When cost and reliability is no concern, you can do truly crazy things...
> 2.0-liter boxer engine ... 670 horsepower and 680 lb-ft of torque
Those are V10 numbers coming from something the size you'd find in an econo-box.
Obviously unlike your Camry this thing is not going to do 300,000 KMs over its lifetime, and will be rebuilt frequently. This is the extreme end of the engineering tradeoff, and it's interesting to see what happens when the scale tips all the way over.
2 liters is hardly econobox, even without a turbo. A new honda civic sedan is 1.3 liters (NA). 2.0 is more typical for sedans imho. The 2.0 turbo in this biuld originally turned 250+ hp (wrx) which is well beyond econo anything.
That was a big thing with Japanese sports cars in general: proving more cylinders was a dead end and just extra weight. Pretty much all of the big JDM classics of the 90s and 2000s are 4-cyl (aside from Mazda's rotary engine cars) putting down 200-300hp range with favorable power/weight.
I can't think of any from the 90s that weren't 6 cylinders. Nissan 300Z, Nissan Skyline GT-R, Honda/Acura NSX, Toyota Supra, and Mitsubishi 3000GT VR-4 were all 6 cylinders.
The only exceptions I can think of are the Subaru Impreza WRX/STI, and the Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution.
A majority of those made in the ballpark of 150hp or less, with the exception of the S2000. A few variants of the MR2 and the Nissan made over 200, but not many.
None ever came near Japan’s gentlemen’s agreement of “276” hp.
Sure, if you completely disregard the legendary straight sixes from Toyota and Nissan (RB, JZ...). I agree 4 bangers are huge historically in JDM sports cars, but so too is the straight six - the classic Z cars, Supras, GT-Rs...
Heh, very true. These days most new cars have a 1.0-1.5 turbo (or hybrid) rather than a larger 2.0 NA. And even 20 years ago most European cars were around 1.5 or less because of their higher fuel prices and registration taxes.
I'm a bit spoiled with the beefy 2.5 in my Mazda... Though it's still about 480 HP less than this beast ;)
The Ridgeline and Maverick are actually quite large compared to a 90s Ranger. Yes, not everything needs to be as big as a modern half-ton, but everything has shifted towards huge.
Regardless of the capacity, the Ridgeline is not a small truck. There are no small trucks anymore. The Ranger and Colorado are not small trucks, they are mid size. Compare them to the pre-2019 Ranger, and the pre-2011 Colorados and S10s.
Sure, the Maverick is kinda small. But and does fine for most people, but it's not really built like a truck. For some reason, I can't handle this thing, because it's replaced real small trucks. It's just an Escape under the covers, and nobody considers the Escape to be a workhorse. Yet, I can give the Baja a pass, because it was honest in the fact that it's a car with a bit of a utility bed.
All of these trade bed space for seating space, and they're still larger than my stepdad's 1990s-era Sonoma. As a sibling comment pointed out, you can't carry 4x8 sheet goods easily in these.
Wouldn't you need to flag a sheet of plywood in the back of a Maverick? My old '06 Canyon doesn't require that and it's actually a smaller truck than the Maverick.
you’d need to flag a sheet of 4x8 in quite a few of the full sized pickups after you get the extended crew cab which shrinks the bed and makes them more of an SUV than a truck. THeres a platonic ideal of a truck bed holding 2x4 and 4x8 sheets, but it’s more of an ideal sometimes.
The overall problem is that the ratio of vehicle size to carrying capacity has gotten way larger. Small 2-seater pickup trucks could comfortably carry this stuff in the 80s and 90s and were not that much bigger than a sedan. Modern trucks are enormous and can't even carry as much unless you choose options that make them even bigger.
Then compare this to something like a Kei truck and it's really quite pathetic.
They have shorter beds, because of the larger cab, but a 1975 Ram one ton could carry 3500 lbs of payload in the bed, and pull a 11,500lb trailer.
A 2025 one can carry 7500 lbs of payload in the bed, and tow 37,090 lbs (some states require extra permits or licenses for that much)
All modern trucks can carry and tow WAY more than they used to.
and the 1/2 ton ones have dramatically impvoved mileage (the modern 3L diesels do about 29Mpg, and the gas ones turn off cylinders when crusing, and can do 20-25mpg when empty. My older small pickup (old ram Dakota) from the early 2000's got 15-16 on the highway.
Total weight is up, but volume is not, and for most people volume is far more important because they aren't trying to put a full pallet of concrete in the back. The weight capacity of basic 90s and '00s trucks were already enough to fill it solid 3 feet thick of stacked wet treated lumber.
Yeah, but they were 2-seater trucks. Very few people want that these days.
Our truck carries stuff a lot. Bags of feed, bales of hay, etc. But unless you want to stack it unreasonably high, 10 bales is about the limit. For big loads, it has to haul a trailer. If it were only a 2-seater, with a bigger bed, it could carry more, but that would mean that all we wouldn't be able to carry all the stuff that's typically in the back seats for safety or protection from the elements.
>Then compare this to something like a Kei truck and it's really quite pathetic.
I will forever be sad that Canoo was wildly (possibly fraudulently) mismanaged and went bust before they ever built any of their planned pickup trucks:
They were going to be built on the same platform as their vans and the best way to describe them is "Kei truck upsized and uppowered enough to be safe on US roads." They had neat party tricks like a compact bed for daily driving that could expand out to fit full size ply and fold out workbenches on all four sides of the truck.
I'm not even a truck guy and I desperately wanted one of these things. Just such a cool concept.
> They had neat party tricks like a compact bed for daily driving that could expand out to fit full size ply...
Unless I'm missing something this sounds like the bed extenders which I've seen on lots of trucks that allow the tailgate to be used as part of the bed when folded down. I was initially think they might be allowing the passenger compartment to be opened up to temporarily get full bed size but I didn't see anything like that when browsing the page. The closest thing I ever saw to that was on the Subaru Baja (which was far more a sedan than a truck) and given how short the bed was and the the fact that the back window was immobile seemed like it had less hauling utility than a standard hatchback.
Thset is really sad - I'd seen a review of an early model on YouTube and it seemed like a brilliant idea - really hope someone else can make something similar work.
Sure, but who cares? Unless you're a contractor/tradesperson, that's a fairly rare edge case.
I've owned a few pickups over the years, owned my house much of that time, and can probably county the times I've needed to move plywood or other oversized lumber on one hand. Add a second hand for times I've moved long pipes or other oversized stuff that required flagging.
If you’re a contractor or tradesperson, chances are you’re having sheet goods delivered to the job site by a supply house, unless it’s a tiny project/service call.
My electricians have pipe racks on their work vans, but if they’re buying 5,000 feet of 3/4” conduit (10’ sticks), you better believe a box truck will deliver it. If they need 40 feet for a quick service call, that’s what the pipe racks are for.
I agree with you though, the ability to move sheet goods flat in a truck bed is almost completely unnecessary.
If you really want to do this in a 5’ bed pickup, you can get a rack for above the cab and a crossbar with two posts that installs into the topper mounting holes near the tailgate to provide a 4’x8’ plane to carry sheet goods on. Here’s a universal example for $200, a nicer one meant for a specific truck is probably 3-4x more: https://wmastore.com/product/universal-drywall-plywood-mattr...
Currently, towing a travel trailer and hauling filthy camping shit and mountain bikes. So nice to toss wet stanky shit in the bed instead of in the cab. I need the tow capacity either way, so may as well have a useful bed (vs an enclosed SUV).
Previous truck was to haul a race car on a trailer. Same fringe benefits for the camping shit, plus tools and spare parts for the race car (engines sometimes, wheels/tires, etc).
The current model year Santa Cruz and Maverick are roughly the same size as the Tacoma, and the Tacoma is now the same size as a Ford F-150 was in the 90s when the Ford Ranger came out as a successful small pickup and the Tacoma was sized the same as the Ford Ranger. The vehicle size bloat in the last 30 years has been insane.
Agreed, they aren't all huge, but they are all pretty big and the few that aren't huge sacrifice a lot of bed size.
I'm going through this now because I'm looking at upgrading from my ancient 2002 Tacoma Xtracab. Here's compared to 2025 models:
Vehicle Length Bed
---------------------------- -------- -----
2002 Toyota Tacoma (Xtracab) 202.9" 74.5"
2002 Toyota Tacoma (2Dr) 184.4" 74.5"
2025 Maverick 199.8" 54.4"
2025 Honda Ridgeline 210.2" 64.0"
2025 Hyundai Santa Cruz 195.7" 52.1"
2025 Toyota Tacoma Xtracab 213.0" 73.5"
My Tacoma wasn't even the shortest you could buy back then and it's still shorter than half of the "small" trucks you can buy today. And unlike those, my truck has a full 6' bed. A Maverick is shorter than mine, but the bed is also nearly two feet shorter. I honestly don't see the point of a bed that's less than five feet long. At that point, it's just an SUV with a trunk that isn't weather-sealed.
Now, granted, it's not like you get nothing in return. These new vehicles (except the new Tacoma Xtracab) all have four doors and full-sized back seats. I can fit a kid in my jump seats but anyone older than that has a bad time. I'm sure they're safer for everyone in the truck too.
But if you really do want to prioritize bed size and still want a short vehicle, that option is just no longer well supported. I accept that my use case is probably a narrow one:
* Live in a dense city with a lot of parallel parking so don't want a long vehicle.
* Kayak fish a lot so want a long bed I can load a kayak in.
* Can get away with a two-seater because we can use my wife's car when there are passengers.
But it's definitely not as well served as it used to be. I'm probably going to end up with a short-bed Tacoma and rely on a bed extender to keep the kayak safe.
For what it's worth (maybe not much from an internet stranger), I couldn't possibly overstate how much I love my Ridgeline. I love the trunk under the bed, I love how the back seats fold up for extra in-cab cargo space, and I love how the unibody structure and independent rear suspension make it drive like a car. It's comfortable enough that I can use it happily for longer road trips.
I love it so much that when it was stolen on a trip to Montreal a few years ago, I bought the exact same year and model again without even googling other options.
It is a bit longer than I'd prefer--I live in urban Chicago and occasionally do have to forgo a good parking space, but usually those are, like, Honda Civic spaces that a slightly smaller truck wouldn't fit into either.
I didn't seriously consider the Ridgeline because it's, uh, kind of funny looking, but you are making me take another look. Thanks, I'll do some research.
Why get rid of your perfectly fine truck? People would be lining up around the block for your truck. As you say they don’t make them like that anymore. Here in socal there are still 70s-80s era ford and chevy trucks in service. Those old f150s look tiny today. And in major demand even if they aren’t prestine.
The answer is sad. Last year, I destroyed my left ankle when I slipped in a puddle while biking to work. Even after three surgeries and tons of physical therapy, the joint is falling apart. I drive a stick and it hurts every single time I push the clutch pedal in, so I've accepted that I have to move to an automatic.
> People would be lining up around the block for your truck.
You're not lying. I'm the only owner and it's got barely over 100k miles on it. Every few years, I find a note on it from someone asking if I'm interested in selling.
The kids joke that I love that truck more than them.
It has been a really amazing vehicle and I've had a ton of fun in it. But I'd be lying if I didn't say that it would be nice to have, you know, anti-lock brakes and a back-up camera.
Sure, but the OG Brat is a tiny truck by modern US standards. It's like the Miata of trucks.
Even my 01 Forester will look big parked next to the OG Brat. Despite looking diminutive next to most modern vehicles here in Cali... It's super annoying how big ~everything on the road has become.
The Ridgeline is closer to a 1/4 ton like a Tacoma or Ranger. I own one. It's great for what it is, fits my outdoor lifestyle well (towing a small travel trailer, a few mountain bikes, and a large cooler).
The Maverick, Santa Cruz, and the currently-vaporware Slate are much smaller.
I desperately want the Slate[1] truck to success because it completely lacks infotainment. I hate Jeff Bezo's but I hope his funding helps them actually create a product.
We used to travel with folks in the back bed in beach chairs. It was quite comfortable, and you could fit four in a small Toyota truck bed. We would face each other, and talk, and it's was a fun and social way to travel. Six adults in a short bed Toyota, with 2 in the cab.
With just two of us in the back, we'd have the chairs against the cab (like the Brat did). Riding backwards in a vehicle is surprisingly relaxing. You can't see the traffic ahead, so you have absolutely zero interest in where the car is going, how fast, how close, missing exits, etc. You're just cognitively out of that loop. Even as a normal passenger, even if we stay silent, we're all firing off those "back seat driver" neurons a bit.
But riding backwards, where it's all out of sight and out of mind, it's a noticeable reduction in that. On one trip, we're heading to the mountains, my friend and I in back of the truck. Suddenly, the truck is braking very hard. We, of course, have no idea what's happening. I said "Well, this is it, good knowing you." "Yup! You too!".
Obviously nothing happened, but it was a curious incident to say the least.
Definitely not a place to be during a rollover. Same reason they don’t have seats at the rear of cars facing back. Not best place to be when getting rear-ended even though it’s a great place to be as a kid watching traffic and making faces to passers by…
Why not? Jeeps are basically the same when you remove the top. The original Brat had a faux rollbar but you could integrate a real one into a new design.
personally I drive a 2 liter 4 banger as well with a turbo, fastest I've gone so far is 150mph, next car I'm trying to get is a supercharged Lotus Exige in orange
I know if you want speed it's cheap with a Corvette C6
Unless you would be planning to keep it at a race track, you would not want to own a car like this. It would almost certainly be miserable to drive at legal speeds. That 2.0L engine isn't going to make any useful power below 5-6k RPM. Keeping a turbo like that spooled for any meaningful duration is guaranteed to get you pulled over by the police.
It is more than the speed potential. This thing is very likely not capable of running pump gas, and has to be running very rich. The cost per mile, just in fuel, would be insane. Also, good luck passing any sort of emissions controls for road use.
Premade as in have someone built it for you?
Well, the same way they did it. You offer up a load of money to a reputable build shop and come back in about 2-5 years depending on how busy they are.
Nearly impossible. For the same price and effort, you can probably get a high end Porsche 911 or similar which will be way more practical.
The next level up would be to get a modified car from a company that has very strong ties to the manufacturer, such as Ruf with Porsche, Roush or Saleen with Ford Mustangs, etc.
Trust me either of those options will be more than anyone but the 1% top skilled or thrill seeking individuals can handle.
You don’t- without that knowledge you would not know what to pay someone to build and why. It’s also going to be extremely complex and unreliable, and likely not street drivable or street legal.
Step 1: Get ~$250k+ in cash for the initial build.
Step 2: Start learning. If you don't know how to evaluate the work of your builder you may have a few false starts finding someone who can actually do it, which will cost you even more time and money.
Step 3: Learn some more. Owning a vehicle like this is a constant development effort. The work will never be "done" so unless you have a mechanic on retainer you will be working on it constantly.
In short, unless you have like a million dollars to spend on a toy and staff to keep it running you'll have to shoulder at least some of the effort.
The best way with finite money is racecarsdirect or some other similar platform.
Cons are you're getting someone else's project.
Pros are they've already sunk stupid money into it.
You can get great cars on there if you have someone in the know to bounce deals off of.
The best way with infinite money is either some very high end small batch restomod or to even commission one of the large OEMesque motorsport shops to plan and build a one off. Smaller, specialized shops are also an option but the amount of people who're learning on customer vehicles is high and they'll be so hyped to get a large project they'll promise you the moon with entirely good intentions and then fail spectacularly.
Just to quantify it, most "restomods" start at $100K USD.
Decades ago I had a buddy that did something similar with a VW Bug that he did "on the cheap" doing almost all the work himself and things like paint through connections he had, I never talked price on it but it was at least $30K I'd bet and probably more like in the $50Ks, and took around a decade.
Honestly, just learn it like anything else. Understand the basic components of an internal combustion engine (block, crankshaft, rods, pistons, camshafts, cylinder heads, valves, intake and exhaust manifolds), the 4 cycles the engine goes through (intake, compression, power, and exhaust), how fuel delivery and ignition systems work. And then there are tons of resources on tuning and you can get the software for a laptop.
Then there is the building of the engine and understanding clearances for specific applications and RPM's, value train harmonics when thing start getting to crazy high revs like 9500.
Still very learnable but outside the scope of standard engine rebuilt stuff.
It isn't that simple. I've been learning to work on my own car over the last few years. I'm not even doing anything crazy just fixing up an older vehicle and modernising some parts of it (mainly interior).
I had to fix the wiper system. The wiper system you would think it wouldn't matter much whether the parts are aftermarket or not. I was very wrong, parts that even look almost identical may not work properly, due to differences in tolerances.
There is also different revisions of particular parts and it will become obsolete. You can lose an afternoon on the internet just doing that.
Then there is the tools. I've spent about a small fortune on tools. I have 3 torque wrenches, 3 sets of sockets, 3 sets of spanners and loads of weird specialist tools like special pliers. There are many jobs I can't do myself because they needs specialist knowledge to do properly e.g. gearboxes.
You have to be prepared to spend potentially years on it and huge amount of money, even on relatively simple projects.
There is a reason that a lot of guys get into old 4x4 pickups and do those up, because they are a known quantity and parts are readily available.
As someone building a particularly stupid car in a genre almost but not entirely unlike the OP (a turbo LS1-swapped Rover P5), I am not totally making stuff up when I say that this:
> You have to be prepared to spend potentially years on it and huge amount of money, even on relatively simple projects.
is not at all mutually exclusive to this:
> Honestly, just learn it like anything else.
I didn't really know what I was doing when I started my project. I had an idea and the desire to make it happen. I barely knew how to use a MIG to do the fab work, so I got good (enough) at it. I knew nothing about LS engines, so I learned enough about them at each point I needed to know something about them. I only have a vague idea of how I'm going to do the next phase of it; I know that I can figure it out with enough thinking and by making all the mistakes I need to make. I don't know how to TIG, and it'll be really useful if I do, so I am learning how to TIG.
Start somewhere, and the more you do, the more you can do.
> As someone building a particularly stupid car in a genre almost but not entirely unlike the OP (a turbo LS1-swapped Rover P5),
I have no idea why people do this stuff to a nice car like a Rover P5. It isn't my car though.
> Start somewhere, and the more you do, the more you can do.
Obviously. But I had to do a lot of stuff that I wasn't prepared to do far quicker because the previous person who doing this took short cuts. I almost had the dash catch fire because someone did a bodge job on electricals instead of paying £15 for the correct part (a plastic plug).
The point I was making is that you are making it sound far simpler than it actually is. There been a good few weekends that have been sunny and I have honestly felt like I was wasting my time and couldn't face working on it.
I had to fit a new turbo and it took me about 3-4 weeks. Not because it was difficult (actually it one of the easier and nicer jobs IMO), it was sourcing parts around the turbo such as gaskets, copper washer kits and other dumb stuff like that.
There was constant trips to tool shops because I was always missing like a tool, trying to find a fitting/gromit in Halfords (they never have it) or a parts supplier 40 miles away in the sticks. It all adds up in both time and cost.
Now I know roughly who the order from, what I should order from etc. But that is going to be different for almost different manufacturer and worse if the stuff is more niche/custom.
The amount of the projects that get given up, suggest it not that easy.
(I don't know why your comment got flagged. I vouched for it; whatever we might argue about here, I don't think you're out of line in any way.)
I actually feel everything you have said apart from this P5 being "nice" (it was fucked). Like turbo delays - I had that on my other project, and going from "I need a new turbo" to "I have a new turbo and things adjacent to the turbo" took damn near a year by itself. I know how this goes!
So I hope I did not appear to say that it's EASY. I've put in enough hours to know that it's not, and if it was everyone would be doing it anyway. It does in fact take a lot of time, and willingness to learn, and plain old determination, and money. I will say it's something that IS possible, and that I still agree with this:
> Honestly, just learn it like anything else.
But...I suppose we'll know that for sure once I have an actual working car, right? :)
If you're starting from 0 that's probably a decade long commitment before you're able to start to execute a project like this.
There's a youtube series 'project binky' where a pair of professional car tuners rebuild a mini cooper and stuff a Celica engine in it. They already have all the skills, own a shop and all the tools and it still took them years.
similarly, there's a youtube channel called Mighty Car Mods that does builds also and even the ones they "rush" can take months and thousands of work hours from people from multiple disciplines (body repair, paint, electrical work, tuning, etc.). Not cheap at all.
A decade would be very quick. The amount of specialist knowledge that went into every part of this project is crazy.. After a decade's worth of projects I doubt I'd be confident to tackle the steering and suspension design on something like this, let alone all the aero.
I've been working on cars for 20yr, I weld, I have done CAD/CAM/CAE stuff, rebuilt and modified engines, done custom suspension work... there are so many aspects of a project like this that are just completely unknown to me, like I wouldn't even know where to start. Many aspects of this build are not things you can really learn or research on your own.
You can't, unless you a Saudi billionaire. These things are completely custom, are hugely expensive (why they have sponsors all over them) and often they will have work lined up for literally years.
You also wouldn't want one. They cannot be driven on the road really as they aren't legal. They will also break a lot. Generally the more tuned a car is the more maintenance it needs.
If you are interested in cars, you are better getting an older vehicle and somewhere to work on it e.g. a garage and working on it as a hobby at the weekends. You will learn a lot more and can actually enjoy it.
You can have one built; you just call Vermont Sports Car lol.
Yes, price is a major factor.
No, you are completely incorrect on street legality; and way far from the truth lol
The basis of a WRC rally car is that it is indeed street legal; and is required to be driven on the public roads with a proper license plate in between the stages of the rally.
While I agree with your comment about learning more by doing the work yourself, you don't need to be a billionaire to acquire one of these. Yes, they are expensive. A typical pro-level WRC spec WRX STI rally car from Vermont SportsCar goes for about $600k. They are actually very reliable though. And thats a bargain compared to just about any modern hypercar.
Rally cars also must be street legal because they are driven on public roads between stages.
When cost and reliability is no concern, you can do truly crazy things...
> 2.0-liter boxer engine ... 670 horsepower and 680 lb-ft of torque
Those are V10 numbers coming from something the size you'd find in an econo-box.
Obviously unlike your Camry this thing is not going to do 300,000 KMs over its lifetime, and will be rebuilt frequently. This is the extreme end of the engineering tradeoff, and it's interesting to see what happens when the scale tips all the way over.
Crazy thing is those numbers are low enough to actually be more reliable.
We've got locals pushing 1,200+ HP out of K24's in their civics.
People have been building 700hp WRXes (2L boxer) for decades.
BMW had a 1.5L turbo inline-4 that made 1300+ hp (called the M12) used in some F1 cars
Edit- though, its redline was about double this Brat's...
2 liters is hardly econobox, even without a turbo. A new honda civic sedan is 1.3 liters (NA). 2.0 is more typical for sedans imho. The 2.0 turbo in this biuld originally turned 250+ hp (wrx) which is well beyond econo anything.
That was a big thing with Japanese sports cars in general: proving more cylinders was a dead end and just extra weight. Pretty much all of the big JDM classics of the 90s and 2000s are 4-cyl (aside from Mazda's rotary engine cars) putting down 200-300hp range with favorable power/weight.
I can't think of any from the 90s that weren't 6 cylinders. Nissan 300Z, Nissan Skyline GT-R, Honda/Acura NSX, Toyota Supra, and Mitsubishi 3000GT VR-4 were all 6 cylinders.
The only exceptions I can think of are the Subaru Impreza WRX/STI, and the Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution.
Toyota MR2, Honda S2000, Mazda MX-5, Nissan S13/14/15 and 180SX
A majority of those made in the ballpark of 150hp or less, with the exception of the S2000. A few variants of the MR2 and the Nissan made over 200, but not many.
None ever came near Japan’s gentlemen’s agreement of “276” hp.
Sure, if you completely disregard the legendary straight sixes from Toyota and Nissan (RB, JZ...). I agree 4 bangers are huge historically in JDM sports cars, but so too is the straight six - the classic Z cars, Supras, GT-Rs...
And restrained power figures due to the 'gentlemen's agreement' they had in Japan.
Yeah except the LS engine is still lighter than most 4 cylinder turbos. It's lighter than a lot of NA 4 cylinders, in fact.
The reason they stayed with smaller engines in Japan was because of taxes on displacement.
Heh, very true. These days most new cars have a 1.0-1.5 turbo (or hybrid) rather than a larger 2.0 NA. And even 20 years ago most European cars were around 1.5 or less because of their higher fuel prices and registration taxes.
I'm a bit spoiled with the beefy 2.5 in my Mazda... Though it's still about 480 HP less than this beast ;)
You should look into what they were building for group B rally 40 years ago. Absolute monsters.
Here is a pretty recent and in depth video by Larry Chen of the Subaru WRX STI Project Midnight car built by the same company.
For those who are underestimating just how advanced Vermont Sports Car is, this should open up your eyes.
https://youtu.be/5GklA8AXQvU?si=9pZwanLVpbVw_cWq
I would like to see a comparison between this and a Lancia Stratos.. They somehow share the same vibe
Can we just bring back the Brat? A compact 4wd pickup truck with a pair of jump seats in the bed.
Pickup trucks are great, but they're only available in "behemoth" size in the US.
> Pickup trucks are great, but they're only available in "behemoth" size in the US.
Not all trucks are 1/4 or 1/2 ton in the USA.
There's things like the Honda Ridgeline, Hyundai Santa Cruze, and the Ford Maverick
Subaru had the Baja for a little white but they only sold a couple thousand per year.
The Ridgeline and Maverick are actually quite large compared to a 90s Ranger. Yes, not everything needs to be as big as a modern half-ton, but everything has shifted towards huge.
Regardless of the capacity, the Ridgeline is not a small truck. There are no small trucks anymore. The Ranger and Colorado are not small trucks, they are mid size. Compare them to the pre-2019 Ranger, and the pre-2011 Colorados and S10s.
Sure, the Maverick is kinda small. But and does fine for most people, but it's not really built like a truck. For some reason, I can't handle this thing, because it's replaced real small trucks. It's just an Escape under the covers, and nobody considers the Escape to be a workhorse. Yet, I can give the Baja a pass, because it was honest in the fact that it's a car with a bit of a utility bed.
All of these trade bed space for seating space, and they're still larger than my stepdad's 1990s-era Sonoma. As a sibling comment pointed out, you can't carry 4x8 sheet goods easily in these.
Wouldn't you need to flag a sheet of plywood in the back of a Maverick? My old '06 Canyon doesn't require that and it's actually a smaller truck than the Maverick.
you’d need to flag a sheet of 4x8 in quite a few of the full sized pickups after you get the extended crew cab which shrinks the bed and makes them more of an SUV than a truck. THeres a platonic ideal of a truck bed holding 2x4 and 4x8 sheets, but it’s more of an ideal sometimes.
The overall problem is that the ratio of vehicle size to carrying capacity has gotten way larger. Small 2-seater pickup trucks could comfortably carry this stuff in the 80s and 90s and were not that much bigger than a sedan. Modern trucks are enormous and can't even carry as much unless you choose options that make them even bigger.
Then compare this to something like a Kei truck and it's really quite pathetic.
They have shorter beds, because of the larger cab, but a 1975 Ram one ton could carry 3500 lbs of payload in the bed, and pull a 11,500lb trailer.
A 2025 one can carry 7500 lbs of payload in the bed, and tow 37,090 lbs (some states require extra permits or licenses for that much)
All modern trucks can carry and tow WAY more than they used to.
and the 1/2 ton ones have dramatically impvoved mileage (the modern 3L diesels do about 29Mpg, and the gas ones turn off cylinders when crusing, and can do 20-25mpg when empty. My older small pickup (old ram Dakota) from the early 2000's got 15-16 on the highway.
Total weight is up, but volume is not, and for most people volume is far more important because they aren't trying to put a full pallet of concrete in the back. The weight capacity of basic 90s and '00s trucks were already enough to fill it solid 3 feet thick of stacked wet treated lumber.
Yeah, but they were 2-seater trucks. Very few people want that these days.
Our truck carries stuff a lot. Bags of feed, bales of hay, etc. But unless you want to stack it unreasonably high, 10 bales is about the limit. For big loads, it has to haul a trailer. If it were only a 2-seater, with a bigger bed, it could carry more, but that would mean that all we wouldn't be able to carry all the stuff that's typically in the back seats for safety or protection from the elements.
Like everything, it's a tradeoff.
>Then compare this to something like a Kei truck and it's really quite pathetic.
I will forever be sad that Canoo was wildly (possibly fraudulently) mismanaged and went bust before they ever built any of their planned pickup trucks:
https://cars.usnews.com/cars-trucks/features/canoo-pickup-tr...
They were going to be built on the same platform as their vans and the best way to describe them is "Kei truck upsized and uppowered enough to be safe on US roads." They had neat party tricks like a compact bed for daily driving that could expand out to fit full size ply and fold out workbenches on all four sides of the truck.
I'm not even a truck guy and I desperately wanted one of these things. Just such a cool concept.
> They had neat party tricks like a compact bed for daily driving that could expand out to fit full size ply...
Unless I'm missing something this sounds like the bed extenders which I've seen on lots of trucks that allow the tailgate to be used as part of the bed when folded down. I was initially think they might be allowing the passenger compartment to be opened up to temporarily get full bed size but I didn't see anything like that when browsing the page. The closest thing I ever saw to that was on the Subaru Baja (which was far more a sedan than a truck) and given how short the bed was and the the fact that the back window was immobile seemed like it had less hauling utility than a standard hatchback.
Thset is really sad - I'd seen a review of an early model on YouTube and it seemed like a brilliant idea - really hope someone else can make something similar work.
Sure, but who cares? Unless you're a contractor/tradesperson, that's a fairly rare edge case.
I've owned a few pickups over the years, owned my house much of that time, and can probably county the times I've needed to move plywood or other oversized lumber on one hand. Add a second hand for times I've moved long pipes or other oversized stuff that required flagging.
If you’re a contractor or tradesperson, chances are you’re having sheet goods delivered to the job site by a supply house, unless it’s a tiny project/service call.
My electricians have pipe racks on their work vans, but if they’re buying 5,000 feet of 3/4” conduit (10’ sticks), you better believe a box truck will deliver it. If they need 40 feet for a quick service call, that’s what the pipe racks are for.
I agree with you though, the ability to move sheet goods flat in a truck bed is almost completely unnecessary.
If you really want to do this in a 5’ bed pickup, you can get a rack for above the cab and a crossbar with two posts that installs into the topper mounting holes near the tailgate to provide a 4’x8’ plane to carry sheet goods on. Here’s a universal example for $200, a nicer one meant for a specific truck is probably 3-4x more: https://wmastore.com/product/universal-drywall-plywood-mattr...
So then what the heck did you have a pickup for if you're not moving around large items?
Currently, towing a travel trailer and hauling filthy camping shit and mountain bikes. So nice to toss wet stanky shit in the bed instead of in the cab. I need the tow capacity either way, so may as well have a useful bed (vs an enclosed SUV).
Previous truck was to haul a race car on a trailer. Same fringe benefits for the camping shit, plus tools and spare parts for the race car (engines sometimes, wheels/tires, etc).
The current model year Santa Cruz and Maverick are roughly the same size as the Tacoma, and the Tacoma is now the same size as a Ford F-150 was in the 90s when the Ford Ranger came out as a successful small pickup and the Tacoma was sized the same as the Ford Ranger. The vehicle size bloat in the last 30 years has been insane.
Agreed, they aren't all huge, but they are all pretty big and the few that aren't huge sacrifice a lot of bed size.
I'm going through this now because I'm looking at upgrading from my ancient 2002 Tacoma Xtracab. Here's compared to 2025 models:
My Tacoma wasn't even the shortest you could buy back then and it's still shorter than half of the "small" trucks you can buy today. And unlike those, my truck has a full 6' bed. A Maverick is shorter than mine, but the bed is also nearly two feet shorter. I honestly don't see the point of a bed that's less than five feet long. At that point, it's just an SUV with a trunk that isn't weather-sealed.Now, granted, it's not like you get nothing in return. These new vehicles (except the new Tacoma Xtracab) all have four doors and full-sized back seats. I can fit a kid in my jump seats but anyone older than that has a bad time. I'm sure they're safer for everyone in the truck too.
But if you really do want to prioritize bed size and still want a short vehicle, that option is just no longer well supported. I accept that my use case is probably a narrow one:
* Live in a dense city with a lot of parallel parking so don't want a long vehicle.
* Kayak fish a lot so want a long bed I can load a kayak in.
* Can get away with a two-seater because we can use my wife's car when there are passengers.
But it's definitely not as well served as it used to be. I'm probably going to end up with a short-bed Tacoma and rely on a bed extender to keep the kayak safe.
For what it's worth (maybe not much from an internet stranger), I couldn't possibly overstate how much I love my Ridgeline. I love the trunk under the bed, I love how the back seats fold up for extra in-cab cargo space, and I love how the unibody structure and independent rear suspension make it drive like a car. It's comfortable enough that I can use it happily for longer road trips.
I love it so much that when it was stolen on a trip to Montreal a few years ago, I bought the exact same year and model again without even googling other options.
It is a bit longer than I'd prefer--I live in urban Chicago and occasionally do have to forgo a good parking space, but usually those are, like, Honda Civic spaces that a slightly smaller truck wouldn't fit into either.
I didn't seriously consider the Ridgeline because it's, uh, kind of funny looking, but you are making me take another look. Thanks, I'll do some research.
Why get rid of your perfectly fine truck? People would be lining up around the block for your truck. As you say they don’t make them like that anymore. Here in socal there are still 70s-80s era ford and chevy trucks in service. Those old f150s look tiny today. And in major demand even if they aren’t prestine.
The answer is sad. Last year, I destroyed my left ankle when I slipped in a puddle while biking to work. Even after three surgeries and tons of physical therapy, the joint is falling apart. I drive a stick and it hurts every single time I push the clutch pedal in, so I've accepted that I have to move to an automatic.
> People would be lining up around the block for your truck.
You're not lying. I'm the only owner and it's got barely over 100k miles on it. Every few years, I find a note on it from someone asking if I'm interested in selling.
The kids joke that I love that truck more than them.
It has been a really amazing vehicle and I've had a ton of fun in it. But I'd be lying if I didn't say that it would be nice to have, you know, anti-lock brakes and a back-up camera.
Sure, but the OG Brat is a tiny truck by modern US standards. It's like the Miata of trucks.
Even my 01 Forester will look big parked next to the OG Brat. Despite looking diminutive next to most modern vehicles here in Cali... It's super annoying how big ~everything on the road has become.
The Ridgeline is closer to a 1/4 ton like a Tacoma or Ranger. I own one. It's great for what it is, fits my outdoor lifestyle well (towing a small travel trailer, a few mountain bikes, and a large cooler).
The Maverick, Santa Cruz, and the currently-vaporware Slate are much smaller.
Something like that:
https://www.telotrucks.com/
If they ever build it I might buy one. Heavily depends on if it has an always on mobile connection and the car is full or screens and stupid garbage.
I desperately want the Slate[1] truck to success because it completely lacks infotainment. I hate Jeff Bezo's but I hope his funding helps them actually create a product.
[1]https://www.slate.auto/en
I got my eye on the Slate - https://www.slate.auto/
It answers the question, what if Framework made cars?
The roof rack is the new small pickup for US market. Put a good roof rack on your Subaru Outback and call it a day.
https://sherpaec.com/products/olympus (no affiliation)
Blame the chicken tax. Ruining small trucks in America for decades.
You can’t have passengers in jump seats like it’s 1970 anymore —unless you’re on your own ranch somewhere.
We used to travel with folks in the back bed in beach chairs. It was quite comfortable, and you could fit four in a small Toyota truck bed. We would face each other, and talk, and it's was a fun and social way to travel. Six adults in a short bed Toyota, with 2 in the cab.
With just two of us in the back, we'd have the chairs against the cab (like the Brat did). Riding backwards in a vehicle is surprisingly relaxing. You can't see the traffic ahead, so you have absolutely zero interest in where the car is going, how fast, how close, missing exits, etc. You're just cognitively out of that loop. Even as a normal passenger, even if we stay silent, we're all firing off those "back seat driver" neurons a bit.
But riding backwards, where it's all out of sight and out of mind, it's a noticeable reduction in that. On one trip, we're heading to the mountains, my friend and I in back of the truck. Suddenly, the truck is braking very hard. We, of course, have no idea what's happening. I said "Well, this is it, good knowing you." "Yup! You too!".
Obviously nothing happened, but it was a curious incident to say the least.
Definitely not a place to be during a rollover. Same reason they don’t have seats at the rear of cars facing back. Not best place to be when getting rear-ended even though it’s a great place to be as a kid watching traffic and making faces to passers by…
The Tesla Model S has an optional third row that faces backwards.
Why not? Jeeps are basically the same when you remove the top. The original Brat had a faux rollbar but you could integrate a real one into a new design.
not a fan of the design but for rally I like the stratos or a Focus hatchback/Volkswagen style
active aero seems silly on a truck-design but ehh
regarding cars I did enjoy this video (comparing C8, GT3, GTD)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nw7tDXLyLVo
admittedly not much of a track guy currently
personally I drive a 2 liter 4 banger as well with a turbo, fastest I've gone so far is 150mph, next car I'm trying to get is a supercharged Lotus Exige in orange
I know if you want speed it's cheap with a Corvette C6
Looks amazing. How does someone with no car tuning / mechanics skills get something like this premade?
Unless you would be planning to keep it at a race track, you would not want to own a car like this. It would almost certainly be miserable to drive at legal speeds. That 2.0L engine isn't going to make any useful power below 5-6k RPM. Keeping a turbo like that spooled for any meaningful duration is guaranteed to get you pulled over by the police.
It is more than the speed potential. This thing is very likely not capable of running pump gas, and has to be running very rich. The cost per mile, just in fuel, would be insane. Also, good luck passing any sort of emissions controls for road use.
this vehicle has no interior to speak of, and no lighting to see at night (inside or out)
It has no cats, no EGR system, sequential trans etc etc.
To original OP of this question, this is closer to a racing speedboat than a race car. More expensive to own than a yacht assuming you want to run it
Premade as in have someone built it for you? Well, the same way they did it. You offer up a load of money to a reputable build shop and come back in about 2-5 years depending on how busy they are.
Nearly impossible. For the same price and effort, you can probably get a high end Porsche 911 or similar which will be way more practical.
The next level up would be to get a modified car from a company that has very strong ties to the manufacturer, such as Ruf with Porsche, Roush or Saleen with Ford Mustangs, etc.
Trust me either of those options will be more than anyone but the 1% top skilled or thrill seeking individuals can handle.
Vermont Sports Car.
They build all the fast Subarus for everyone; Travis Prastana, Bucky Lasik, Ken Block, Lia Block.
The Huckster, the Project Midnight; all them too.
https://vtcar.com/
You don’t- without that knowledge you would not know what to pay someone to build and why. It’s also going to be extremely complex and unreliable, and likely not street drivable or street legal.
Step 1: Get ~$250k+ in cash for the initial build.
Step 2: Start learning. If you don't know how to evaluate the work of your builder you may have a few false starts finding someone who can actually do it, which will cost you even more time and money.
Step 3: Learn some more. Owning a vehicle like this is a constant development effort. The work will never be "done" so unless you have a mechanic on retainer you will be working on it constantly.
In short, unless you have like a million dollars to spend on a toy and staff to keep it running you'll have to shoulder at least some of the effort.
The best way with finite money is racecarsdirect or some other similar platform.
Cons are you're getting someone else's project.
Pros are they've already sunk stupid money into it.
You can get great cars on there if you have someone in the know to bounce deals off of.
The best way with infinite money is either some very high end small batch restomod or to even commission one of the large OEMesque motorsport shops to plan and build a one off. Smaller, specialized shops are also an option but the amount of people who're learning on customer vehicles is high and they'll be so hyped to get a large project they'll promise you the moon with entirely good intentions and then fail spectacularly.
> someone with no car tuning / mechanics skills
I'm just going to pull the band-aid off, you're probably not the target audience for a drag-race sleeper rig.
Just crapping on GP's dreams!
If he wants to believe he's the target demo for a car that would immediately put him into a wall, let him!
Money, lots of money.
Just to quantify it, most "restomods" start at $100K USD.
Decades ago I had a buddy that did something similar with a VW Bug that he did "on the cheap" doing almost all the work himself and things like paint through connections he had, I never talked price on it but it was at least $30K I'd bet and probably more like in the $50Ks, and took around a decade.
Buy a hooligan car new (or very lightly used) like a WRX STI, or Lancer EVO.
Honestly, just learn it like anything else. Understand the basic components of an internal combustion engine (block, crankshaft, rods, pistons, camshafts, cylinder heads, valves, intake and exhaust manifolds), the 4 cycles the engine goes through (intake, compression, power, and exhaust), how fuel delivery and ignition systems work. And then there are tons of resources on tuning and you can get the software for a laptop.
Then there is the building of the engine and understanding clearances for specific applications and RPM's, value train harmonics when thing start getting to crazy high revs like 9500.
Still very learnable but outside the scope of standard engine rebuilt stuff.
It isn't that simple. I've been learning to work on my own car over the last few years. I'm not even doing anything crazy just fixing up an older vehicle and modernising some parts of it (mainly interior).
I had to fix the wiper system. The wiper system you would think it wouldn't matter much whether the parts are aftermarket or not. I was very wrong, parts that even look almost identical may not work properly, due to differences in tolerances.
There is also different revisions of particular parts and it will become obsolete. You can lose an afternoon on the internet just doing that.
Then there is the tools. I've spent about a small fortune on tools. I have 3 torque wrenches, 3 sets of sockets, 3 sets of spanners and loads of weird specialist tools like special pliers. There are many jobs I can't do myself because they needs specialist knowledge to do properly e.g. gearboxes.
You have to be prepared to spend potentially years on it and huge amount of money, even on relatively simple projects.
There is a reason that a lot of guys get into old 4x4 pickups and do those up, because they are a known quantity and parts are readily available.
As someone building a particularly stupid car in a genre almost but not entirely unlike the OP (a turbo LS1-swapped Rover P5), I am not totally making stuff up when I say that this:
> You have to be prepared to spend potentially years on it and huge amount of money, even on relatively simple projects.
is not at all mutually exclusive to this:
> Honestly, just learn it like anything else.
I didn't really know what I was doing when I started my project. I had an idea and the desire to make it happen. I barely knew how to use a MIG to do the fab work, so I got good (enough) at it. I knew nothing about LS engines, so I learned enough about them at each point I needed to know something about them. I only have a vague idea of how I'm going to do the next phase of it; I know that I can figure it out with enough thinking and by making all the mistakes I need to make. I don't know how to TIG, and it'll be really useful if I do, so I am learning how to TIG.
Start somewhere, and the more you do, the more you can do.
> As someone building a particularly stupid car in a genre almost but not entirely unlike the OP (a turbo LS1-swapped Rover P5),
I have no idea why people do this stuff to a nice car like a Rover P5. It isn't my car though.
> Start somewhere, and the more you do, the more you can do.
Obviously. But I had to do a lot of stuff that I wasn't prepared to do far quicker because the previous person who doing this took short cuts. I almost had the dash catch fire because someone did a bodge job on electricals instead of paying £15 for the correct part (a plastic plug).
The point I was making is that you are making it sound far simpler than it actually is. There been a good few weekends that have been sunny and I have honestly felt like I was wasting my time and couldn't face working on it.
I had to fit a new turbo and it took me about 3-4 weeks. Not because it was difficult (actually it one of the easier and nicer jobs IMO), it was sourcing parts around the turbo such as gaskets, copper washer kits and other dumb stuff like that.
There was constant trips to tool shops because I was always missing like a tool, trying to find a fitting/gromit in Halfords (they never have it) or a parts supplier 40 miles away in the sticks. It all adds up in both time and cost.
Now I know roughly who the order from, what I should order from etc. But that is going to be different for almost different manufacturer and worse if the stuff is more niche/custom.
The amount of the projects that get given up, suggest it not that easy.
(I don't know why your comment got flagged. I vouched for it; whatever we might argue about here, I don't think you're out of line in any way.)
I actually feel everything you have said apart from this P5 being "nice" (it was fucked). Like turbo delays - I had that on my other project, and going from "I need a new turbo" to "I have a new turbo and things adjacent to the turbo" took damn near a year by itself. I know how this goes!
So I hope I did not appear to say that it's EASY. I've put in enough hours to know that it's not, and if it was everyone would be doing it anyway. It does in fact take a lot of time, and willingness to learn, and plain old determination, and money. I will say it's something that IS possible, and that I still agree with this:
> Honestly, just learn it like anything else.
But...I suppose we'll know that for sure once I have an actual working car, right? :)
>Honestly, just learn it like anything else.
If you're starting from 0 that's probably a decade long commitment before you're able to start to execute a project like this. There's a youtube series 'project binky' where a pair of professional car tuners rebuild a mini cooper and stuff a Celica engine in it. They already have all the skills, own a shop and all the tools and it still took them years.
similarly, there's a youtube channel called Mighty Car Mods that does builds also and even the ones they "rush" can take months and thousands of work hours from people from multiple disciplines (body repair, paint, electrical work, tuning, etc.). Not cheap at all.
A decade would be very quick. The amount of specialist knowledge that went into every part of this project is crazy.. After a decade's worth of projects I doubt I'd be confident to tackle the steering and suspension design on something like this, let alone all the aero.
I've been working on cars for 20yr, I weld, I have done CAD/CAM/CAE stuff, rebuilt and modified engines, done custom suspension work... there are so many aspects of a project like this that are just completely unknown to me, like I wouldn't even know where to start. Many aspects of this build are not things you can really learn or research on your own.
You can't, unless you a Saudi billionaire. These things are completely custom, are hugely expensive (why they have sponsors all over them) and often they will have work lined up for literally years.
You also wouldn't want one. They cannot be driven on the road really as they aren't legal. They will also break a lot. Generally the more tuned a car is the more maintenance it needs.
If you are interested in cars, you are better getting an older vehicle and somewhere to work on it e.g. a garage and working on it as a hobby at the weekends. You will learn a lot more and can actually enjoy it.
You can have one built; you just call Vermont Sports Car lol.
Yes, price is a major factor.
No, you are completely incorrect on street legality; and way far from the truth lol
The basis of a WRC rally car is that it is indeed street legal; and is required to be driven on the public roads with a proper license plate in between the stages of the rally.
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While I agree with your comment about learning more by doing the work yourself, you don't need to be a billionaire to acquire one of these. Yes, they are expensive. A typical pro-level WRC spec WRX STI rally car from Vermont SportsCar goes for about $600k. They are actually very reliable though. And thats a bargain compared to just about any modern hypercar.
Rally cars also must be street legal because they are driven on public roads between stages.
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Waiting for my Honda Goldwing powered hybrid with 4-wheel hub motors in a Vanagon Syncro chassis.
Holy crap. Ken Block died????
Snowmobile accident, rolled over on a hill and it squished him.
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