Welcome to Craigslist Crapshoot, our weekly search for the most bizarre, awesome, and/or terrible vehicles that the online classifieds has to offer.
Last week we all went against our better nature and looked for cars with manual transmissions that even WE don’t think should have come with manual transmissions. We’ll row our own winner in just s sec, but first, let’s go camping.
Motor homes are great. In fact being able to cook, sleep, and poop in your own mobile castle is one of life’s great luxuries. After all, if James Franco had the option of cracking a cold PBR in a lawn chair next to his rig at a KOA campground instead of running around in the middle of nowhere he wouldn’t have had to gnaw off his own arm and then they wouldn’t have had to cancel Freaks and Geeks.
The only issue with motor homes is typically their size, which makes maneuvering them, as well as finding a place to park as well as their gas mileage kind of a pain. That’s why this week I want cars and trucks that you could potentially live in, at least for a short period of time, say until your significant other cools down, or the LeMons weekend is over. Sleeping is the biggest concern, but we’ll also want room enough for other gear like cooking and clothing storage.
As always, we want your finds to go down in infamy and not in the site’s spam filter. Since we’ve changed commenting systems, you may need to update your commenter account. Make sure you have a Disqus account – they’re free and easy to get – and then comment away.
Oh man, the sight of so many sticks was giddy-making. That is, until it sunk in what all those sticks were stuck on. I took special note of the Rolls Royce Silver Wraith found by Manic_King. This is very similar to my Father-in-Law’s ’49 Bentley Mark 6, which is also RHD and has a four-speed manual, the lever for which you have to climb over to get behind the wheel as it’s in the door jamb.
The winner however, is a 1978 Ford Econoline with a three speed, found by Potbellyjoe★★★★★ and which has since sold on eBay for a solid $761.99.
I’ll just let I_Borgward explain why this van’s driveline is just so incongruous:
Aaaaagh! The dreaded 3-speed OD stick Econoline! Definitely in the “shouldn’t have a stickshift” category, which I can attest to from having owned one. Unbelievably awful, from the crappy low-grade transmission bearings to the fragile, Tinkertoy-grade mechanical clutch linkage to the balky, ever-jamming shifter. How Ford managed to make a floor shifter that was sloppier, cruder and even more indirect than a column shifter still amazes me. And for all of that joy, it only got about 2 MPG better than an automatic on a good day.
I went through two clutch pedals, two shifters, a junkyard transmission swap and then finally a fully rebuilt transmission before I finally ended the pain and ditched it. The rest of the van was fine, but I just couldn’t take that damned transmission anymore.
I couldn’t have said it better. Congrats, PBJStarfishs, and thanks to you all for the contributions.
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