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A Toyota Confessional: Only When You Beat On Them Do You Understand · BREAK/FIX the Motorsports & Vehicle Enthusiast Variety Show

0:00
John Summers is the motoring historian.
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He was a company car thrashing technology sales rep that turned into
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a fairly inept sports bike rider.
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Hailing from California, he collects cars and bikes built with plenty of
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cheap and fast, and not much reliable.
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On his show, he gets together with various co hosts to talk about new
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and old cars, driving, motorbikes, motor racing, and motoring travel.
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Good day, good morning, good afternoon.
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It is John Summers, the motoring historian.
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Rather than saving this particular topic up for, for an episode, I thought, you
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know what, I'll just lay this, uh, lay this down real quickly because, uh, this
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already took place a couple of weeks ago and I'm in danger of sort of forgetting.
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The, uh, the wrinkles of, uh, of the process that led me up to this rather
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unusual situation of me buying a Toyota, um, yeah, there, I said it,
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it's, it's, I almost can't get it out.
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I mean, a few years ago when, when Toyota lost Le Mans, um, on the very last lap
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after 24 hours of racing, and it would have been their first time winning
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and, you know, I, I was blown away.
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Please for Porsche.
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You know, I, I'm not a Toyota fan.
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I, I respected them from the time that I visited the town in, uh, in Japan.
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And I'll talk more about that in, in a moment, but my God,
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yeah, I bought a Toyota Tundra.
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Um, yeah, I, I feel it's like a confessional, right?
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And this is why this piece has to be like, uh, uh, a standalone.
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Um, for the longest time I was looking at Rams.
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Um, I've always had a thing about rams because you know, what I've, what I always
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do and what I have to step away from when I'm making a sensible purchase like
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this is I always go to the nth degree, you know, I don't buy a sports bike.
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It has to be the leader sports bike.
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I don't buy a leader sports bike.
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That's in good condition.
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No, no, I'll buy the cheapest, most wrecked one.
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I can possibly find, you know, that that's the, the uh, The way that I,
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I seem to have done things, certainly since I came to the States because of
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the whole thing of no MOT, so you can get away with with ancillaries, you
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know, cars on cars, things like wipers and things like that not working.
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I mean, for American audience in Britain, any switches that
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the car has on the dashboard.
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And they have to work.
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So if it has spotlights, it doesn't matter if the if as a switch for spotlights,
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even if it has the spotlights taken out of it, that's still an MOT fail.
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And that means you can't register the car and use it that year.
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So, um, yeah, so we're here in here in California.
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We have like.
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You know, smog, right?
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So it has to pass emissions if it's older than a 1975.
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But, you know, we, there are, are, you know, all that means is you have to,
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you, you kind of hot rotted it, right?
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That that's not a test of how good the lights are or the brakes are, or whether
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or not the windshield's got a massive.
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Cracking it as our Mercedes has got at the moment.
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So, you know, it really is.
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Pardon me.
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It really is the land of the free.
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And I realized that when I, when I first came here, it's not a coincidence
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that, you know, California is where they invented the hot rod and the hot rod is
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a vehicle that doesn't have mud guards.
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Because, you know, it doesn't rain.
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So why would you need it?
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You're not driving through mud.
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It's not splashing up on you.
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It doesn't have windscreen wipers.
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It doesn't have a windshield.
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If you think about the quintessential, you know, high boy hot rod.
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Um, Yeah, if you think about the hell's angels, you know, that's
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a lifestyle that's predicated on the weather being alright.
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You couldn't be a hell's angel in Norway, could you?
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Bloody freezing.
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There's going to be loads of hell's angels from Norway writing to me now.
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But you understand the concept that, you know, that I'm saying that this lifestyle
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of, of, uh, living on the road as a biker or, or, um, hot rods without rooms.
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Um, this is, uh, uh, or weather protection.
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This is a, uh, function of, of California and primarily Southern
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California's, uh, uh, great weather.
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But the Toyota truck is also a function of California, right?
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This one I've bought.
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Um, I mean, it was built in Texas, right?
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It has a 350 cubic inch V8.
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You know, I, I, if, if you said that normally built in Texas, 350 inch
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cubic, uh, three 50 cubic inch va, you would think I was talking about a
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domestic pickup truck, wouldn't you?
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And, and that's really how I arrived here the morning I went to, um.
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The morning I set out to look at the one that I ended up buying, I planned to
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look at another truck earlier in the day.
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That was a Chevy.
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It was two years newer.
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It had done 60, 000 miles less, but I just thought, you know, for raw, Value.
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So look, let's, um, position this truck, uh, positions truck property.
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It's, it's a 2016 Tundra limited, um, limited, I guess, is the gussied up one.
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It has, uh, uh, leather interior has heated seats, which are the two features
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that my, my wife and son were keen for.
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Um, I've done like.
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It's got 1200 1300 miles in it.
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Long journeys running around town.
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I'm towed with it already.
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Um, it has cruise control.
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Um, that works superbly on hills.
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Um, it's towed the heaviest car that I'd likely to want to tell with it.
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I'm just about the heaviest car.
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Maybe maybe the Pontiac's heavier than the Mercedes, but I told the
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Mercedes with their home from the dealership that I bought it and just.
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Was I think of that Toyota of Clovis was the dealership and shout out to
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them, you know, it was a pleasant experience, uh, uh, dealing with them.
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Yeah, so it's a limited, I guess, which isn't like the TRD, like,
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whatever, but it's got like the chrome grill and it's got chrome wheels,
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which is a little gussied up for me, frankly, but, you know, it's a Tundra.
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So.
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You know, it's not that gussied up and, and fundamentally, you know, I
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found myself saying to somebody can't remember who I feel like when you
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buy a Toyota pickup in California, it's almost like buying a pair
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of flip flops or buying a hoodie.
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You know, the, these, this, it's sort of part of a, of a California, California
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car guy sort of uniform or California dude kind of, uh, kind of, uh, uniform.
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So.
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Yeah, so I was looking at the Rams for the longest time.
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How those of you that know me well know that probably, you know, five,
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six, maybe even 10 years ago, I was looking at those, um, the 10 rounds,
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the ones that had the Viper engine.
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If you don't know about them, just Google them.
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I think they're called the SRT 10.
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Um, I, I was close to, to buying one, but, but didn't just because,
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um, I mean, they're just a bit bloody stupid, aren't they?
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Just a, a high revving race motor in a pickup truck.
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I mean, it's just a bit like, it's a bit of a silly thing.
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So I, I, I drove one and, and it was, um, thuggish, um, The salesman kept
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on wanting me to do a burnout in it.
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And that kind of put me off it.
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Um, because like, that's kind of all it's good for us.
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That's the implication.
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And the gas mileage is terrible.
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And I was planning to use it as a daily driver.
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And I just, I just You know, I just didn't want to be there with, I
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mean, it around town, it does like eight to 10 really bad gas mileage.
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If you stop and think about it, you think, well, it's that much worse than
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this Tundra that does like 15 to 16.
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Well, yeah, it is.
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It really is.
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It's, it's, you know, the Tundra is 50 percent better.
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Now, I agree that in comparison in this place of European cars that
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are regularly doing 40, 50, 60.
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Maybe even more than that miles to the gallon.
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Then, you know, this this 15 to 16 for this tundra is is pretty bad.
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Um, so how do I arrive at it?
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Well, um, the, uh, So I pivoted from the V10 Rams to then feeling like I,
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I had always wanted a dual wheel truck and, and uh, the Rams of recent years
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have not only had more power than the Fords and the Chevys, but they've
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also had the dual wheels encased in this sort of swoopy bodywork.
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I bloody loved it.
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The 2018s, 2016, 17, 18s, they sort of did a leaning forward look on the grill.
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Um, looked really good.
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2019.
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They did a grill, which I wasn't sure about at first.
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Now I like it, but I wasn't, I wasn't sure about it at first.
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But, um, in 2019, they introduced, uh, a model that had
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a thousand foot pounds of torque.
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Well, while I was looking at trucks, I realized that those trucks, a lot of
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them are used for car hauling and what they can do with a gooseneck trailer.
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They can, it's like if you imagine a flatbed.
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It's just like an open car trailer, but a gooseneck, so it's attached in the
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middle of the bed with one, two, three cars parked on the trailer, chained down.
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These things tow across the country.
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There's a whole, I believe there's a whole raft of business that these massive
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torque and horsepower rams, particularly other, Duallys as well, Fords more than
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than Chevys, but particularly these Rams have opened up a whole kind of
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business where where you can, um, you know, go in your local Dodge dealer,
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buy a truck like it's a personal car and then set up a business that can can tow.
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So you can tell them how to turn on my voice, how for howie.
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Cool.
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I think these thousand foot pound, uh, trucks are, you need to do the,
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so I, at Christmas time, I was on the brink of buying one before I
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realized that not all trucks, not all duly diesel rams are created equal.
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They are not.
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Some have the 68 RFE Chrysler transmission.
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Others have the Asian Ashin asin, A-I-S-I-N.
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Um, I have a colleague or, you know, mentor at Stanford who did
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some consultancy work for them.
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And, and it was crazy how, you know, he was doing consultancy work for them and
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I was, and had I ever heard of them.
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And, and here was me researching why I needed a truck with that transmission
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rather than the, the, the, the.
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Rather than the Chrysler.
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Well, I actually understand there've been recalls around each of them,
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but this didn't put me off the truck.
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Uh, uh, and I realized that I could get into one for, you know, 25 for
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a super high mile one 30 for a 200.
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Ish, 200,000 ish, mile one and, and uh, uh, you know, mid thirties if
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you wanted to just do them, just ticked over a hundred thousand miles.
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Clearly that mid thirties truck is probably the best price point.
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In fact, spending 40 on one that's done less than a hundred thousand miles, like
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a 2019 or a 2020 is actually probably your best value for, for those trucks.
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But I'm just like $40,000 for a pickup truck.
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I just couldn't bloody do it.
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So I was looking at the 35 range, but you know, it's still a lot
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of money for a pickup truck.
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That's what I'm excited about because it's got this amazing talk statistic.
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I mean, am I ever gonna, am I ever going to use that?
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I mean, it just seemed a bit, um, Yeah, anyway, so it was that the waters were
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further muddied by the fact that last summer, the truck that we had, um, for
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a road trip for our Route 66 road trip, there's another pod about that was
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a, um, me and my son, it was a F 250.
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Um, he loved the super duty thing about it.
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Um, he loved the towing mirrors as, as well.
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Um, and it had a 6.
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2 gas motor, which I understand absolutely bulletproof is what they say.
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It's very much, but, but it's like a work truck.
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And, um, my wife is like, Oh, I'd like leather, you know, if
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I'm, if it's going to be like our money, I'd like it to be leather.
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And I'm thinking to myself, that's not unreasonable, is it?
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That's not an unreasonable ask.
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She's like, you know, she's, uh, so, but you to try and find, you
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know, the Lariat ones, gussied up wheels don't like, didn't like that.
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Rare.
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You're spending like on a 20 grand truck, you're spending like 25 to
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get a Lariat one with the same miles and you're looking at, you know,
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this is be like, uh, we're in 2024.
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Now this would be like a 2015 2016 truck that's going to have 200, 000 miles on it.
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And I'm just like, you know, gas one, not a diesel one and gas one.
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Diesel ones are more.
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Um, these are Ford's terrible reputation for reliability, but it
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doesn't seem to hurt the values.
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Yeah, so I was all about the Rams and I was in and I was out and
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probably a year went by and I had, um, I mean, I've had two trucks.
14:06
Um, by, you know, lemon squad.
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So there was one in Dallas that I was interested in where, you know, and my
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thought was that the inspector would, would look at it and that would include
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photos and he would test drive it.
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So if it was good, I could, you know, if it seemed right, I can
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negotiate a price fly into town.
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I'm not spending 20, 30, 000 on a vehicle.
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Unless I buy it.
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Bloody well driven it right, fly it down, drive it and you know, but
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this, this ram that they looked at, I mean, the price was good on it.
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And of course you get what you pay for, don't you?
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And, uh, um, it, uh, I mean, it, it pulled to one side, it scrubbed the
14:47
tires, it hard shifted at 40 miles an hour, which I understand is an Asian
14:54
kind of thing, but like, I'm not, it just like, it had just been used like a work
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truck and, and, and, uh, so I didn't, you know, I walked away from that one.
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Went cold on the whole thing again and then I came back and I was enthusiastic
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and I should say over Christmas, you know, I even spent a while looking at
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escalate because ultimately there's a towing that I want, you know, an
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escalate with 400 horsepower that 6.
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2.
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It's the luxury interior.
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It's but, you know, I kind of want to do like off roadie stuff and, you know, my
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son's like truck, not SUV truck, not SUV.
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Hey, And, you know, you shouldn't be influenced by that, but like, obviously
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I am, um, But he was also like no Toyota.
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So, you know, I thought of Tundras because they are so like, because everyone knows
15:42
how their value and that bulletproof and, you know, a million, you know, UN
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relief agencies and Mujahideen and, you know, Uh, can't be wrong kind of thing.
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There is that element, uh, you know, uh, about them.
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Um, yeah, I mean, and, and that morning where I was going to drive that
16:03
Chevy and then, uh, look at this one.
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I was just like Chevy, the Chevy was two years newer at 140, 000 miles.
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This Tundra I've got is a 2016, not an 18.
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It has 198 when I bought it.
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Um, And just a word on that, right?
16:21
You see them advertised with 300 plus.
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This is a one owner clean Carfax truck.
16:28
There's a lot of them like that, right?
16:30
I look, I was looking at three that were like that within 500
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miles of, of San Francisco here.
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Um, so I didn't want to go as far, right?
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And this, what happened was I just had like a rush of blood to the head
16:44
where I was like, The problem with these, you know what it is, is we
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went to visit friends up in, uh, Napa.
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They had like a party at their house up in Healdsburg.
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Lovely spread, like, lovely spread by, by vineyard, like.
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And, and as we're driving up there, I'm thinking, would I be happy driving
17:06
that dual wheel ram with its, I looked at one dual wheel ram that was, uh,
17:13
Uh, had a, it had been used on a branch in the Dakotas and it had like
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a great big ball bar on it, like a high ball bars at high ground clearance.
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And that's where like rocking up at their nice little place
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at that nice little house.
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And you know, there's all these fucking Teslas and hybrid
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fucking Toyotas parked up.
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I'm like, you know, I.
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Don't want to cause offense, you know, I never did.
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I always loved heavy metal, but I never wanted to have the overkill
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t shirt with fuck you on it, not least because it didn't like overkill
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because I never felt like that.
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I never wanted to be like, you know, this ram would be too much of a You know,
17:59
and I don't even mean like an I mean a modern one with that big grill on and
18:04
the deal with all of it is, is too much.
18:08
Um, and if it can't be used for that kind of excursion from the city.
18:14
Which the BM BMW is too long in the tooth for, and the
18:16
Mercedes is too knackered for.
18:18
And the fiesta is just too much of an asshole on any long journey for 'cause.
18:23
It's like Berg's, you know, like an hour and a bit away.
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And we're gonna be driving back late at night, you know, by the bull.
18:29
Maybe if I've had a few beers, too many Dana needs to drive.
18:32
Again.
18:32
The fiesta not an option there 'cause it's a stick, right?
18:36
This guy, he's just fine.
18:38
So fundamentally these tundras, they're like land cruisers with.
18:43
Tailgates.
18:44
Oh.
18:45
You can get them with like, you know, basically like a BMW 7 Series
18:49
backseat or a BMW 3 Series backseat.
18:52
The 3 Series ones they're called double cabs and they've got like an
18:56
alpha 156 hidden in the B pillar.
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Hidden in the C pillar kind of door handle and you know enough room for
19:06
like a non american sized adult in the back The crew max is the name of the
19:10
ones with like the big rear in them.
19:12
They're basically like Suburbans like you've got a lot of room in the back
19:17
Especially the high trim ones with like the leather the high trim Tundra is called
19:22
the 17 94 how cool Cheesy is that, I mean, it's a, if, if you don't know the
19:29
Ford King Ranch, the 1794 seems pretty cheese dick until you know the Ford King
19:35
Ranch and the King Ranch is my word.
19:39
Like, I mean I like him 'cause I don't take myself seriously.
19:42
But I mean, look, look at photos online there.
19:47
The interiors on King ranches particularly are just bloody incredible.
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Well, so the limited is the one down from the.
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Like chintz of the 1794.
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There was a 1794 for sale, right?
20:02
Uh, similar miles, newer, um, at Toyota dealership as well.
20:07
Um, but like five grand more.
20:10
And I'm like, you know what, I don't need the, like, you know, I mean,
20:14
the one I've got has got a backup camera on it, which is bloody useful.
20:18
Like, I never thought I'd say that, but it's really useful because
20:22
I'm not used to the length of it.
20:23
So I could just like, you know, back up and yeah.
20:26
Anyway, so that, uh, so I probably was going somewhere there, but I've
20:29
completely lost my train of thought.
20:31
I dare say the second coffee is wearing off and now I'm going to just.
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Uh, move on to my actual agenda and, uh, and logistics here of,
20:41
uh, of what I was going to, what I was going to talk about with it.
20:45
So, um, yeah, so this was the process, right?
20:49
So I, I, I looked at, so I was off the rams cause I was just
20:53
like, they're not practical.
20:55
I need something that can at least, you know, we could use for like a visit to
20:59
see friends at the weekend or, you know, if, if, and literally if we go and see
21:04
those friends of ours down in Santa Barbara, I've moved there permanently now.
21:08
Literally, right, the super duty would look like workmen were visiting.
21:12
Every 250 F250 super duty you see is a work vehicle.
21:16
It has a rack.
21:17
It's a work vehicle, right?
21:19
I'd look like I was a workman.
21:20
Yet the ram wouldn't fit through the gates of the place into
21:26
the little courtyard, right?
21:28
And if it did, it like wouldn't, you couldn't turn it
21:30
around properly and all that.
21:32
The tundra, it fits.
21:34
The tundra looks all right, you know, on the school run amongst the Teslas
21:39
and the Hondas, you know, it fits.
21:42
It's, you know, that.
21:43
So I feel like it is a really.
21:49
Good, good compromise.
21:51
So anyway, so I looked at this crew max, this, that's what I was
21:54
talking about before, wasn't I?
21:55
I was talking about the crew max and the dual, the double cab, the double cab,
21:59
having the hidden door, the crew max, having the full light suburban back seat.
22:04
But I looked at this backseat.
22:05
black crew backs when I guess there's this special dark package that they do.
22:10
I had specials earlier was it was like stickers and wheels,
22:13
but this truck was a Texas truck.
22:14
It was one owner clean car facts.
22:16
I looked at it.
22:17
It's this scuzzy, like the scuzziest most, most Arthur daily car lot used
22:25
car lot I've ever been to in Sacramento.
22:28
So I drove up to Sacramento And I'm looking at this truck and my
22:33
first thought when I walked up to it was, it was dinged to fuck.
22:38
And if I think about that, if I think it's dinged, I think the paint is bad.
22:42
If I noticed that, Jesus, the paint must have been bad, right?
22:46
And, and yes, full service history, clean car facts, all of that, right?
22:51
But, You know, the 20,000 mile service I remember was done at 23,000 and
22:57
change miles, and I'm just like, wow.
22:59
That was his first real service.
23:01
And the bloke was like three and a few thousand miles late.
23:04
And then you look at the interior of it, and that was the first one I'd driven
23:08
when I drove this one in close, the one that I bought, it just felt newer.
23:13
Right?
23:13
It'd done a.
23:14
I guess that other one I've done 192, um, yeah, and just, and, and, right, I
23:20
have to, you know, these are eye popping mileages, you know, I watch car UK league
23:26
in these crappy like Hyundai's and Kia's and Vauxhall Corsas and, and, you know,
23:34
this like one Lisa crap, five grand crap that he deals in, um, this stuff is done.
23:42
Uh, like 100 or 120 or 130, 000 miles, I guess, you know, I is a
23:48
long time since I first surf copart.
23:50
I noticed that all of the cars with more than 200, 000 miles on them were
23:55
either Hondas or Toyotas or a few BMWs and Mercedes, but you know that
24:00
the BMWs and Mercedes, the person spent an arm and a leg keeping the go.
24:04
And you look at these Toyotas and Hondas, they were Camrys, they were Accords,
24:07
they were wearing a quarter of a million.
24:10
Miles and you know, the interiors were fine and, and, you know, uh, um, friend
24:17
of mine, uh, I mean, Mark Newton, who's, I think on one of the early, well,
24:22
he is on one of the early episodes.
24:23
I don't know which number it is.
24:24
I can't remember what we called it, but, uh, he, he always says about
24:28
Toyota, he's a trained Toyota mechanic.
24:30
You always say it's only when you beat on them.
24:32
I mean, really beat on them that then you understand the difference.
24:37
So this truck, I bought 198, 000 miles.
24:42
Split in the driver's seat.
24:44
Bit of dirt on the shifter.
24:46
Bit of dirt on the armrest.
24:49
Bed has clearly been used.
24:52
Probably got a new tailgate on it.
24:54
Bit of paint on the side.
24:56
But underneath?
24:58
I mean It looks like a vehicle that's less than a year old.
25:02
If you're used to looking at vehicles on the East Coast or in England
25:07
or in Germany or anywhere where they solve the roads, it's just,
25:11
you know, as you like underneath.
25:13
Yeah, so this Sacramento one, sorry, I'm jumping around it.
25:16
Um, the Sacramento one.
25:17
So I'm looking at it.
25:18
My first thought was dinged up love this black package that it had
25:22
on it had like blacked out grill and it's kind of cheesy wheels.
25:25
But you know, you can fix that easily.
25:27
Can't you bloke doesn't even come out and speak to me.
25:30
So I walk in the shack and it is a shack and it's like, you know,
25:33
and the other thing I should say is that it is beautiful.
25:35
It's balls hot.
25:37
It's like, you know, 110 degrees, right?
25:41
And, uh, I've driven like the two hours up to find him.
25:44
And, uh, so we talked for a little bit.
25:47
And, uh, he's not, he's not stood up from his desk.
25:50
And I said, can I do it for a test drive?
25:52
I monosyllabic then as well.
25:55
He didn't, mother, not English as a first language.
25:59
And, uh, Anyway, long and short, I get the keys in my hands, he tells me to
26:04
go right, right and right, away from the dealership, and I'm like, yeah.
26:08
No.
26:09
So I roll away from the dealership, like making sure the truck's gonna get up, heat
26:14
up properly somewhere where I can, you know, do a proper brake test, all of that.
26:18
Um, I lay on the ground and looked after, I mean, but it's too
26:21
bloody hot to lie on the tarmac.
26:23
That's the thing with it, right?
26:25
So looking at this truck properly was, was not easy, but you
26:29
know, I feel like I managed it.
26:31
You know, it was sand, right?
26:32
But I knew that the grey one that I ended up buying was just It just felt
26:37
like that was more of what, um, Rabbit Pits, um, you know, what, what Rob Pits,
26:44
the, the, the rabbit, um, rest in peace, rabbit, you were a great storyteller.
26:49
Um, What old, uh, old rabbit would describe as a, as a pawpaw truck.
26:56
It had the feel of a pawpaw truck.
26:58
Um, uh, when I was on the test drive with the Toyota guy, I was like, what's that?
27:02
There's a button on the, uh, uh, under their driver mirror there.
27:06
And I was like, what's that button again?
27:08
It's worn away.
27:09
I was like, what was that button there?
27:10
And he went away.
27:11
It's obviously been kept in a garage because that's the button
27:14
for like the, the button has built into the car for the remote garage.
27:18
Opener.
27:19
I mean, yeah, so, uh, so yeah, so I had, um, Considered other things.
27:29
I mean, I did book to, there was a morning where I booked to go and look
27:32
at an F 250 and then of the morning was just like, no, I just can't do the work
27:36
truck with the long wheelbase, which, you know, just would have been ridiculous
27:40
for, uh, um, this Tundra is pretty ridiculous as, as, as it is, but I feel
27:45
like, so I, I've touched all the bases.
27:48
I've got something which could tow all of my shit and won't, Need
27:51
any maintenance and fits anywhere and fits into the background
27:55
anywhere, especially in California.
27:58
Awesome.
27:58
That's what I what I wanted.
28:01
I'm a superb drive.
28:02
You know, it just works for me.
28:05
My wife described it as not embarrassing.
28:08
And you know, we're using it for the school camping trip, which I'm meant to be
28:12
packing for as I'm as I'm practicing now.
28:15
Um, And, you know, the boy's happy because I've got a truck
28:19
and I've stopped talking about it.
28:21
He keeps opening and closing the tailgate and leaping up into it
28:25
and climbing over into the bed by standing on the wheel, which, you
28:29
know, is scratching the side of it.
28:31
But, you know what I mean?
28:32
I'm like, whatever.
28:33
Um, and that is the thing with it, right?
28:35
That's the other thing about getting a Toyota is, is not only
28:39
is it this bulletproof reliability, but I'm not sad watching it sit
28:42
out in the street and bust away.
28:44
I'm like, whatever.
28:45
You know, I don't know.
28:46
It's Toyota, you know, and the reality is even with a hundred, a hundred
28:50
thousand more miles on it, you know, it's still be worth, you know, I, there
28:55
are T one hundreds with 350,000 miles on them from the mid nineties that were
29:00
on Craigslist and that offer up and, and Facebook for five and, and $7,000
29:07
because they're in clean condition.
29:08
And that's, you know, it's, it's uh, you know, the value hold.
29:12
So yeah, so the dealership was down in Clovis, so I, uh, I drove
29:15
down there in the Mercedes, balls hot, along Highway 152, super
29:20
picturesque, really enjoyable drive.
29:23
And not much to report, really.
29:24
I mean, I, I, uh, looked around it stupidly, forgot to look under the hood
29:30
before we got out on the test drive.
29:31
And I never did look.
29:32
I didn't look under the hood until we got back to the dealership.
29:37
But I was so when I noticed it had pain on the door.
29:41
Um, and thought that it probably had a new tailgate or paint on the tailgate that set
29:47
me worried, worrying that it had been hit.
29:49
And as I spent a long time in the shade, rolling around underneath it, trying
29:54
to see if it convinced myself that it hadn't basically been hit inside.
29:59
The test drive, I mean, weird, right?
30:03
Because we get up on this highway, on this concrete highway,
30:06
and it's pulling to one side.
30:08
And I'm like.
30:09
And the dude's like, yeah, they all do that.
30:11
And I'm thinking that sounds like their worst fucking line.
30:17
They all do that.
30:18
The test drive route right from the dealership has
30:22
trucks pulling and, you know.
30:25
That that's meant to be like, you know, but yeah, it seems that
30:29
it is for the first 500 miles.
30:32
I drove the truck because after that first piece of freeway, it didn't pull again.
30:36
But for the first 500 miles, I drove the truck.
30:38
Anytime I pulled to either side, I was terrified that I'd bought
30:41
something that had been hit and the frame was was twisted.
30:45
Uh, no, I, I'm, I'm here to tell you it didn't pull.
30:48
Drives straight as it does have a problem with losing tire
30:53
pressure on one front tire.
30:54
And obviously you let that go too low.
30:56
There is a pool there, but, but, uh, you know, fundamentally,
31:01
um, thing drives straight.
31:02
So Toyota of Clovis change your test drive route guys.
31:06
Idiotic test drive route, because your first impression is that things
31:11
pull into the right and it's not, it's a terrible piece of freeway,
31:15
nothing to do with the truck.
31:16
Um, you know, literally it's the road, not the truck, but my word, that did
31:22
not showcase the truck to its best.
31:24
That really, um, I went to bed, I ended up having to stay over in Clovis and
31:30
I went to bed, I'm in the motel that night thinking, Yeah, because I had
31:34
to pay him the cash in the morning.
31:36
That's the way that it worked out.
31:37
So.
31:38
But I went to bed thinking, God, I hope the thing doesn't pull, and worrying that
31:42
I hadn't looked under the hood thoroughly, and when I had looked under the hood, it
31:46
had been warm, so I couldn't, you know, check the oil properly and all of that.
31:49
It wasn't warm when I started it, which was great, because then you
31:53
could tell there was nothing, you know, no problem out of the tailpipe.
31:56
It's been cleaned up under the hood, which is, is, you know, which is fine, right?
32:02
It had done 200, 000 miles, clearly had a life before.
32:05
Um, It's got a bed liner in it.
32:08
Um, don't know what the bed's like underneath it.
32:11
Looked not too, not rusty, which is the thing you worry about.
32:14
But, but, you know, it's like Clovis.
32:16
It was sold new at that dealership in Clovis.
32:19
It was serviced there and in Clovis had all the changes
32:22
at another place in Clovis.
32:24
It had that its whole life.
32:25
You know, you're like, you are, um, you know, you're buying a true
32:30
desert state vehicle with, with it.
32:32
All right.
32:33
All right.
32:33
Good.
32:34
Yeah.
32:34
So I drove down the inner Mercedes, um, then left the Mercedes at the dealership,
32:39
took the truck home and then the following Monday morning, scooped up a U Haul
32:44
and went back to Clovis, loaded the Mercedes 116 degrees on the dashboard,
32:52
loaded the Mercedes and then drove home.
32:55
Always on that beautiful Highway 152, um, do a street view of
33:00
it past the, the lakes there.
33:03
Um, But it's, it's between Gilroy and, uh, and Highway 5, um, super
33:10
picturesque, super picturesque.
33:12
Um, and Clovis is nice.
33:14
It's sort of a nice bit of Fresno.
33:16
I guess I didn't realize it was a suburb of, uh, of Fresno before, but I liked it.
33:21
I like Clovis.
33:21
It's a brick town, which is quite unusual at the center of it is a brick town,
33:25
which is really unusual in California.
33:27
And of course, it speaks to a really old town in California because it's a town
33:31
that was clearly built before the 1906 earthquake, when everyone realized, or
33:36
at least all the, uh, all the recent transplants from other places realized,
33:41
uh, the way that california is with earthquakes and uh stopped building out of
33:45
brick and started building out of things that are more easily and cheaply rebuilt
33:51
yeah so the drive is awesome right it's a beautiful drive um uh the truck itself um
33:58
i mean coming up past the cliff house here towing the mercedes coming up past the
34:02
cliff house home it kicked down one gear to go from You know, I was only doing like
34:09
25 or 30 miles an hour, but it kicks down one gear to go from like turning over at
34:13
1750 rpm to turning over at like 2250 rpm.
34:18
Um, it really has great power between three and four thousand rpm and I
34:23
had it towing up a steep grade at 65 miles an hour with the cruise
34:28
set and it just, it just did it.
34:32
If, if you ask too much of the cruise, it doesn't strain around.
34:35
It just.
34:36
turns the cruise off.
34:37
And as you drive it on the throttle, um, on the decent, um, it went down,
34:43
went down a gear or went up a gear.
34:46
What would it be?
34:46
It would be whatever it, it changed ratios to use engine braking to keep
34:52
it at 65 miles an hour in a beautiful controlled kind of, uh, kind of a way.
35:00
I don't mean 65 miles an hour, by the way, you haul, I mean 55.
35:04
Miles an hour.
35:05
I mean, at no point did I exceed 55 miles an hour while towing, um, for the
35:13
purposes of, uh, because that's the limit with U Haul equipment, believe it or not,
35:17
which 18 wheelers and so on and back, you know, I quite enjoy just pottery, you
35:23
know, I'm, I'm fine with, uh, with, with that and I have every reason to believe
35:29
that, you know, it would tow with, with stability, uh, speeds far beyond, uh,
35:35
Um, that 55 miles an hour that I, I just mentioned, um, not that I indulged in,
35:41
in any of that activity because of course the equipment was, uh, was, was new to me.
35:47
I've positioned it up there that it moved quite smoothly through, but really there
35:51
was like whenever you buy a car, there's always like hassle and you have to see
35:54
one person, you have to see another person and then you have to like wait
35:57
until the bank opens in the morning.
35:59
Oh, but you know, if I'd have brought a checkbook, I wouldn't have needed
36:02
to, you know, that, that kind of thing.
36:04
So I, I, uh, you know, I could have prepared better, um, You know, when I
36:08
prepared myself to think very clearly about the truck, but I hadn't prepared
36:12
myself for anything that happened after that, um, in terms of how to pay for
36:17
it and all of that, you know, so that I skillfully so I, I, uh, found it
36:23
surprisingly familiar, actually, and have found it surprisingly familiar in the,
36:27
you know, I did spend that summer, um, working as hot air balloon crew where
36:31
the vehicles, there was a Peugeot 504.
36:33
Station wagon and Citroen C35 vans that Gami and I have talked about in another
36:39
of these of these pods, but, but, but we, uh, there were also 3 Toyota pickup
36:45
trucks, basically 1st generation Tacomas.
36:47
They weren't badged as that because it was in Europe, but that's what
36:50
they, that's what they were, like, early 90s Tacomas and 4x4s, Subaru
36:58
manual transmission, 5 speed manuals.
37:01
Um, And, uh, previous previous, we used to race the previous, um, they do 118
37:09
miles an hour flat out with the overdrive off only 115 with the overdrive on.
37:15
Allegedly, so I was familiar with the trucks, but, um, at that
37:18
point, um, obviously, Mark Newton.
37:21
Swear Biden, John Garcia, um, has had a gold one for years, which is a manual
37:27
transmission 2001 and, uh, it's like trebled in value, um, since he, when he
37:34
first bought it, it was like a 5, 000, you know, five year old pickup truck and, and,
37:39
you know, now it's like, you know, manual transmission, four wheel drive, four
37:43
cylinder, you know, bulletproof spec kind of, uh, kind of thing in nice condition.
37:48
Yeah.
37:49
Um, you know, so it's like a 10, 000 truck now.
37:52
Yeah, and a surprisingly different vehicle, although
37:54
similar in feel to, to, to mine.
37:57
I mean, mine.
37:58
Uh, feels like a land cruiser, um, and it is sized like a domestic US pickup truck.
38:06
And that's really what appeals to me about it is here is a domestic US
38:10
pickup truck, domestic in every sense.
38:12
The 350 cubic inch normally aspirated V8, the automatic transmission, the
38:18
bed that's big enough to fit a Harley.
38:21
You know, you'd think I was talking about a Chevy or a Ford or a Ram, wouldn't you?
38:25
But now you're going to ally that with this bulletproof build quality,
38:29
which, you know, you might say, Oh, it's not so bulletproof now.
38:32
No, but the value proposition is that it's bulletproof.
38:36
And what I didn't realize You know the value that the reputation is that so
38:40
they hold their value, you know, so just hold their value better than anything
38:44
better than modern BMW better than modern Mercedes, you know, because everyone
38:47
knows they're complicated and fragile.
38:49
That's the other thing to say about it is that the Fords with their turbos or even
38:54
the the Ford motor, it's a five liter that the V8 motors of the Mustang motor.
39:00
It's a five liter that makes 400 horsepower now, but the
39:03
Chevy's a five three liter.
39:05
Makes 335.
39:06
You know, that tells you how much less stress the Chevy Metro
39:11
is the RAM as a five seven.
39:13
I don't know what horsepower that makes.
39:15
I just wouldn't do a RAM that wasn't like a duly for build quality again, right?
39:19
This is a market against like somehow I could forgive Chrysler build quality
39:23
for, you know, if I was going to get the dual wheel, like, no, right?
39:27
Just do this.
39:28
Toyota is never going to go wrong.
39:29
The moment I sat in it and I could, it just looked like a truck that had
39:33
done 20,000 miles or 40,000 miles, not one that had done nearly 200.
39:39
I mean, yeah, it, it's, uh, that was what, uh, was what sold me on it.
39:45
So I did visit the Toyota factory.
39:49
It was like Starling grad, you know, they, uh, uh, the state renamed the community.
39:58
Toyota, the community where the factory was located, Toyota.
40:01
Um, I can't remember the full details.
40:03
I mean, it's Toyota family, Toyota family.
40:07
Um, they, Toyota's more easily pronounced in Europe and America.
40:12
So that's why they, they did that.
40:14
It's also something to do with the syllables and being
40:17
lucky in, in, Japanese.
40:19
I learned all of this on the guided tour I had of, of, of Toyota Tau.
40:24
And I say it's like Stalingrad because, you know, the community was named
40:28
after this entity which is going to rebuild the community, you know,
40:32
or in the case of Stalingrad, you know, stop the, uh, the, the advance.
40:36
Uh, sewing machine, British sewing machine patent.
40:39
I remember that that was how Toyota made their money, um, that they reproduced.
40:44
They did all these sewing machines and then with the
40:46
money that they made from that.
40:48
Um, they, uh, bought the patent out and then the money they made from
40:51
that, they pivoted to making cars.
40:54
Um And that was when, um, the Toyota renaming took place.
40:59
That was post war, 1950, something like that.
41:02
Of course, it was post war because they needed to rebuild.
41:04
So this is the essence of, of, of Toyota.
41:07
So you may know that story about Satura Honda, that when the Model
41:12
T comes to Honda's village for the first time, it drops some oil, that
41:17
first Model T, and he goes Into the street after it's gone and he dips his
41:22
finger in the oil and he tastes it.
41:26
You were a Honda racing engineer for Honda Motorcycles.
41:32
When Honda san came to the track, when he came to the track, when the
41:37
boss man came to the track, if your bike wasn't the fastest one down the
41:42
straight, that was a great dishonor and you felt in danger of your job.
41:48
Because Honda engines were The most powerful and that was what
41:53
he, but that's Honda, right?
41:55
This Formula One history with Senna or whatever.
41:58
Toyota's none of that.
41:59
Toyota's rebuild the nation.
42:01
That's why there's no thought of how to.
42:04
you know, make the car good to drive or fast or anything like that.
42:08
Why would you do that?
42:09
You buy machine tools who are the best Mercedes Benz, right?
42:12
We buy machine tools from Mercedes Benz.
42:14
How are they styling their cars over like this?
42:16
You know, they've gone to a two blob headlight style like my E55.
42:21
Well, the next GS300 has exactly the same two blob headlight
42:24
style, even though it's different.
42:25
to this day looks a bit ungainly.
42:27
I personally, I personally like it, right?
42:30
But it's definitely, um, an, an acquired taste and they, they, Toyota and Lexus
42:35
in that case, just unashamedly copy that Lexus LS 400 was a straight copy
42:40
of the Mercedes S class of, of that era.
42:43
They're shame, they were shameless about delivering what they
42:47
were going to, to, to deliver.
42:49
And this is Um, you know, with the pickup truck, you're just like,
42:52
yeah, I just want it not to go wrong.
42:54
I want And it's curious there are elements of the design which remind you of ford
43:00
because it's cheap feeling But it's like the materials are ford grade but the
43:07
Build quality is Mercedes, you know, in the 80s, you know, it's this bulletproof
43:13
screwed together of cheap materials and it really reflects in this truck
43:17
and it's why I've, uh, why I bought it.
43:21
I did indulge in a little bit of high four around some cheap materials.
43:25
You know, I stopped for a pee.
43:26
Of course, that's the other thing that's awesome about it.
43:28
Everywhere you go, there's a urinal, right?
43:30
You just park at the side of the road, walk around the truck, open the
43:33
passenger door, there's your urinal.
43:34
Like it just rules that truck.
43:37
Anyway, well, I did that at the side of the road.
43:38
And then I was like, this was obviously not when I was telling
43:41
this, when I was driving at home, I was like, you know what?
43:43
Listen, I'll just do a lap of this little, you know, fruit section here.
43:47
There was wide, there was a wide path there, so I had it in two wheel drive.
43:51
Bit of jigsaw hazard, had it in I 4 for a little bit.
43:54
I only did about 40, 50 miles an hour.
43:56
Gonna have to find somewhere to do that properly.
43:59
Really good traction truck felt.
44:01
Really, really good.
44:01
Haven't tested low four yet to jump back to the day, the day of the pickup.
44:07
So I, you know, it took me like four hours to get down there.
44:11
So it's like heat of the day, like early afternoon by the time I'm
44:14
loading, because I made sure I had like food and water before, because
44:17
it's this bloody 116 degrees.
44:20
Of course, it's California.
44:21
So all the shady parts.
44:23
I've got like homeless people in their tents living in,
44:26
which is fair enough, right?
44:27
I got nowhere else to go if I can be there, if they could
44:29
be anywhere else with that.
44:30
So I'm not knocking them for that.
44:32
But it means that I'm out in the middle of the Home Depot car park, Home
44:37
Depot car park, you know, taking up to parking spaces, you know, loading up,
44:42
putting the axles, putting the chains.
44:44
over the axles.
44:46
I was out lying on the ground for a little bit and then I had to like
44:49
shift my shoulder position because the tarmac is too fucking hot to lie on.
44:56
So of course didn't bring gloves stupidly I brought tools and everything but didn't
45:00
think to bring gloves some my hands are absolutely filthy because they are a
45:04
mercedes it's like obviously he's 160, 000 miles of leaking power steering and oil
45:11
and you know or so the, You know, there's some hands filthy from all of that from
45:16
sorting out, you know, the differentials leaking a little so I'm like covered
45:20
from that, you know, that was like at the back and anyway, so I go in the Home
45:24
Depot to, you know, use the loo, right?
45:26
Well, it's being cleaned.
45:31
Just two dudes in line already.
45:33
We're all like fidgety, we all like need to go.
45:35
So I'm like trying to go in the ladies, but the door keeps closing before
45:39
I can get in, and we're not allowed to know the codes or just Anyway,
45:43
so that was, uh, uh, that was drama.
45:46
That was like, um, five or six of us eventually demanded that we be allowed
45:52
into the ladies and, uh I just went ahead and, uh, did what I needed to do
45:58
and of course made a massive mess of the sink, um, washing, uh, uh, all the crap
46:05
off my hands after I'd, uh, peed out all the Gatorade that I'd been drinking
46:10
to, uh, keep my, keep my strength up.
46:12
So, yeah.
46:14
So, uh, yeah.
46:15
And then the scenic route home towing, as I say, it's absolutely
46:19
a beautiful sunset that evening.
46:21
I remember towing, um, you know, when it tows on cruise, just just
46:27
absolutely no problem at all.
46:28
So really sort of made up with with the purchase.
46:32
The family are happy with it as well.
46:35
It's just the icing on the cake.
46:38
So, um, that's how I ended up with the Tundra.
46:43
Thank you, DriveThru.
47:07
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