The pasture buggie

[Pat]

Jazz, That wet travel issue is a mixed blessing with the Dakota. It leaves less "footprints" than either of our diesels (1 ton dodge dually or F-250 PowerStroke) or the tractor but is still not as light on its feet as an off road golf cart. I have been ignoring my VW dune/beach buggy/pasture buggy which is street legal and is quite light on its feet. It is fitted with enormous rear tires so the heavy end doesn't sink in and larger than stock ones up front. The rear tread is barely more aggressive than a set of cheater slicks so it does slide around a bit on wet grass and of course on mud.

The VW buggy is probably as close to an off road golf cart as you will see short of the real thing but being 2 wheel drive it is not quite so capable in the slick stuff. It does have a fair capacity platform in back above and forward of the engine and can carry several sacks of cubes or a few buckets of xxx.

Pat

[CJDave]

[img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] While purpose-built pasture buggies do get the job done, it's real hard to beat a good used '51 Buick Roadmaster with the rear seat jerked out. [img]/forums/images/icons/crazy.gif[/img] That 360-cubic inch straight eight and the Dynaflo transmission can make cruising the weeds akin to driving on a cloud. [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

[jimbrown]

But Dave if you had one in half decent shape that ran you could probably sell it for more than enough to buy a new UTV.

[CJDave]

[img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] When I wuz still in skool in da early-early sixties I worked weekends in a big wrecking yard. I could not COUNT the number of early model Boo-ahs I put to the torch. They were like leaves on the trees. The Roadmasters actually had a lot of stainless steel used for interior ornamentation. The whole dash was bright, chrome and stainless. Some of the big Roadmasters had two carbs on that big straight eight. Of all the stupid stuff I have done, I think that letting a 1938 Cadillac Opera Sedan go to the chopping block was about the worst. This car had come from an estate, was jet black with a finish that you could see yourself in, had been garaged all of its life, and was perfect except for a cracked engine block. Now in terms of restorations, what could be easier than replacing the engine? We had oodles of flathead Caddy engines in the yard. I could have bought the car for 25 bucks and swapped the engine for fifty , and then put that superb relic in mothballs for twenty years or maybe even thirty, and then it would be off to the big antique auto auction for some real $$$$. [img]/forums/images/icons/frown.gif[/img] [img]/forums/images/icons/crazy.gif[/img] [img]/forums/images/icons/smirk.gif[/img]

[Pat]

I used to see more home brew pickups, big tuna boat sized cars with the back seat out to connect the volume there to the trunk. Typically the trunk lid was gone and a crude box was installed like a pickup bed. I haven't seen any for several years now, used to not be so rare. Hadn't thought about them till your comments, Dave.

Pat

[Bird]

Dave, in 1957 or 1958, I was working in my dad's service station in Plano, Tx, just north of Dallas when a 1940 Buick came in for gas. It was a chalky looking powder blue 4 door with a white haired old lady in the back seat and a black chauffeur in a black suit and cap who was probably as old the old lady in the back seat. When I checked the oil, I noticed the two carburetors and asked the chauffeur who had put those on the car (I'd never heard of a Buick with 2 carbs). He seemed surprised and asked what I meant, and when I told him he, he said, "Oh no, no one has changed anything. Mrs. (I forgot the name) bought this car new and I've been driving for her ever since and everything on this car is original."

That was the only Buick I've ever seen with 2 carbs.

[Pat]

Bird, That is a new one on me too but I have not had much experience on cars of that vintage. Older and newer but not then, except for a '43 Ford built military Jeep which of course had one carb with one barrel, and a pretty small one at that on the little Willys 4 banger.

Pat

[Bird]

Pat, while that was the only one I ever saw, and the only one I'd heard of, if you look a bit on the Internet, apparently they made the Buicks for several years with "twin carburetors, or what was called Compound Carburation."

[CJDave]

[img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] I recall my dad and another guy making a neat little pickup out of the guy's 1936 Plymouth coupe. In the late forties and early fifties, all kinds of tradesmen like carpenters and plumbers had little car-to-pickup conversions that they drove around. That was due partly to the shortage of pickups during WWII and to simple economics. In point of fact, the front end of some early model pickups was identical to the car of that same make. Pre-war vehicles were still quite common in the early to mid fifties. [img]/forums/images/icons/crazy.gif[/img]

[CJDave]

[img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] Wow! I haven't heard the term "compound carburetion" in forty years! The two carbs were hooked in such a way that the linkage opened the second carb only after the power setting (the position of the accelerator pedal) reached a certain point. It actually idled on ONE carb. [img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] The Hudson Hornet also had "Twin H Power" with dual carbs on the 308 cubic inch Hudson Six. No big mystery why Marshall Teague won something like 50 stock car races in 1950-51 driving a Hudson Hornet. [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]