Comparison left vs right for a craftsman who doesnt know which one he should buy:
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l/r same bed size
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r lower bed for way easier loading/unloading
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r less likely to crash
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r less fuel consumption and costs
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r less expensive to repair
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r easy to park
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r easy to get around in narrow places like crowded construction sites or towns
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r not participating in road arms race
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l You get taken serious by your fellow carbrained americans because ““trucks”” are normalized and small handy cars are ridiculed.
So unless you are a fragile piece of human, choose the right one.
I agree with the sentiment of this post, but to be fair, you can also carry 3 or 4 passengers in the left vehicle, as opposed to only one in the right.
The main problem is the US fuel economy regulations actually encourage manufacturers to build bigger trucks and SUVs so they get classified into a category that has looser fuel economy requirements.
The extended cab version of the right truck would still tick all the boxes.
Off-road and towing capacity are probably the main feature you give up with that sort of design. Whether or not most people need that is a separate story.
They make kei trucks in 4x4, but you do lose ground clearance.
That being said, what kind of “off road” conditions are any of the trucks really contending with?
You are right. Still the american truck is hugely oversized, even for 5 persons and cargo. But, for the sake of the argument, imagine standing on the highway. Have a gander at the cars around you. How many people per car do you see? Exactly, 90% of the time there is exactly one person in a car. What makes the american truck an extreme waste of space an ressources, beside being a health hazard to everyone outside of the car.
Cars should get smaller, not bigger.
You’re mostly right. The main problem is that manufacturers chose to ignore the spirit of the US CAFE fuel economy regulations, and instead build everything bigger and bigger. That’s why quarter-ton trucks grew to the size of the F150 in the year 2000 when they were quite a bit smaller before.
It’s not the fault of the regulation. It is the fault of the manufacturers and to an equal extent, of consumers for preferring gigantic vehicles.
And let’s not let GM off the hook for the 1990s Suburban, which began to, quite literally, dominate the roads. Those fuckers were the original huge grocery getter, and they had truly awful turning radius and blind spots. You just couldn’t drive them safely or courteously if you tried. So of course everyone wanted more powerful and bigger vehicles to compete.
I’m actually going to fault regulations on this one. The EPA bases fuel economy requirements on the wheelbase of the vehicle. They used to publish a range of values based every other year or so, but then changed it to a formula. The formula is non-linear, making it neigh impossible to build anything with a small wheelbase anymore. In theory, they could design a small hybrid truck, but would need an obnoxiously long bed to compensate.
I watched a YouTube video on it not terribly long ago, and iirc, a 95 Ford Ranger, if held to the current formula-based regulations, would need 60+ mpg to be produced without major penalties to the company.
The EPA either needs to reevaluate the formula, or start manually publishing the numbers with values that are actually achievable by the industry at scale. Basically, by publishing the formula, manufacturers are able to min-max their designs in all the wrong ways.
EDIT: Updated for clarity and fixed some typos
Thanks for pointing our the real incentives which are always some bullshit about more money and less regulations - basically the reason capitalism sucks at innovation - it doesn’t care about whats important and in some cases actively hates it
What’s important for you specifically is not what is important to the customer base writ large.
You have problems with fellow consumers that you blame on manufacturers.
Capitalism does not follow the desires of consumers, it follows the desire of shareholders.
Given the usage patterns, most people in the US do not need large trucks. They have been convinced that need them because the auto manufacturers make a lot of money selling trucks.
I thought it was very disingenuous of OP to not mention crew capacity between the two trucks at all. I’d assume the bigger truck also has a better towing capacity which may be required. What isn’t required is buying one of these trucks to get groceries and replace your tv every 3 years while commuting to your desk job 1 hour away.
But what about cargo capacity? The beds look pretty much the same size, although I’m sure allowed weight is drastically different
The main post claims the beds are the same size. Technically speaking in terms of volume the kei truck wins due to lower bed height (if we are using max height to pass bridges as our standard). As for weight I’m pretty sure the left truck wins out on total capacity. That said the kei truck is still a remarkably useful minitruck and i wish they had a bigger market in the west.
Thats why we always had larger and smaller versions of trucks.
99% of trucks don’t NEED 3-4 passengers. Same with SUVs. Most are just used to commute back and forth to work.
Half ton trucks should have remained small, while the 1 ton ones should be closer to what the half-ton are sized today.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_F-Series#/media/File:1953_F100_Diagram.jpg
Look at the original F-100 for a good example. The old Rangers are also what most trucks should look like. Only the people that really use them should be driving these massive trucks around. I honestly hope gas prices spike massively because it’s going to hit idiots that drive this shit the worst.
Can’t tow a boat an RV or trailer with the Japanese vehicle. All things Americans do for fun. For work? The Japanese vehicle can’t haul 6,000 lbs of lumbar or steel, nor can it pull another vehicle out of a ditch.
Just gonna keep on posting this
Good pic. Question : I’m new to Lemmy. How come it’s almost impossible to resize a pic without the pic closing on me? Is there a trick to this?
Try voyager, it allows zoom in and out without issues. https://vger.app/settings/install
This pic is fantastic but I wish there were more examples from actual alternatives to what people claim they need the pickups for e.g. vans like Trafics, Kangoos/Berlingos, Mercedes Sprinter/Vito etc etc. There is at least a sprinter there in version pickup, which has a very good result as I’m sure the other ones would as well, because these things tend to have the windshield all the way at the front of the vehicle so you have great visibility for the front 180°, the back 180° depends on the configuration you have which range from completely closed/opaque cargo space to fully furnished 5/7 seaters with windows.
To anyone claiming that the bigger one is the safer one …
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24499113/
https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/countries-with-the-most-car-accidents
From the Bloomberg & NLM articles
From a safety perspective, kei cars have a lot going for them when compared with American-style SUVs and trucks. Their light weight generates less force in a collision, and their stubby front ends reduce driver blind spots. Research suggests that their occupants are equally safe as those inside full-sized vehicles.
At first, I was going to criticize the collision speed of the example study, but found ( ok, I say found, I mean I googled for 15 seconds ) that the average American collision is occurring at less than 40mph, so good to go there.
Second, I was going to comment on the relative safety of being in the Kei truck and being struck by the 2500HD… but that just goes back to the ‘participating in the arms race’, so feels… stupid.
So, overall: Thanks for providing this. It directly answers the primary concern of ‘what if I hit something tho’. There are some other angles I could nitpick on maybe, but they all feel like a kind of ‘consolation prize’ to the argument.
95% of the craftsmen I know have panel vans. Easier to both organize and secure tools and materials, more overall room.
I lived in (and now commute through) a neighborhood of older houses, and higher incomes, so I see a lot of contractor vehicles. It seems like it breaks down as landscapers and lawn services use the pickup trucks; trades companies (plumbers, electricians, HVAC, carpenters, painters, etc.) use vans or box trucks; and the independent guys tend to use Dodge Caravans. Nearby, the university uses fleets of kei trucks (the low-speed versions because “freedom”), Ford Model E vans, and Caravans. I think the landscaping crew has pickups.
There are an increasing number of company pickup trucks, but most of them appear to be pavement princesses, used only for their usual function: transporting egos, not equipment.
It’s also residential. On big commercial and industrial construction sites it’s almost all big but fully functional trucks for exactly the reason you mention; they have to be able to haul trailers and heavy equipment --like generators, water buffalos, sand-blasters and the like-- over unpaved rubble or dirt.
But those are almost all company vehicles in any case.
Until you have an odd size item like a door in frame. Or need to move something like a 1 man post lift. And since you know you won’t be cleaning it out as often so your always going to have extra crap your hauling for no reason. I’m just going off every pro that has shown up for work at my job sites in a van.
I had a 1 ton Ford van for 12 years and I could haul a pallet of flooring or 20 sheets of drywall inside it, as well as lumber 12 feet or shorter. Anything more bulky than what fits inside a van like that would have difficulty fitting inside a 6.5 foot truck bed without a rats nest of ratchet straps and hanging way over the tailgate.
You have the right of it. If it won’t fit in the van, you hook up a trailer. The cost of the van and trailer combined is still a sight less than these living rooms on wheels.
Since Americans are obese, it makes sense that their cars are too.
I was looking for the “America bad” comment, was not disappointed. At least that carried over from reddit.
American cars were big way before they became obese. Americans have been more suburban and roads were developed before a lot of towns were, so roads are wide and big.
I love small cars. I’m happy to live somewhere with small roads. And I care deeply about living in a walkable city, but obesity is not the reason the US has big cars and the UK has small cars. Similar obesity rate. Different roads. Different fuel costs.
Obesity rates in the UK are not far behind the US. 32% vs 38% according to WHO. Unfortunately most western developed counties are well on the path to where America is regarding obesity. The key difference in terms of car sizes is size of roads, civil planning, gas prices, and marketing. Not obesity.
I was looking for the “America bad” comment comment, was not disappointed. At least our fragile egos carried over from Reddit.
