OK, I warned you!
I posted somewhere on here about this when it happenned but it illustrates my point about liking "older" trucks.
My wife drives a nice/well-taken-care-of '90 Suburban, 4wd, 6" lift, 35" tires, winch and bumper/mount.
It has 205 K on it but looks and runs good. It is starting to show it's age on the outside though in the last couple of years.
Anyway she takes the kids down to the store, parks, walks to the front entrance and BAM! A guy in a new Scewbachu runs into/under the driver's side. Slightly bent the bottom of the doors and the bottom rear corner of the front fender. Left a lot of silver pain on it. Bent the running-board under and bent-up the pinch weld.
Estimate--almost $1900---money's in the bank.
Cost of repair $5.00

I went to my friendly local wrecking yard and lo-and-behold there's an '87 Suburban with EXACTLY the same running boards on it! Sraight as an arrow and $10 for the pair.
Straighten the pinch weld with a floor jack, vice-grips and a hammer. Bolt on new/used running board and away she goes.
Ganted I have some body damage that NOBODY has noticed once I got the silver paint off. The opening, closing and sealing of the door wasn't effected at all.
I'd gladly let someone do the same thing to the other side for only $1500 as I have a spare running board now.

 

Sounds something like what happened to me. I was about to turn of the the street to work waiting on traffic in my 95 chevy k1500 and I just happend to look in my rearview mirror to see a truck comming. Right when I looked, WAAAMMOOOO, 35mph right in the back. Well, since everything I had on my dash was either in my lap or back seat and seeing his front end in my rear view mirror, I figured mine wasn't going to look pritty.

Well, When I got out and went to the back of my truck, right off I couldn't even tell It was hit, And the front of his 97 dodge was trashed. I finally noticed that my reciver hitch with the large 3 ball attachment was almost on the ground and my frame slightly bent, it wasnt too bad at all. I actually got 2,300 dollars out of it cause of a little dent behind the bumper on the bed and they said they would have to paint the whole bed to match it. Well it cost $400 for the frame repair, 140 for the class 3 reciver hitch (not the cheapo multifit from walmart either) and the acturall 3 ball hitch attachemt was perfect.

So I got a rhino liner,... A real nice heavy full front grill guard,...$160 of led running lights for the running boards and a 4" lift I have yet to install
.
The dodge, well smashed bumper, grill, radiator brackets, AC condenser, right fender, ect. It dang near totaled his truck and the worst part is it look like it was in great shape (till now) and he Had libility only. OUCH (I carry full on both my 93 and 95). He actually drives it with a black fender and hood, no grill/bumper and has a bungie holding the hood down.

The reason he hit me was a factor of things including a bad day
1.arguing on the cell phone
2.Just got fired less than an hour ago
3.Was fighting with his girl friend in the truck
Then
4.She wasn't buckled and her head hit the windshield
5.Found out he Had a near totaled truck with libility only
The reason I know is because He told me and he is friends with several of mine and I even slightly knew him.

I made out on that and didn't even try although I kinda felt bad for the dude it happend to but I guess we all go through hard times. As for my truck, i still have it and you can't tell it was ever even hit.

Hears what it looked like sometime after it hit. I have yet to install the new reciver. This was an off topic thread so I hope posting a chebby wont hurt no fealins

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Lucky I had that hitch on. If you look closly at the right side of the lower bed fender right infront of the bumper, you will see a darker round area. That is the dent that got me my extra $1800. I just choose not to have it fixed. Oh and the guy had the same insurance agent That I had...

 

weeelllll, since we're kind of off topic, my wife has the same kind of luck. been rear ended three times while minding her own business(which really surprised me) now she claims there's an invisible sign hovering around her car that says "hit me, i've got insurance" LOL at least she wasn't hurt beside some minor whiplash in one of them and insurance covered everything. i keep trying and trying to talk her into a 250 diesel, but she hates the size of them. i think it's becasue she's only 5'2" and can't see over the steering wheel. LOL, LOL, LOL. thank goodness she ain't reading this.

speedrdr

 

I was with a buddy in his '88 Chevy 1500 4wd, headed to a tough-truck event. We were stopped waiting for traffic going the other way to clear so we could turn into the parking lot. A guy in an '01 Dodge diesel, ext. cab 2wd rearended us at about 50 miles an hour.
It messed up the frontend of the Dodge enough that it had to be towed, it ran but the fender was pushed back into the tire so steering was pretty much gone. And there was coolant leaking out.
The Chevy was technically totalled but we drove it into the parking lot and then home after the event.
One, or both of us hit the back window with our head(s) hard enough to pop it out and shatter it into the bed.
The weird thing is we didn't want to miss the tough-truck event so we never went to the hospital and neither of us was very sore or anything, even the next day.
His insurance company almost INSISTED we had injuries and we needed examinations but we never did. I don't like insurance companies but I can't bring myself to rip them or anybody else off. They may deserve it but I can't do it.

 

Someone hit me in the side in downtown Little Rock in my dads 01 crewcab Ford Dually, put one little dent in the bed and knocked the back end out from under it, Insurance company said they would have to replace BOTH side body panels and fendors plus the back end, grand total $6000 I paid the Ford dealers bodyshop $600 to put the back end back under and a new driveshaft and leaf springs, bought a NICE steel flatbed just like he had always wanted but couldn't afford for $3800, and he put the rest of the money in his pocket.

 

Again, since we are off topic.....

I (yes it was my fault, but the other driver was doing twice the speed limit at least!) hit a car while backing out of my drive way in the middle of the winter. Ice covering everything!!!! The pickup was an 83 K1500 Chevy. I totally redesigned his Pontiac yet only had a 3" swipe of red paint on my bumper. The cop couldnt believe that I had no damage.

I wish I hadnt sold that rig. It was bulletproof.......

 

First off.....now that I cant see due to the chevy pic. I just saw on a ford truck site........ Well I was driving my old ...uhhh...chevy blazer when a lady pulled out in front of me from my right...shes in a honda something, and I'm going like 25mph. with my foot over the break, (I knew she was gonna) I hit her D.S. front fender, pushed the motor over, broke the rad..the windsheield tank, batt. was leaking..... I had a bent bumper- fixed with a cumalong- a verry small dent behind the bumper,( what dent) a piece of my grill flew off,(due to it was already cracked) got a nice billit aluminium after market grill,,her ins. agent says $1900-I say OK...

 

i knocked over a telephone pole with my 96 f250 after sliding on a patch of ice (my fault) i have full coverage on my truck but i never put in a claim i only claimed the damage to the teliphone poll the bill for that was around $3000







drove it around like this for a while just pulled the bumper out, then i got tired of seeing half a bug deflector so i took that off. someday ill replace it to cover the half dollar size dent in the hood. iv sense straightened the bumper out the rest of the way, you have to realy look to tell that i hit anything let alone that i snapped a telephone poll

 

Wow, Almost everyones accidents happend in a chevy!!! Must be an accident magnet.
I have only hit 2 things in my ford. First I was backing somewhat fast and hit a large round cemet pole holder (no pole luckely) in a parking lot in the dead center with my hitch (same 3 ball hitch I got rear ended with) and shattered that c-ment thing in 3 large pices held toghter with rebar. No damage to truck.

Then One day I was driving around and I had a sever cold and headache. I was in the lowes parkinglot and turned right into a large rock halfway into the ground going probably 10-15mph. Didn't even see it. Front end of the truck shot up, made big bang then the right rear duals hit the rock I just finnished digging up with the front twin I beam and the back end went in the air. It kinda bent my running board but luckly it smaked the main frame rail.At first, I didnt even know what I hit. Oh, they are going to have to fix the shrubs I pulverised as well and put the big rock back in the hole in the little garden. Oh ya, The rock was uninjured

Ummm also, Anyone know what takes bright red coolaid out of carpet?? Used the shampooer and lots of resolve and still has a red tint on the tan carpet. Cat knocked our cups of the table.

 

I saw an infomercial where the SHAMWOW! takes a stain out of ANYTHING!
And if you believe that I have a tune-up kit for your IDI that will give you 200 extra horse power. It's a new set of sparkplugs, a distributor cap and a high-energy coil. Only $299.95 + S&H which is $299.96, most of that is the "handling" part.

You could also try using the cat, if it's nice and fluffy.
Probably won't do anything for the stain but it might make YOU feel better!

 

My truck is all beat up to hell with dents and rusts spots all over. Whats funny about it is that only one of the dents is mine. Was backing into the garage and failed to note where my passenger mirror was, heard a "clunk!" and looked over to see it crooked. spent the next 2 hours fixing it and you couldn't tell anything happened after I was done.

Then some one backed into it starting at the front box side and ended at the side mirror conpletely messed up the ex cab portion (only mint part of the whole truck!!!!!!) . Also had a tree branch fall on it last winter (indirectly responsible for my engine rebuild as well).

Funny thing is I've never been pulled over in that truck. Only one time out in the middle of no where there was a drunk driving check point (felt sorry for the cop actually).

 

Getting even furter off topic.

Hey david85, I checked out your gallery and it seems that you have somewhat an interst in EV transportation. Well after that, I searched EV on ebay motors in title and description and a whole bunch came up. Iv never even heard of such production vehicles expecially by ford and gm. A full sized 1 ton 8,000lb electric van with a 60 mile range was somewhat impressive for 1991. I guess way out here you need way more than 60 mile range to benifit from it though unless theres a plugin everywhere you stop. ( wonder how much fuel it would take new honda generator to charge that set of batteries?? (since they are the quietest and most fuel eficent gas generator out there.) If it would only use a gallon, then that would equal almost 60miles per gallon...IN A VAN. But I guess the first time you change 36 batterys then you spent more than you saved. I wonder how well these deep cycle gell cell batteries would work in it. YOu would think as well as they performed that long ago, Then by 2008 it would have even been better!!!

eBay Motors: GMC (item 180279429937 end time Aug-26-08 15:12:35 PDT)


Dodge/cummins, I thought about using the cat, but...but ... I Just couldn't do it!!! I guess Im weak.

 

Yeah please leave the kitty alone. I like cats

Hey cool find with that van! They'll get a kick out of this on the EV forum.

You are actually the first to comment on that gallery.

The lead acid deep cycle batteries on average last 2-5 years depending on the DOD per cycle (DOD=depth of discharge) and battery quality/maintenance. For best results keep the DOD to 50% or less when dealing with lead acid batteries. If in a pinch you can go further, but ideally one would design a conversion to only be at 50% DOD after your daily commute is complete. 60 miles is typical of a properly done conversion on lead.

The project I'm planing is to use the newer lithium batteries for converting a small, light vehicle. Thinking of a corolla or ranger. I have a sample battery on order direct from the factory in china and if it perforns as claimed, I should be able to plan for a range of at least 150 miles per charge. With lithium, vehicle range is more limited by budget than weight or space. Since the batteries are lighter and more powerful than lead, the car should also move pretty well to. Acceleration should be at least as good as OEM (if the tranny can take it that is).

Disadvantage with the lithium batteries is that they cost more, in fact they will be the single biggest expence. The trade off is that they could last up to 15 years by some estimates. Since the technology is less than 10 years old, no one really knows though. Older lithium ion chemistries have lasted as predicted and beyond in some cases, so I'm hoping the same is true for this new type. If they can last that long and deliver satisfactory performance than the car will be a sound investment since it won't burn fuel anymore, and who knows what gas/diesel will cost in ANOTHER 15 years.

And maybe batteries will be even cheaper later on when it comes time to replace the pack.

 

HEY MAN, I KNOW MY 91 idi COULD USE A GOOD TUNE UP, DO YOU THINK I COULD GET A DISCOUNT ON THEM TUNE UP PARTS ??? U KNOW, CUZ WERE SUCH GOOD PALS AND ALL ????

 

[QUOTE=FORD MEGA CAB!!!;6470426]If it would only use a gallon, then that would equal almost 60miles per gallon...IN A VAN. But I guess the first time you change 36 batterys then you spent more than you saved. I wonder how well these deep cycle gell cell batteries would work in it. YOu would think as well as they performed that long ago, Then by 2008 it would have even been better!!!QUOTE]

Sorry, my head wasn't clear enough to anwer this part of your question earlier.
What you are describing is a series plug-in hybrid.

A charge for a vehicle of that size will be in the $4 range, but exact cost of a charge varries by location and in some cases time of day. In my case I pay about $0.08 per kilowatt hour and this van needs 43.2khw to charge from zero. That costs $3.456 for a complete charge. Divide that by the claimed 60 mile range and the cost per mile is $0.0576 in energy under ideal conditions. Battery replacement cost brings that up, but its still less than paying for fuel.

About running it off a generator, that gets a little more complicated. First, you need to establish what the minimum power requirement is to drive that van at a average cruising speed. A wild guess would be 40Hp, so your generator would have to put out at least that much. If on the other hand you spend a lot of time stuck in traffic, than the average Hp requirement drops because you are not under power as ofter and now its possible to get away with a smaller genset. But its still going to be quite large because overal genset are not very compact relative to the power output.