Should a part-timer step up to a full-size truck?

Originally Posted by Mudlucky

I've found my Ford E350 cargo van more valuable than our Dodge Dakota. And, you can pick up a used one fairly inexpensively. It can carry more weight, it covered for privacy and gets a heck of a lot better gas mileage. Only down side is it is "short" and you can't stand upright in it. But the space and cargo weight is worth the inconvenience of a short height.

I'm looking to stay with a pickup though, primarily for 2 reasons:



1) Since I live in the Northeast where winters can be extremely harsh, cold, and snowy, having 4WD is a GODSEND, especially since I live in a hilly area and have seen people without it unable to make it up even the slightest of inclines in my neighborhood in a snowstorm. It's a LOT easier to get 4WD in a pickup than it is to get 4/AWD in a van, GM to my knowledge is the only automaker that offers AWD in a full-size van from the factory but that was 10-20 years ago and maybe others do now (I don't buy brand new though due to the cost, rapid depreciation in first 3 years and, since I haul crap I don't wanna go singing the blues when that brand new truck gets an accidental dent/scratch in it). I've driven/been a passenger in a 2WD truck and van and the experience not only sucked but at times was downright scary. Although after the past two winters which hammered the region with unrelenting bitter cold and snow, I'm looking to move to Florida within the next year as, after 31 years of dealing with Northeast winters, my tolerance for the cold has diminished to almost nothing. On the other hand, in Florida I wouldn't bother with the added expense (vehicle price and fuel penalty) of 4WD since I won't have the threat of heavy snowfall that was constant for a two-month period this year and last (1-2 storms a week on average).

2) Just my luck a lot of stuff I get tends to have "creepy crawlers" on/in it. Case in point I gutted a couple of discarded CRT TV's/monitors that were thrown out in the neighborhood trash about 2 months ago and two of them had become colonies for earwigs. At least in a pickup they won't be able to get near you or anyone else riding with you, in a van they have free-run of the place. Not only that but if you pick up something stinky you won't have to smell it, as a buddy of mine found out one time when one of his friends in demolition got him a piece of heavy cast-iron pipe from a job he did. Transporting it in an enclosed vehicle, the thing gave off a foul-smell, his buddy later told him why: it was an old piece of sewer pipe.

Originally Posted by JunkmanDan

I'm looking to stay with a pickup though, primarily for 2 reasons:

1) Since I live in the Northeast where winters can be extremely harsh, cold, and snowy, having 4WD is a GODSEND, especially since I live in a hilly area and have seen people without it unable to make it up even the slightest of inclines in my neighborhood in a snowstorm. It's a LOT easier to get 4WD in a pickup than it is to get 4/AWD in a van, GM to my knowledge is the only automaker that offers AWD in a full-size van from the factory but that was 10-20 years ago and maybe others do now (I don't buy brand new though due to the cost, rapid depreciation in first 3 years and, since I haul crap I don't wanna go singing the blues when that brand new truck gets an accidental dent/scratch in it). I've driven/been a passenger in a 2WD truck and van and the experience not only sucked but at times was downright scary. Although after the past two winters which hammered the region with unrelenting bitter cold and snow, I'm looking to move to Florida within the next year as, after 31 years of dealing with Northeast winters, my tolerance for the cold has diminished to almost nothing. On the other hand, in Florida I wouldn't bother with the added expense (vehicle price and fuel penalty) of 4WD since I won't have the threat of heavy snowfall that was constant for a two-month period this year and last (1-2 storms a week on average).

2) Just my luck a lot of stuff I get tends to have "creepy crawlers" on/in it. Case in point I gutted a couple of discarded CRT TV's/monitors that were thrown out in the neighborhood trash about 2 months ago and two of them had become colonies for earwigs. At least in a pickup they won't be able to get near you or anyone else riding with you, in a van they have free-run of the place. Not only that but if you pick up something stinky you won't have to smell it, as a buddy of mine found out one time when one of his friends in demolition got him a piece of heavy cast-iron pipe from a job he did. Transporting it in an enclosed vehicle, the thing gave off a foul-smell, his buddy later told him why: it was an old piece of sewer pipe.

Did you have a particular part of Florida you were considering heading to or did you just spin a globe and the finger landed on Florida? I live in the Tampa Bay area and have made life here since 1980. Being from NY, you would enjoy the fact there is no state income tax... and the much less restrictive gun laws.