Y’all like trucks, right? Sure you do. Everybody likes trucks. Okay, maybe not, but I bet if you need to move a refrigerator or something, you suddenly really like your friend who has a truck. But the question today is, how big does a truck need to be, really?
Yesterday we looked at two V8-powered coupes from different eras, and I had a feeling the Mercury Cougar was going to take the win. It’s the safe, sane choice of the two, the car you could actually use every day if you wanted to, with air conditioning and fuel injection and disc brakes and all the other advances provided by the twenty-year age gap between it and the Buick.
But there’s just something about those old bubbletop GM coupes that’s hard to resist, and I had forgotten how handsome Buick’s version is. Yeah, the interior is sketchy and the engine isn’t original (which I would have realized if I had done more than glance at the photo), but it’s a running, driving early ’60s classic for three grand.
The other day, I went to the local big-box chain hardware store, and as I was walking in, an early ’90s Toyota pickup rolled by. I was struck by just how small it really was, especially compared to the behemoth Rams and Fords and GMCs in the parking lot. And yet, it still can haul a half-ton of whatever will fit in its six-foot bed, with that old 22R-E happily chugging along. It’s as much truck as most people will ever need, unless you’re really hauling or towing heavy stuff.
But even that little Toyota is overkill for, say, puttering around a college campus and emptying trash cans. You can get by with something even smaller, like one of our trucks today. And even though it isn’t capable of highway speeds, that doesn’t matter; it probably fits in the bed of our other choice. Let’s take a look.
1967 Cushman Truckster – $3,000
Engine/drivetrain: Overhead valve flat 2 of unknown size, three-speed manual, RWD
Location: Boulder, CO
Odometer reading: Doesn’t have one, I don’t think
Operational status: Runs and drives great
All over the world, vehicles smaller than typical cars do all kinds of chores every day. We see them all the time, but rarely think about them. Cushman, founded in 1903 in Lincoln, Nebraska, made a business out of such vehicles, as well as motor scooters, golf carts, and agricultural engines. The Truckster, made in dozens of different forms over the years, has been used for mail delivery, groundskeeping, parking enforcement, and more. This one dates from 1967, and wears Harley-Davidson stickers, though I don’t know if it actually has any connection to Harley.
It’s a little hard to find specifications on these things, as you might imagine, but as far as I can tell, this Truckster is powered by an 18 horsepower air-cooled flat-twin, driving a conventional rear axle through a column-shifted three-speed manual. Top speed is about 30 miles an hour, plenty for running around in an enclosed environment. Obviously it’s not street-legal most places. It does run and drive well, the seller says, and I did find a few sources for tune-up and maintenance parts, so keeping it running in the future should be possible.
The engine is under the single seat, and although it’s a three-wheeler, it does have a conventional steering wheel instead of handlebars like the similar Piaggio Ape. It does not appear to have side curtains or doors, nor does it have a windshield wiper, so it’s strictly a fair-weather friend. The windshield has a crack, but I think it’s Plexiglas, and you’ll never find a replacement, so you may have to just live with it.
The cute little pickup bed is just the right size for a few yard tools and a bucket or two. I don’t know what the weight capacity of it is, but it’s probably more than you’d guess. The whole thing looks like it has been painted recently, and I get the feeling that it’s in rougher shape than it appears at first glance. But it’s a utility vehicle; you can’t expect it to have been coddled.
1994 Ford F-250 XL – $1,750
Engine/drivetrain: 460 cubic inch overhead valve V8, four-speed manual, RWD
Location: Vancouver, WA
Odometer reading: 180,000 miles
Operational status: Runs and drives great
Speaking of vehicles that aren’t meant to be coddled, here we have a good old Ford F-250, in the working-class XL trim. It’s a single cab with an eight-foot bed, the classic work-truck configuration. And if that didn’t cement its work credentials well enough, it has a ladder rack, and an air compressor mounted in the bed.
Under the hood of this beast of burden is Ford’s biggest gasoline engine, a 460 cubic inch V8, driving the rear axle through a four-speed manual. It’s probably overkill for most of the use this truck will see, but better to have it and not need it than need it and not have it – take it from someone who owns (and overworks) a six-cylinder truck. The tradeoff is fuel consumption; I’ve heard that trucks equipped with this engine average 10 MPG no matter what they’re doing. The seller says this one runs and drives well, and is ready to go to work.
You don’t expect work trucks to be luxurious inside, and some rips and tears are just par for the course. This one looks like it was mainly driven with just one person in the cab; the driver’s side of the big bench seat is beat to hell, but the passenger’s side looks fine. No word on whether or not it has air conditioning, but it certainly doesn’t have any other amenities.
It’s straight and rust-free, but the paint is toast. It still has the logo of the landscaping company that owned it on the doors; the next owner should probably take those off. And if you have no use for that gigantic air compressor in the bed, you could probably sell it and recoup quite a bit of the cost of the truck.
Yes, I know this is a silly comparison. But I saw that Cushman for sale and I just had to. So the question stands: How much truck do you need? Would a little three-wheeled glorified golf cart do you, or are you in need of a three-quarter ton monster with a gigantic V8?
Obviously the Ford is better for almost anything, but the Cushman triggers a want in me whereas the F-series just makes me happy I am not in the landscaping business.
Also, can we get a size comparison between the bed of the Cushman and that of a Cybertruck?
I know it’s shocking that someone wouldn’t get all the details right in a Craigslist ad, but the Ford has a 5-speed, not a 4-speed.
10 mpg? Might be a bit optimistic. My parents owned an 86 Suburban with the 454 and THM400. It was fantastically comfortable, was a total beast towing a 10,000 lb trailer.
And got 5 to 8 mpg uphill, downhill, towing, empty, whatever. Didn’t really matter. It had a drinking problem, but otherwise was a truly excellent and reliable vehicle.
Fix that seat, and the F250 is pretty much the same idea.
I voted F250 because I’ve been looking for a truck and that’s my favorite Ford body style in my ideal configuration.
Also it’s less than the Cushman.
Do I need another F-250? No, but I do need a compressor.
Let’s see, a real truck for over $1,000 less or a carnival ride toy? Got to go with big boy and use that $1,300 savings to drive the first 13,000 miles.
I already have and F100 and an F350, so no need for an inbetweener, so went with the smaller for balance.
I have little use for an F250 like that. But I have absolutely no use for that Cushman.
And the F250 is cheaper.
So my vote went to the F250.
Rather have a 300 I6, but F250 everyday. This is lightyears better than any you see local (PA) anymore and I prefer this Aeronose bodystyle and interior to the later ones. The 460 will swill gas like a drunk but get you there slowly. The 300 will get you there slowly, just drinking less gas. Or you could have the 351W, worst of both worlds.
Well, this was easy- I have no need for that Cushman (it’s still good for it’s uses) and even though the other one is a Fix Or Repair Daily, I do know that these are workhorses and ok for getting work done. At least it has usability when it’s not Found On Road Dead. Plus V8, stick, RWD, etc
I had to go with the Cushman.
Sometimes my Kei truck is just to big and unwieldy.
Normally I’m at least semi-realistic about these: I don’t own a garage, so a convertible without a top has to hit a lot of marks for me to pick it.
I basically don’t have a yard or any use whatsoever for the Cushman, but I do have fond memories of 3 summers working maintenance on a golf course where our vehicles were cousins of this one, two-seaters with beds for soil & seed or tools, one of which the mechanic had souped up a bit and could definitely hit 25.
So nostalgia it is for me. There’s bike lanes from here to the Home Depot, so maybe it could be my personal home improvement shuttle.
I doubt the F-250 has been worked all that hard, because how many lawn sprinklers are there in the rain forest climate of the Pacific Northwest? An air conditioner would be nice but can’t be assumed given the location, but the price gives some room for an aftermarket unit if needed.
Cushman made scooters, scooters make me smile, this thing is close to a scooter if about 37x easier to dump, so gimme the Cushman.
By the pound the Ford is the better deal! Lol
At that price the Ford is generally in the “why not?” category. A running and driving vehicle that can pass state inspections is largely worth $2K nowadays.
It’s a good thing it’s as far away from me as it is. It’s charming as heck, as the best honest and earnest work trucks tend to be.
Someone buy this for David so he can replace his gm truck and we can have red Ford trucks on both coasts in the founders’ fleets.
$3000 for something my father-in-law once pulled out of a scrap heap and threw a used Kohler into that literally only moves firewood around the yard vs something that actually has power for less than $2k? Hm. Hmmmmm.
“Glorified golf cart” is exactly right.
The Ford is a ready-made side gig: blow out sprinklers in the fall. Slap a new phone number on there and make your money back in a weekend.
Also, that compressor looks like it could generate enough psi to blow over the Cushman.
There used to be a gentleman somewhere in South GA who collected and restored old Cushmans and similar vehicles, so apparently there is a market for these things.
New golf carts are starting in the $6500 range so $3K pn an old Cushman is probably not a bad option.
The Ford is a Cockroach.You may not like how much gas it uses but it won’t leave you stranded or wishing you had more power.Minimal maintenance and it will run another 30 years.
The Achilles heel is the ignition module. Original Motorcraft ones last a long time, but were getting hard to find back when I had a F-250 10 years ago, but aftermarket replacements are crap, some lasting as short as 100 miles. And they fail with no warning, sometimes leaving you able to limp along, sometimes not.
OK, Mark. Last week you said you were reserving the “Both” option for complementary vehicles. What’s more complimentary than a big truck that can haul a little truck?
So, through the magic of the refresh button, I voted for both.
I’d get more use out of the F-250. Not too much use though since it drinks gas like it has a hole in the tank. Now if I lived in one of those subdivisions where people use golf carts to cruise around the neighborhood I’d take the Cushman and instantly become the coolest guy on the block.
Absolutely this. Stick a small chest freezer in the bed and hand out popsicles and Otter Pops in the summer.
Ford. Absolutely the Ford.
I’ve worked at several industrial facilities where they used these Cushmans as runabouts for the staff and they were so poorly made and expensive to repair that one site gave up and bought Yamaha Mule SxSs and another just hired a dedicated mechanic to keep those piles of junk running.
Agreed. The Mule, having four wheels would be safer, and some models can carry 1,000 pounds and tow even more. I imagine it would be more fun to run around and less polluting if being driven inside a factory.
The four wheels was certainly a big part, as the three wheels were a liability in areas where the roads weren’t perfectly smooth. In that same topic, the Cushmans would also break frame joints and sheer suspension mounts constantly. The Mules were a huge improvement both from payload capacity, but also from the suspension being able to handle the payload. The biggest drawback to the Mules were their physical size, which created issues in the designated parking areas, but that was a worthy tradeoff.
I can’t comment on the durability or build quality of either, but the city I’m in replaced its Cushman parking enforcement vehicles with Smarts well before they pulled out of the US market, and I’m guessing the enforcement officers were grateful to roll around downtown in air conditioned comfort. There’s a pizza place that uses them for deliveries, though, so maybe they got recycled locally.
I’ve already got a 92 F-250 but with the smallest engine offering (300-6), 4 speed, ladder rack, and rusted bumper, so I’m all set there. And I get a whopping 13 mpg…