On Fri, 8 Mar 2019 21:00:21 -0800 (PST), DerbyDad03
wrote:

On Friday, March 8, 2019 at 11:03:49 PM UTC-5, Ed Pawlowski wrote:
On 3/8/2019 10:23 PM, Clare Snyder wrote:
On Fri, 8 Mar 2019 17:14:24 -0800 (PST), DerbyDad03
wrote:

On Friday, March 8, 2019 at 6:01:01 PM UTC-5, Clare Snyder wrote:
On Fri, 8 Mar 2019 10:55:51 -0600, Leon lcb11211@swbelldotnet wrote:

On 3/8/2019 9:52 AM, -MIKE- wrote:
On 3/8/19 8:38 AM, Leon wrote:
On 3/7/2019 6:23 PM, Bob D wrote:
On Wednesday, March 6, 2019 at 9:46:40 AM UTC-6, Leon wrote:
On 3/6/2019 9:40 AM, Leon wrote:
Actually I prefer this new tail gate by RAM.

https://www.motortrend.com/news/ram-...tion-tailgate/

They gave taken a proven, useful design used on Honda pickups and
enhanced it. I especially like the kick activated step. It looks like
its low enough to be really useful and its out of the way of trailering.


Yes!* With Honda and Ram you can actually get really close to the bed.

That's the real benefit I see.* When I saw that it reminded me the back
door on a 70s station wagon that would swing all the way out.

Or that station wagon door where the door dropped down beneath the back
floor and the glass went up into the roof panel. ;~)


Of course, if they'd quick making these things so fricken high off the
ground, the gate wouldn't be an issue.* Probably 85% of these trucks
with such high suspension never get the springs bent, if you know what I
mean.

There is that but for open road traveling the tall stance gives you a
better view.




My old '84 F-150 could comfortably haul a ton and a half of gravel but I
could see the top of the roof and into the engine bay without a step
ladder.



3,000 lbs???
Dad's of bent-side F150 scaled at 2.5 tons of mixed hardwood on one
load - it had quite a "squat" and had rolled 2 tires off the rims on
the way down the hill to the road from the cutting site - it was quite
a job to jack that sucker up to change the tires. He drove home with
the tires at 50PSI at 30MPH max (about 20 miles)

Whenever I had to move 2.5 tons, I'd make 2 trips at 1.25 tons each.

That's about all the Vega could handle. ;-)
On that note - what was the biggest design flaw on the GM Chevette??
(aka the shove-it)

Single exhaust.

It's awfull hard to push a wheelbarrow with only one handle - - -


Some years back I drove one cross country. It was one of my brother's
cars and his wife liked it. When he moved to San Diego, I took the Vega
about a week later. Made the trip OK, never abused it speed wise, but
it was never the same after that. 3500 miles in 5 1/2 days was too much.
He got rid of it a few months later.

I once shared the driving of a Javelin from Cleveland to NYC. AMC used to
tap into the vacuum line to run the windshield wipers. Early into the
trip, the wipers started acting weird. They would go up, but not come
back down unless you turned them off, which was done with a sliding lever.

Whoever wasn't driving would slide the lever up, down, up, down for hours.
I was doing the "levering" when the lever came off in my hand. Luckily, it
happened when the wipers were up because we found out that if you manually
pulled them down, they would go back up by themselves, thanks to the vacuum.

We rummaged around in the back of this beater and found just enough wire
to tie to the passenger wiper so that the passenger could pull them down,
let them go up, pull them down, etc. Unfortunately, to make it work, we
had to let our hand go part way out of the window. Highway speeds and 40°
weather make for some cold-ass hands. We ended up putting our socks on
our hands to keep them somewhat warm. We were wet, cold and dirty by the
time we reached NYC. 30+ years later I found the following video and sent
it to my best man, the guy I made the trip with. We still laugh about it
whenever we get together.

These guys were lucky enough to have longer wire.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyPI438nGjI
You needed a new fuel pump. The Javelin used a vaccum pump on the
fuel pump to operate the vacuum wipers if yoiu didn't spring for the
optional electric wipers.
I was an AMC mechanic in 1972.
Now the Chevies up until about 1957 didn't have this luxury - and
the wipers would slow to a halt on a long uphill grade, then go so
fast they'd throw a blade coming down the other side of the hill with
your foot off the gas. The #48 juice can repurposed as a vacuum
reservoir was almost adequate to keep the heater controls working, and
the hydrovac was good for ONE application of the brakes - but didn't
help the wipers for more than about a 10 second passing maneuver.