Colinism

Mid-size trucks, they were a thing in the 90’s thru about 2010 when the segment collapsed (lack of new product didn’t help). Well now they are a thing again. Over the past 5 years or so (starting with the release of GM’s current generation Canyon/Colorado twins) with Tacoma, Colorado/Canyon, Frontier, Gladiator and Ranger making large year over year gains in many of those years. One of the biggest reasons for the increase of sales in the segment is using the trucks as lifestyle vehicles (which has always been the compact / midsize trucks biggest draw) the increase in overlanding style off-roading, camping, boating, fishing, kayaking, biking, and many other outdoor activities has people looking for a vehicle that’s small enough to drive everyday while still being able to handle all their other duties on the weekend. Filling the bed or towing toys are some of the biggest truck uses. While we can get into towing another time, I think it would be a good idea to compare and contrast the ...

  Earlier in the week, Nissan announced a new Pathfinder coming for 2022 (sales starting this summer). While most of the press release went on to describe what you would expect in a new CUV launch, bigger touch screens, roomier, seats better electronic safety measures, something else caught my attention. According to the release it would be capable of towing 6,000 lbs, which is damn impressive for a FWD based 3-row crossover, I assume this is being helped by the new Transmission. This may be about the highest towing I have ever seen on a FWD chassis but I would need to do more research on it (all the other ones I can think of stop around 5k).    Now my favorite nugget, the press release also said it would be capable of hauling 4x8 sheets of plywood. If that’s with the door closed that would be damn impressive. Right now if you want to do that (with the door closed) your looking at a Suburban or a van (and maybe an Expedition). If it is true that would shrink the line...

 A little while back I wrote a short intro to the Albin 24 getaway. LINK HERE   Well now I found one for sale here in the North East. The ad states it has the 318 thou it has a knock. Otherwise looks to be in decent shape in the pictures.  Find the listing here on Craigslist

BCS 201 tiller I have a bit of an obsession with multi use items. Sometimes they aren’t very practical but I love a tool or anything else that can do a variety of jobs well. My Leatherman Wave being a good example. Would you use it to rebuild an engine? Nope. Is it incredibly useful to have on your hip doing projects around the house? Yep. Which leads me to todays topic, Two Wheeled tractors and in particular BCS. While browsing Craigs List today, I came across, a BCS rototiller. LINK I have known about BCS tractors for about a decade now and look for them from time to time but they are often well out of budget. This one was cheap so I dug a bit more and determined it was really mostly a rototiller version and not a true two wheel tractor (single rear PTO no reverse and limited controls). I’m pretty sure it’s 201 model but have emailed to confirm. So what is a 2 wheel tractor and how is it different then a regular rototiller? 2 Wheel tractors are pretty much what they sound like. They...

1990's Albin's why do I like you so much. There just something about the classic but up to date styling, with a good dose of practicality that's just hard to ignore.  The 24 is an oddball in some respects with a relatively few examples (48) made for a 24 footer. It's basically a scaled down version of the 31-34 foot command bridge models Albin built over the years. Having the raised helm area nets you more cabin in the larger boat.  Here it gets the engine under foot instead of in a box in the cockpit, as would normally be the case on a 24 foot boat with a straight shaft inboard.In actuality the straight shaft is one of the more unusual parts of this boat. While the arrangement was common in the pre stern drive era, it was very uncommon by the early 90's. The only other production cabin boat under 26' with an inboard of the time period I can think of is Shamrock (I'm sure there are others but I'm not going to spend all day finding them).  In the ...

Sometimes you just find a boat and you have to look into it more. I happened to be looking thru motor yacht listings one day and came across a Carver 325. The reason it  to me was the swim platform arrangement. Instead of a near vertical transom there was a series of steps in the platform allowing a non climb transition to the area above the aft cabin. Other then that change and some tweaks to the bridge this is the same basic 32' motor yacht Carver offered for a couple decades. But I like it might be my favorite small motor yacht. The arrangement below with a enormous v shaped dinette really makes it feel like a bigger boat and the berth arrangement in the back while a bit odd is versatile. Almost all of these are gas powered but diesel was an option. For a detailed write up the owner of boat-project.com used to own one and has mods and lots of info on his page http://www.boat-project.com/boats/carver.htm For some specs here is the factory info https://drive.google.com...