A small pickup truck or an all terrain vehicle?

Can a pickup truck do what a smaller ATV can? Certainly the little ATV has slipped into a pretty big niche. The Kawasaki Mule and the long and growing line of competitors now make up a class of vehicles that people a few years ago didn’t even dream they needed. Now it seems that these vehicles are everywhere. Here are ways the above options can work just as well.

Until the invention of the Kawasaki Mule and similar vehicles, what did people ride on? How could you do maintenance or farm and construction work without an ATV? Well, there were and still are other options, much cheaper too.

A viable option for many uses is the minivan. By that I don’t mean used mini-trucks that can’t have a street license. I mean conventional little pills. These are also fairly recent inventions. Only since the late 1960s has this class of vehicle appeared on the American market. At that time, Toyota, Datsun/Nissan, Mazda, and Mitsubishi brought trucks made in Japan. Then American automakers came out with their versions.

Japanese trucks were generally built to work and were small but tough. Many of these older Japanese trucks are still in operation. Earlier versions of trucks tended to be cheap, plain, work trucks. Over time, all small trucks became larger vehicles with more options and more car-like features. That’s good if you need a truck to use as a car, but not so good if you want an inexpensive work vehicle.

If you can find an old small truck that has been taken care of, you have a good alternative to an expensive ATV. Now granted, pickup trucks will be hard to find in 4 wheel drive, but not impossible. Of course, in most cases, 4-wheel drive is rarely needed anyway.

What you get with trucks includes several advantages over ATVs.

You get a street legal vehicle useful for any type of job. That includes the transport of food or fertilizer, as well as the use like any car. In addition, you do not have to transport it to the workshop with a trailer. Also, maintenance work on a pickup often costs you less than work on an ATV.

Don’t forget about the weatherproof truck cab that may include a fully functioning heater and maybe even an air conditioner. Imagine that.

Then, in addition, some older trucks came with virtually bulletproof engines and transmissions that lasted for decades and cost little to keep up.

Also don’t forget the price difference. A good used small truck can cost only a small fraction of what you pay for a new ATV. You skip the depreciation cost and get a vehicle that does most of what the ATV does and does many other things much better than a small ATV.