-income neighborhood and all the construction guys had beater pickups. But if you live in a place with snow and unpaved residential roads, 4x4 is pretty much a must (and pickups can be also be used for plowing, etc).
Since when? I sincerely do not understand that point about snow. I've lived in Canada (not southern Ontario) for most of my life and everyone had (and still mostly has) FWD. 4x4 was only for people actually going off road... I don't get how this is now a "must".
it's a perceived must. when running "all season" tires year round the AWD inspires more confidence, and most people don't even know winter tires are a thing. Plus 4x4 only helps you start moving, but once you are, every car still only has 2 wheels to turn and 4 to stop, which are quite possibly more crucial in snow....
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Since California required drivers to equip chains when driving in the mountains, unless they have AWD or 4x4. So, probably at least 70 years ago.
If you mean true 4x4, there are none. Sprinter went AWD a few years ago.
But I believe most vans on the market have an AWD option. Ford Transit and Volkswagen IDBuzz both offer AWD. Toyota’s Sienna is (only?) AWD with a silly lifted trim for the off-roading soccer mom market. Chrysler’s van is AWD.
That leaves the ProMaster as the only two wheeler I’m certain about. Mazda and Kia also have vans, unsure about their drivetrain options. Did I leave anyone out?
I think your generalization is the bad one. Most trade jobs get better value out of vans compared to trucks. Vans offer awd, I am not sure a 4x4 offers much value.
Most companies prefer vans over trucks. Much better economics.
Fullsize vans don't offer AWD at a reasonable price point.
Either AWD/4wd is necessary when you're going to other people's property because you can't guarantee any given property isn't an icy shithole and when you're a professional being paid by them to be there for a specific purpose the last thing you wanna do is slip out trying to do a 25-point turn on their stupid sloped driveway and put a tire in the landscaping.
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AWD is a luxury outside of the most extreme of extreme locations.
I grew up in Minnesota driving rear wheel drive cars to start. They worked fine even in the olden days where plows would take a couple days to clear the country backroads and even rock salt was applied sparingly due to the expense.
Not a single one of my vehicles had winter tires - all seasons were perfectly serviceable. You’d get stuck once in a great while but that’s what the bag of sand and shovel in the trunk were for.
Front wheel drive came along and made it easy mode.
All wheel drive is certainly something I love these days, but it’s an extreme luxury that makes winter driving laughably easy.
A basic utilitarian work vehicle does not need to be 4WD in 90% or likely even 99% of use cases anywhere in the country.
>AWD is a luxury outside of the most extreme of extreme locations.
Only in the most strictly technical "I'm not touching you" sense.
Either AWD/4wd is necessary-ish when you're going to other people's property because you can't guarantee any given property isn't an icy shithole and when you're a professional being paid by them to be there for a specific purpose the last thing you wanna do is slip out trying to do a 25-point turn on their stupid sloped driveway and put a tire in the landscaping.
Even if it's some megacorp's facility that "should" be plowed and salted, it might not be when you show up at 6am on the dot to service something.
>I grew up in Minnesota driving rear wheel drive cars to start. They worked fine even in the olden days where plows would take a couple days to clear the country backroads and even rock salt was applied sparingly due to the expense.
>Not a single one of my vehicles had winter tires - all seasons were perfectly serviceable. You’d get stuck once in a great while but that’s what the bag of sand and shovel in the trunk were for.
I completely agree but the past isn't coming back. Those standards of performance are unfortunately no longer acceptable, especially in business settings.
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Ford Transit and Sprinter both have AWD. GMC apparently has a 4x4 van, the other 4x4 vans are aftermarket.
No vans are currently sold in the US with 4WD. The Sprinter and Transit are available in AWD, that's it. There are companies that will convert a van to 4WD but it's typically around $20,000 which is beyond the budget of most people.
2026 GMC Savana 3500 is first-party 4x4.
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How do you fit a 40ft ladder inside a van? How about a mound of mulch or compost? How about hauling away customer's old plumbing or any number of filthy things you don't want in a car interior? Not to mention that when it contains heavy items like a large beam of wood, you often can't physically lift it out with those awkward van angles, but could in a truck bed.
First of all I'm not convinced that the utility of the trucks is mostly unused. This seems like a trope from anticar people. But second of all and more concretely, I've done a lot of trade work that would have simply not worked in a van, so seeing your common sentiment is always bemusing.
> How about hauling away customer's old plumbing or any number of filthy things you don't want in a car interior?
Funny story, the guys who demolished an old bathroom for us hauled the crap & dust away in a very dirty beater van (either a small cargo van or a minivan with rear seating removed, can't remember). It was their designated demolition vehicle.
Nobody drives sheet goods around in a pickup or a work van with any sort of regularity.
There are only two trades that use sheet goods: drywall and carpentry. Most of the time they’re getting dozens or hundreds of sheets delivered to a job site.
What are you going to do with (12) 32 sq ft pieces of sheet goods anyways, put up drywall in a half of a bedroom or reroof a quarter of a garage?
If you really want to do this, you’ll get a roof rack for hauling sheet goods.
Light-duty pickups still exist, eg the Nissan Frontier with the 6’ bed is probably the most reliable, sturdy and cost-effective pickup out there. Europeans may know this truck as the Navarro.
A minivan with the two rear seats removed can move so much stuff.
Yeah but the same exact geniuses in here screeching about "you don't need a truck" will judge you so hard when they see you in the home depot parking lot stacking the thing floor to ceiling with building materials.
Source: own minivan
Sprinters vans are the GOAT. My wife drives a 2009 Ford Ranger, love that damn truck. When it goes, the Sprinter it is.
The sprinter is massively over-hyped by people who've never owned one.
Yeah, everything about it is generally "solid" and well done but at it's roots it's a very german car. The longblock will theoretically go a million miles but realistically you're gonna replace every part around it several times over to get it there. I'm sure they're fine when new but as they age it's basically the same "replacing way too much BS because while nice it's over engineered" as the rest of german car ownership. Like c'mon man, an asian or american car would "just" require simpler less invasive things and generally be less of a headahce in old age.
Source: semi responsible for keeping one running
Really hoping Slate works out! The modern pickup is usually a tuba for assholes not a working tool.
The only reason i have a pickup is because i put dirtbikes in it. They also fit in a van, but good luck finding a reasonably priced one with AWD (very high demand, especially due to camper conversions).
Vans are way better in almost every regard.
Actually, I'm buying a house with a garage and I may get a bike trailer, and a tow hitch for my BMW. That would be an even simpler solution
Same. Where are you, want to hit the trails sometime?