My uncle once again delivers the goods. He spotted this late ’60s or early ’70s Transporter pickup earlier this week. Apparently it is a fleet vehicle for a storage company in Coralville.
These pickups had a very clever design, with a tailgate and side panels that converted it to a flatbed. A very cool – and rare – find. And it’s still earning its keep.
I’ve wondered why fold down sides on pick ups are not more popular. The VW does have a highish deck due to the engine back there, but not that high. I suppose wheel size does put some constraints on deck height, and the fact that a lot of pick ups don’t seem to be made for actual work (the old story).
I think that the VW Transporter and the Corvair Rampside hit upon the only two solutions for a rear-engine pickup. The VW gave you a high flat bed with dropdown sides, and lots of storage compartments under the parts of the bed that were not over the engine. The Corvair stepped the bed floor down into the middle of the truck so that you had a deep center portion accessible from the side.
I also think that in the US where fuel has not traditionally been outrageous, we have become spoiled by pickup beds that are both flat and low. Every pickup other than the Transporter and the Rampside give you both. It would have been interesting to see how the Transporter sold here if the chicken tax had not been a factor. I suspect that it would not have done much better than the Rampside for the reasons above.
Edit – your idea would seem to translate to the modern pickup like the F-150 where the bedsides are so high that you need a ladder just to look in. Drop-down upper bedsides (maybe the top 18 inches) all around would be a great idea, although I’ll bet they would rattle like crazy.
All of the current USDM truck beds are too dang high. The fact that Ford offers a tailgate step is exhibit A. Some of the AMC era Jeep ad copy for the J truck and Comanche talks up its class leading low bed height.
I’d love the ability to purchase a chassis cab and choose my own bed on a 1/2 ton or compact pickup. I always gaze in wonder at what the Australian Market gets:
http://www.uteltd.com/index.html
Aussie and NZ get utes designed for work not as show ponies.
Except for the HSVs and FPVs with their ~300kg payloads that all the young tradies love to drive
Most pickups (not utes) would have a bed/body like those, slightly higher deck but can load from all sides and don’t need to worry about scratching paint.
You could easily pull the bed of a pickup and put one of these on, it is common to do it here with double cab units that come with a bed.
Shoot, that load floor is almost low compared to the new monster trucks the D3 are putting out. Make me wonder why the hell people don’t just buy a Peterbuilt tractor and call it done.
But these VWs were very cool and practical vehicles, and the crewcab versions arguably even more so. ‘Course, living in the south these days I’d want corvair, porsche, or subaru power, so I could have decent A/C. But the bay window Type 2’s were awesome, practically indestructible, and still dead simple to keep on the road (except in the rust belt, of course).
I really miss the one I had, it was a good, solid improvement over the old split window model, though I loved owning that one too…
Any VW van with a 2.2 or 2.5 Turbo Subaru is the Über-sleeper.
In Asia, forward control pick ups with fold down sides are everywhere. They also have small rear wheels so said wheels do not intrude into the load bed. Since the tires are small, they are dual wheels. Great work rigs.
Cool find. Only way that could be better is if it were the 1st generation pre-68.
I could see myself driving this. It would certainly do what I need.
I remember the white van with black spots named road cow. Toyota engine made it pretty near indestructible unlike the stock engine. I could see that happening. I just can’t see it enough to spend the money to make it happen.
That truck has a 2293lb. payload, by the way… When I learned of that for my ’71 bus, my jaw dropped…
Much more useful than most of the American trucks for most things with the exception of trailer towing.
In 1974, after we had finished filming/photographing in Morocco, we boarded the ferry from Ceuta to Algeciras. We had a brand new VW Westphalia camper that we had done our best to destroy on the “piste” of Saharan Morocco. Piste is the unpaved desert floor that you run into south of the Atlas mountain range.
Aboard the ferry we met a mechanic from Gibraltar who spent a good amount of time in remote areas of Morocco fixing busted VWs of all descriptions. His machine shop (lathes, mills, and other heavy crap) was housed in a VW van that was truly heavy duty. He said that in order to handle the weight of the machine tools, his VW had planetary reduction units on both rear wheels. The vehicle probably wasn’t good for more that 30 mph tops. He said that he was looking to upgrade to a unit with a MAN diesel. Even back then Mercedes diesels were expensive to purchase and to maintain.
When we disembarked in Algeciras, a member of the Guardia Civil, Franco’s shock troopers, instructed his minions to begin disassembling the interior of our VW. They had taken we three, bearded americano hippies, as drug runners.
However, before we had left Algeciras, we had gone to the American Consulate, described our work (we were filming a documentary on the 800 years of Moorish occupation in Spain), and asked for a letter describing our mission in English, Spanish and French. The Consulate graciously acquiesced, and the next day we had our document. We had not used the doc yet since we didn’t have work permits in either Morocco or Spain (We’re tourists, mon capitan, and yes, we always travel with about $30,000 worth of film and still cameras). But as a swarm of screwdriver-wielding officiales began disassembly our van, I knew it was time to bust out the big gun. I handed the doc to the head of police, and waited for a reaction. I was totally unprepared for what happened next. The Capitan clicked his heels together, and saluted me! He then said that he had no idea that we were on such an important cultural mission. I thought, you have to be shitting me. Is this guy for real? We told him it wasn’t necessary to replace the screws that had been removed, we would take care of that. We just wanted to get the hell out of Dodge. I think we drank a whole lot of sherry that night, and of course, played pinball. Brain hurt the next day.
I think the Frontier/Dacota/Tacoma are the perfect size modern trucks. A 7/8 size 1/2 ton with good V6 towing. The current full size crop is way too big for my needs.
I am glad some one else thinks the new pickups are way too big. I currently have a 2006 GMC Sierra long bed. Dang, that thing is hard to get in a normal size parking spot without backing and filling sometimes. I wish I had kept the 1995 Ford F-150 XL I traded in on the GMC. The F-150 had the 300 six with the 5 speed Mazda transmission and a short bed. The reason I got rid of it was the interior was falling apart and the boss was tired of me b——g about it. It did last 10 years with only a few problems.
I have a red ’90 F150 XLT Lariat, 300 I-6, Mazda 5sp, short bed — great truck, but that transmission does limit towing considerably. And yes, the interior (and parts of the electrical system) is decaying rather badly. At least it has the wide, fold-down center armrest. I’m determined to keep it til I run across the right older truck. Possible a neighbor’s non-running ’68 D-100 with /6 and LoadFlyte, if I can get the right deal…
There’s been a beautiful light green one for sale on trademe here for quite some time. NZ$35,000. It’s as new, and even has a factory canvas canopy. Or for those who like to carry extra crew to help load their pick-ups, how about this crewcab version (is it factory?) that’s on trademe at the moment for NZ$25,500:
Yes, that’s a factory body style. I love those.
That’s gorgeous, utilitarian and very, very cool.
Sentiments like those above are why I drive a small truck. I drove Nissan half tons for years. Never been a fan of the S10. Now I have one. It has a seven foot bed and a pay load capacity of far more than it’s rating.
Turns about 1500rpm at 60mph so gets decent mileage. Already had a fire under the dash that took my speedometer. I put in a tach. Think I’ll just keep it unless I start having problems with the smog inspection again. I am not interested in five years of payments for something “better” when most of the miles are with my wife in our shared car.
The power surge took the air conditioner as well. That has to get fixed (houston summer). If I make it simple enough by stripping out what causes problems and don’t cripple it in the process, I may start adding and wiring anew. That made the station wagon last a long time.
Wish me luck.
My first wife’s father owned a 1964 or 65 crew cab version of this Type 2 though I don’t think they used the term “crew cab”. They were donating a bunch of furniture to us and let us use the Type 2 to haul it from Connecticut to Maryland. When we crossed the Deleware River on I-95, the cross winds were so bad that it actually went up on the two left side wheels. Scared the crap out of me. Once we got to our apartment in Maryland I parked it and never drove it again. Her dad picked it up and drove it home.
Nothing better than a split window transporter. Mines a single cab 58.
I don’t know if I’ve just become more observent recently or if it’s a true trend, but I’ve suddenly started seeing 3rd-gen VW transporters all over. Those were never officially imported to the US, so they’re exceedingly uncommon here. I’m not accustomed to seeing them in the past more often than one every couple of years.
The Quality Care empire also includes a pretty successful lawn/landscaping service.
They used to service Iowa City and Coralville using an entire fleet of 40s/50s Chevys, GMCs, possibly Fords…most of them flatbed dually “tonners” if I remember correctly. I always thought it was kind of a brilliant strategy. Those old trucks were probably fairly cheap to buy, cheap to run, and they were extremely noticeable.
This was well into the 2000s. I think they were finally getting rid of most of them around ’05. Their yard was right off highway 6; 1st St. off of 1st Ave. (1st Ave. Coralville, not 1st Ave. Iowa City!)