Tiny-trucks making a return?

I was recently given the opportunity to staff and manage a production shift for a long time vendor who was backlogged on orders and losing ground. I accepted conditionally, pending placement in into a gig more in my wheelhouse.

The work is ship-through light duty upfitting for class 2 trucks. We are producing trucks for a large fleet customer, the kind of operation that buys trucks 300-500 at a time. My crew is doing simple installs; tool-boxes, tonneau covers, power inverters and the like. What is noteworthy isn’t the equipment we are installing but the equipment it is being mounted on.

These are trick trucks, not the optionless beaters that were so prevalent in fleet at one time. Crew-cab, OE backup cameras, power-seats, power mirrors and locks – your proverbial Sunday-go-to-Meet’n truck.

The irony enters stage-left with the domestic car manufacturers announcing that they are considering reintroducing the compact pickup in the domestic market. Yes, this is the same industry that has been telling us for decades that we needed tricker, bigger, better, more deluxe equipment. And they have done a remarkable job of that sales job based on what we see on the road today. As I said above, even fleet customers are leaning this direction. Fleet managers are pragmatic, if they believe a vehicle will resell for more at end of life with more do-dads, they buy more do-dads.

So, what drives this interest in re-penetrating a market that was abandoned years ago? Mom and pop America seems very content in their trucks that came with individual zip-codes, oil prices are falling as domestic production increases, and now we have a taste for trucks that drive more like Cadillacs and Lincolns than work vehicles. I would hypothesize that it is federal fuel mileage standards that are pushing the buttons right now.

You see, there is no free ride. It takes fuel to accelerate a 6400 pound living-room on wheels. And like it or not, Detroit knows that they are against the wall on trying to eek any better mileage out of their passenger car offerings to make their averages go up.

Don’t get me wrong, I do believe there is a place for a tiny-truck as I had very successfully used one myself during my contractor years (a second-hand Rabbit pickup, remember those?). But after years and years of brainwashing us into believing we needed bigger/better/tricker trucks, the ad campaign to get this market shift off the ground is going to be fun to watch!

Danny’s top five “If I could own anything (again?)” cars

We all have them; cars we’ve yearned for or those that went away that we miss. 

My own wish list is tempered by prior experience. In my 20’s I had raced, Autocrossing specifically. It had been known as gymkhana racing in prior generations. This type of racing pits you against a stopwatch and a closed course (typically on a parking lot) made of switchbacks and slaloms laid out with cones.

Like most types of racing the SCCA divided cars into classes by engine displacement and extent of preparation. This allowed for virtually any flavor of “run what you brung”. I recall seeing guys show up in little bitty econo-boxes, pry the hubcaps off, slap a helmet on and go to work. Next up may be a Porsche 911, which naturally looked much more impressive than the Renault “Le Car” (remember those?) that ran seconds before. 

This was possible as there was only one car on the course at a time. It was in this climate that I learned some performance driving, watched, and formed opinions. Probably my biggest take-away was that there seemed to be absolutely no replacement for experience with your wheels. It was the folks that showed at all the events and ran the same car in the same configuration every time, who did well enough/consistently enough to go to nationals.

That said there were specific cars I used to see that were able to smoke most others that left an impression on me, and a few cars I myself used and abused and had a warm spot for. These are as follows.

Wish List:

1.       Lotus Elan – Made by the famed British automaker from 1962-1973 these cars could be either real jewels or real pains in the rear. When set up right and when the electrical system wasn’t out for blood, these cars had such balance and poise it is virtually impossible to drive them slow. A sleek/tiny roadster, it is apparent that when Mazda brought out the first Miata is was a shameless copy of both appearance and concept.

2.      Lotus 7 – more Loti, yes. Perhaps Colin Chapman’s greatest masterpiece, this tough little car dominated club events through the 60’s and well into the 70’s. What’s not to like; 1100 lbs of classic long-hooded, scalloped doored, clamshell fendered British goodness. All were built to spec and most ended up on the racetrack, and often had screaming little 1.6 liter Cosworth Fords in them, often churning out 150-200 HP. Sounds insignificant? That’s only 5 lbs for horsepower. Work the numbers on your 5700 lb Navigator and tell me what you get. After Lotus pulled the plug, a company called Caterham bought the design and tooled up. They still make variants, some with supercharged Ford Duratech 4’s which crank out 320HP. Must drive like a Saturn booster tied to your rear!

3.      A tie – The 1968 Camaro Z-28 and the 1966 Shelby GT350 Mustang. Why not the later ones? Both of these were towards the front of production and both were coded into production as real race cars. While they were indeed streetable (sort of) either was fully legal and competitive in what was then the new Trans-Am sedan racing. Both had screaming small block V-8’s that loved high RPM, and I’m not sure either had the edge in competition. Kind of rough and boisterous – that’s where they get their charm.

From the sublime to the ridiculous (my own beaters – gone, but alive in memory)

4.      1970 Oldsmobile Vista Cruiser wagon. I see your eyebrows furrowing. Why this car? Well, not all Vista Cruisers are created equal. Mine was a Frankenstein. One very-ugly decade or better old utility hauler. Somehow once the original engine shelled-out, I ended up with a high performance engine Olds called the W-31. These were very underrated at 325HP. I say very underrated as I have fond recollection of taking a Porsche 911 Carrera to the woodshed on a chunk of highway that will remain nameless. Must have been humiliating, the wagon even had a roof-rack on it… Porsches should stick to turns. I behave myself now, honest!

5.       And for no particular reason except that I loved it. A 1963 GMC C1500 long-bed with the 305 V-6. The truck was just an old GMC/Chevy. But it would haul anything you loaded into it. The half-ton that could haul 3500 lbs. The engine was the jewel. I still don’t know what wild hair the GMC engineering department got, but this V-6 was a torque monster. You could lug it down to walking speed in top gear, push the pedal and it would just go. No fuss, no muss. Truck shrugged at any work I threw at it, towing or hauling.

I’d love to hear what cars tripped your trigger – in the past or now.  

Kansas City going alternative

We are just wrapping up the National Drive Electric week https://driveelectricweek.org/ , which was in effect a media blitz sponsored by various interested parties to promote electric vehicle awareness.

Later in the week, I attended the stakeholder meeting for the Kansas City Regional Clean Cities Coalition. In this meeting I heard of partnerships between businesses and utilities to install charging kiosks at various area employers’ locations.  The thought is that an electric commute may well be possible if the user has an opportunity to plug in a charge while crunching spreadsheets upstairs.

We also discussed various companies and organizations installing CNG stations, both private and public access. By virtue of my prior employment, I was also aware of other entities considering installation, or who have already entered agreement to install additional stations in my area.

The age is indeed upon us. In 1980 if someone had pulled me to the side and said “Dan, sell your IBM stock. Alternate fuel cars are the wave of the future,” I likely would have frisked them to see what type of illicit drugs they were on. Today, I honestly feel you may be stoned if you haven’t realized that gasoline and diesel are on the way out.

There is no embarrassment in this departure. In fact mineral, fuels have owned road transportation for more than 120 years. If you start figuring rail transportation into the mix, coal and oil burners, you realize we have 230+ years relying on Fred Flintstone’s pet dinosaur Dino.

Oil isn’t going away overnight. But dinosaurs went extinct once, and it will happen again.

Am I intimidated by this? Sure am. I have several decades learning the ins and outs of internal combustion engines as we know them now.  

Am I going to let that make me close my mind, shake my head and say “Ain’t gonna happen”? Sure not. I’ve learned the unknown before, and I will learn it again. I have confidence in my ability to adapt.

That and I followed a Chevy Volt on the way home from the gym Friday.

Figure your personnel changeover times into replacement costs

Let’s face it, no matter how underpaid or underappreciated your workforce claims to be, their time is expensive. Depending on who’s talking, you will hear numbers suggesting that an employee actually costs the company 1.4 – 1.7X their gross salary, variable based on company-provided benefits.

In many fleet operations new vehicle assignments are as easy as giving the operator a set of keys and watching out the window as they move their golf-clubs from one car to another. After they get their garage door opener and cell phone charger, they are on the road.

Work vehicle fleets, not so much. I have seen some operators putter around for three days just to transfer tools and fittings from one ¾ ton to another -- whereas another tech got it done in five hours. You scratch your head as you watch.

The point is, operators and their perceived vehicle setup requirements are all individual, but none can accomplish an equipment assignment move without impacting their actual work in some way.  So the fleet department isn’t the only one incurring expense.

Generally, if something can go wrong, it will.  The tech needed a new vice-mount and didn’t have it, the old bolt-on tool box is rusted and needs to be replaced – insert problem here.

More likely the upfit was delayed due to an ordering glitch, and the trucks didn’t deliver until rush season. No one can get more irritable than a supervisor whose star performer is locked in the shop moving onto a new truck while orders are stacking up.

They have a point.

The operator’s time does have a cost. It can cost not only the dollars he expends making the move, but also lost opportunity and the resulting overtime to make up for it. Does this mean you don’t change out the equipment? No, but it does mean their manager needs to be aware of the variables so that they aren't caught off-guard. 

Don’t be fuelish

OK – so any of us responsible for company rolling-stock for any period of time have gotten sucked into discussions with our management about how to better control fuel consumption. Rationale varies depending on employer/workforce relationship and how much expense fuel constitutes in the budget.  But statistics from whatever source indicate that fuel is in the “Top Three” category of fleet expenses; so if the topic hasn’t been addressed, it will be.

So – what fuel issues burn in the back of senior management’s mind?  Probably topics such as theft, waste, and personal use, among others. These are the high level concerns that typically come up when the topic is discussed. But what of fleet managers?  What factors cross our minds regarding fuel consumption?

Naturally, those same topics are front and center, if for no other reason (and there are other reasons) that if they burden our boss, they burden us. But let’s not stop there.

A responsible fleet manager knows that budgets are made or broken on details. While excessive fuel consumption is often caused by poor driver ethic and theft, can’t it also be indicative of other problems? Overloaded vehicles, tuning out of spec, brakes sticking, A/C compressor dragging or the vehicle being worn out -- all these can, and will, affect the fuel consumption of a vehicle.

These factors cost money to repair, but if we put off addressing the issues, they will cost more money yet. We will not only lose the fuel-related money, but likely the repairs or solutions to address the issues will become more involved and more expensive the longer we put them off. So if we are going to be proactive rather than reactive managers, we need to think ahead of immediate concerns.

Theft is a huge concern, sure. So let’s not steal money from ourselves through inattention.   

  

On equipment specifications

My career in equipment support has always been vocational; I have always dealt with mobilizing a trades-based workforce. Most recently this was managing fleet for a natural gas utility. Observations from years within this field make me draw the conclusion that, pound for pound, there are likely no industries slower to adapt new technologies than those who deal with pipe, whatever the commodity those pipes carry.  Really this should come as no surprise, as much the tooling and technique associated with working on this infrastructure hasn’t materially changed in the past 60-70 years. In a nutshell, what worked 10+ years ago still works today. Also, functioning in a regulated marketplace doesn’t really force a business to consider different solutions to remain competitive.

About 16 years ago, a determination was made by my employer to specify air conditioning in all vehicles going forward. The reason flew in the face of industry wisdom, it was simply “the right thing to do” for the employees. We joked occasionally that we had decided to jump into the 20^th century with both feet. The next century was 2 years away.

Years later this same equipment came up for replacement. My department both bought and sold the equipment, so I got to see first-hand the cost/resale ratio associated with this altruistic purchase decision. While market variables are always tweaking resale values, it was none-the-less apparent that the up-front cost of the option was more than recovered once the vehicle was sold, as I had similar equipment with and without air-conditioning selling side by side.

And really – should this be a surprise for anyone? Which of us, if we are in the market for a used car or truck, wouldn’t pass on a vehicle without air-conditioning? While there are still businesses where automotive creature comforts are not required, the lack of them on your equipment certainly narrows your potential remarketing field.

Specifications for that employer continued to evolve, eventually incorporating cruise-control and tilt-wheel. As before, it appeared that the cost was easily recovered during resale.

And there is the crux of this discussion.  As a commodity, the up-front expense associated with these bells and whistles seemed needless as the truck “worked” just fine without them. However, the resale differential had proven that sale recovery could, and should, be figured into total vehicle costing. It is on this total cost of ownership paradigm that purchase decisions should be made.  

On trends in automotive marketing

Years back, when I first hired on with a company, I was in a position of digging around through retired equipment to find a viable company scooter to facilitate my work. Deep in the ubiquitous pile of trucks gleamed my diamond, a GMC 2500 with a utility bed. The truck had around 10 years and 200K miles on it, but it was straight and ran pretty good. So I moved in.

Specifications were simple. It had 4.11 gears, positrac, heavy springs and an AM/FM radio. This particular truck was also in a group the company bought that had the now infamous 1^st generation 6.2 liter diesel.

This engine was developed after the fairly catastrophic 5.7 liter Oldsmo-diesel from the late 70’s. The Olds engine of the era was tough in auto applications, but wasn’t a good basis for a diesel engine and was plagued with durability issues.

The 6.2 on the other hand seemed to start where the 5.7 left off, and was actually a pretty good engine except for a few issues with injector pumps and glow plugs. The one in my gleaming jewel was a little tired, but it still started easily and made enough power to keep the truck at highway speed on hills. It offered something else though – economy.

How economical you ask? In spite of the lack of overdrive and the high gear ratio (engine buzzed fast on the highway), I could consistently get 20-22 MPG on open-road--and this in a truck that weighed about 7000 lbs. with tooling on it.

Jump now to the diesel horsepower wars of the 2000’s. We developed and still have diesel engines in pickup trucks that produce more power and torque than the average over-the-road tractor from the early 1970’s.

I have little interest in trying to pull a 25,000 lb. trailer with a pickup truck for many reasons, though I understand the livestock or equine hobbyist or small business may have need. But really, how many times have we all rolled up to a stoplight only to be joined by an 8’ tall  4X4 pickup with 430 clattering horsepower and maybe a bag of groceries in back. Is this prudent use of technology?

There is no free ride. An engine can’t make power without burning fuel; the more power you make, the more fuel you burn. The little 6.2 diesel in that old GMC was rated at maybe 150 HP, but it pulled the old truck around fine.

So what need drives the monster power figures that today’s engines are producing? Even in gasoline powered equipment it is now pretty easy to go buy a ½ ton pickup that would blow the doors off an old Camaro. So is it purely ego that makes us want this power, or are we being told we need it and so we’ve swallowed it hook, line and sinker?