20k: Custom Dually Wagon: 1972 Ford Country Squire
A few years ago I had this TV that would stick between channels, the image would become a blurred amalgam of two channels, and the consequences could be interesting. Gilligan as Tom Selleck in Magnum’s Private Island was bad enough, but the time National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation got jumbled with Duck Dynasty was amazing, and this is what the bearded Griswold family drove as their family truckster. Find this 1972 Ford Country Squire Custom offered for $22,000 in San Diego, CA via craigslist. Tip from Rob “The Hack Mechanic“.
Starting with a 6th generation Ford LTD platform, the Country Squire was the wood-side equipped wagon version. This Squire has been dropped onto a Ford F250 truck frame and equipped with a dually setup in the rear.
The wood sides are not the original vinyl applique that came from the factory, but a hand painted faux wood paneling that looks surprisingly decent in the photos. Power comes from a 390 cubic inch Ford FE V8 which was probably transplanted from an earlier car because the 402 replaced the 390 in 1971.
See plus sized wagon that doesn’t have a crazy asking price? tips@dailyturismo.com
Hmm. I thought for a moment that Rob "The Hack Mechanic" must be K2's true identity, wordsmith chops and all.
Now I'm not so sure. I'd love to read this, though, as well as the book which K2's was hawking as his own, but don't have any info.
Perhaps I need to share my e-mail via the DT tip line, or…?
ANYway, yes yes that is a sweet wagon, but CP. I think that I could do it for less; it'd be time, not parts, that'd get me under real quick.
Completely different. K2 wants to know anything and everything that people have on their minds, and Rob couldn't give a FF.
TRUE! Although I don't personally know that's accurate about Rob. I haven't been able to lure him into talking to me, which is his prerogative. I can see how you guys would link this post with my wagon infatuation but it twern't me! ESK, I'd be happy to share my book with you! Just shoot El Jefe your email addy (thank you, El Jefe!). If you love wacky movies and particularly Westerns, you're gonna love it.
I wonder why Rob doesn't give a fast forward? ;-D
Rear end is a Dana 44, not a Ford 9 inch. He wants 22K for a vehicle with a boat anchor for a motor and has no clue what rear end it has?
Pass.
Rob wrote/writes a column for the BMW CCA magazine "Roundel". I haven't been a CCA member since I bought my E28 >a decade ago, his articles were the kind that make a mundane topic interesting in the way that car guys tend to do when talking amongst themselves. That sort of writing applied to the topic of the kind of cars that we come to DT to see would be good, I think.
Got a question for you, Neil. I assume there were fees to be a CCA member and that the magazine was included as part of membership. Do you recall what those fees were and would you pay the same to read DT?
Enquiring minds want to know?
I personally wouldn't have paid to start frequenting this site. But…with its hooks buried hilt-deep into my oft daily routine, I'd throw these guys a roll of nickels.
It's an interesting thing to ponder. Either DT goes on because El Jefe just deems it so or there's external impetus for him to encourage him to do so.
As we witness the seeming demise of print media and online content appears to be what will replace it (we'll see), the financial model must also change with the times. Don't believe me regarding the death of print? Check out the photo I took of the newest issue of Car and Driver. The August 2015 issue is about .3 cm and the one from February 1995 is over half a cm thick. The newest issue has 108 pages, the old issue 151. There's barely any room on the new issue's spine to print text.
[img] i.imgur.com/HOjSdD0.jpg?2[/img]
I don't know what the answer is but I do know that if I find sites like DT that I really enjoy and think are worth supporting, I do so. And not just with my crazy, wacky words; I bought a DT shirt. Though it doesn't pay a single bill for El Jefe, at least it's a sign to him that what he and the rest of the crew are doing is valued and not just taken for granted.
The struggle to monetize enthusiasm continues. The real question is; do people value creativity and effort or are those lost elements in our zoned-out, pixelated and hypnotized society?
Only you can decide and the way you do it is with your wallet.
I agree with what you said about not paying initially to read a site like DT, Doc. I don't think anybody would. But, after a while, I think it's worth considering throwing some monetary appreciation their way. It's not like those charities that hit you up all the time on the phone and on every street corner; you know the money is going where you thought it would/should/could…even if that means something as simple as a single beer for El Jefe, that seems like a pretty good thing to do.
I wonder if El Jefe gets money from clicks on the ads? I know I used to with a couple of sites I used to run. The site itself made nothing but I got a small check in the mail from the ad clicks. It was great, even if it didn't really make much money. If so, I'd be happy to start clicking away!
I don't care what the subject is, it's worth noting how hard it is to write compelling copy. Taped to my monitor, there's a quote by one of my favorite authors;
"I am constantly trying to communicate something incommunicable, to explain something inexplicable, to tell about something I only feel in my bones and which can only be experienced in those bones."
The same is true of cars. Once you're past the numerical data, the information is experiential. Forging that into words that capture the essence of the subject is no more or less hard than any other difficult task. That's another reason I want to know what you guys think so much. My world is only so large; I need more data to widen that field of knowledge.
The flexibility and speed of communication is one reason DT is in many ways superior to print media. I worry that the lifespan of such a thing, be it DT or similar sites, is built on too little of a foundation. With print media, there's a machine that must run in some semblance of order or the whole house of cards will collapse. The great thing about online is that those rules can be subverted. But what keeps such a thing going long-term if there's no ability to benefit financially from it? Surely it will fade away at some point, possibly replaced by something similar…?
I suppose another question here is what does the future hold for DT and how can it be steered in a positive direction? I'm sure plenty will say, "It's just a website about cars!" Yes, but what if it was gone tomorrow and you could have changed that outcome by just doing something small today?
youtube.com/watch?v=9Gtc4DHYvc0
It's the mass market car mags that are dead but don't yet know it. In today's ADD, gotta have the latest thing yesterday, 2 to 3 month leads doesn't work when I can blog in almost real time. That being said, the niche stuff like Hemmings Sports and Exotic Car, Grass Roots Motorsport are actually growing their base and probably have healthy ad revenue. There is unique content produced for them and people are willing to pay for it.
Precisely. And that's the market DT targets. So that begs the question; as one of the most active members of DT, would you pay for membership? Maybe it would give you access to special content or features that a non-paying member wouldn't have the ability to see or do?
I don't care about subscriber only content, but I would make a contribution to be a "supporting member". It could come with say a "badge" on my comments and even better – suppress the ads on the site.
402 Chevy wow cool !
402?? Ford never had a 402 – maybe you mean 400? And Anonymous, I don't think that's a 44 either. Since it allegedly came from an F250 and is an 8 lug dually, I'm guessing it's a 60 or larger. F100s came with 44 rear ends for a few years in the 60s but that's about it.
Technically if you are talking about the name — yes, Ford called it the 400, but it did displace 402 cubes.
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Oh Jeez! Leave it to you Ford-Garage Nerds to suck all of the air out of the room on this incredibly STUPID & AWESOME custom. All this things needs is a flamethrower and some pale bald dudes in leather pants to make this rig total Mad Max Fury Road!
I'm with K2 on his analysis concerning the monetary viability of print and the motivation of El Jefe to continue. Not knowing the ins and outs I would speculate that El Jefe is shmart enough to work both sides of the fence. To wit: Build the brand name with clicks of readers in order to sell advertising and provide some sort of revenue stream to lessen any financial and time burden that preparing DT requires. And I'm sure its a hell of a lot of both. That said, I super appreciate the fact DT shows up magically in my in box every day. A tip of my pointed hat to him and the contributors!
Interesting discussion going on here guys – and not about lifted 4wd wagons…
As Vince has alluded to, we do make a few pennies from ad clicks, but certainly not enough to support 5 contributors and their families. Needless to say we all have day jobs.
It's certainly interesting to consider the possibility of DT becoming its own self-supporting entity. Without losing its personality, of course. Feedback and discussion on the topic are always welcome here!
There are lots of ways of offering a "Premium Membership" that wouldn't require making massive changes to DT.
This is a great conversation — and I've purposely stayed out of it because I don't want to crush any ideas or suggestions. As CFlo mentioned, this is a hobby for the writers, but we do make a few nickles here/there on ads and affiliate listings (if you buy a car on ebay after clicking through one of our links, we earn a few bucks — actually, if you buy ANYTHING on ebay after click through one of our ebay links, we make a few bucks). I've been tempted to offer premium membership, but haven't really had the time to scope the changes needed or figure out how to implement. I've also toyed with the idea of a pledge drive (ala PBS or wikipedia) but I think I'd need a good end product (website upgrade, something new? DT videos?) in mind to ask for money — still working on that one. Finally, as CFlo mentions, we are all working schlubs, so this is a hobby — where will it go in the future? Who knows, but I tell you one thing, it's gonna be fun.
I think for say $25 you got "Supporting member" after your user name on comments would be cool. Also turning off the ads would be a good thing if you contributed and became a 'Supporting member".
And the ability to edit comments…
The idea of giving a couple of bucks to be a supporter is an excellent. The three ideas (label, no ads and editing) are also good but I'd think those would require switching off of Blogger, which I'd be surprised if that's a really appealing idea to El Jefe. Still good ideas, though. I the label could be handled by having a special supporting member page which thanks those folks for doing so.
More ideas, in addition to the addition of a "Thank You, Supporters" page:
– Swag package…a shirt, bumper sticker, DT-themed a$$less chaps (okay, maybe not that one)…stuff like that for $50. Yes, you could already do that by just shopping. But this could be themed; the recent LeMons feature could be a great lead-in. And it should be for a limited time and everybody should know about it…but you can only buy it if you're a supporter.
– Special, more timely handling of submissions (over non-supporters…who would still get attention, just after the supporters).
– Email (monthly, maybe?) newsletter for supporters only.
– Supporter's choice features, such as for the Twister and What Is It? The supporter could suggest what car that week's feature could focus on.
Those are just a couple of ideas that could be implemented without too much fuss. Some of them seem like they may be a bit of work but if that means the staff is getting paid to do so…suddenly, it's a lot more fun.
Please DON'T stay out of this conversation, El Jefe. The more you let everybody know about how much work this actually is (and it IS, I don't care what anybody says), the more they'd realize that a little monetary appreciation would be a great thing.
YES, I am shilling for DT; I want it to stick around. For a long time, if possible. And NO, nobody's offered me anything for saying what I think. Just the opposite.
That's a great idea! The more a person donates to DT, the more I shut up! That would be a GREAT way to raise money. Consider this my official offer to be a willing participate in the "Shut K2 Up For A Great Cause" fund-raising campaign.
You won't be able to get rid of me entirely but you'd get some quiet for a short period… 🙂
I have two suggestions:
1) I'll pony up if I don't have to use a blogger login, AND I don't have to pick all the pictures showing sushi every time.
2) K2 could pay by the word and/or post and you all could retire early.
I'm way too poor for that. Good idea, though.
FTB, are you using a Google login? I think maybe you aren't. If you create a Google profile, you'll never have to pick sushi again. I don't anymore.
We could do a reversal of my idea, too; "Talk smack to K2 for a buck to DT". Doesn't that sound like fun? Sort of like a virtual dunk tank…or a roast. I don't mind. Me and this dude hang out all the time.
[img] i.imgur.com/wwcbXqy.jpg?1[/img]
Nah, not using Google login….not that I'm a Colombian national using DT to surreptitiously plan my coup or anything, but I'm not a big fan of big brother knowing all my business.
I really DO wish we had a threaded structure in this forum though….I'd pony up for that too. Replies would be a LOT easier to read (and know who they were directed to), and your "stream of consciousness" posts could be sub-posts under the original to keep the though train straight.
You just need new glasses or lasik surgery.
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