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Here Are The Hardest Jobs That Involve Driving

Urban concrete truck drivers, specifically the ones in and around NYC and the boroughs, have one of the hardest driving jobs in the world. They have only an hour or two to get a truck full of concrete in nearby NJ or one of the boroughs to Manhattan or a denser part of one of the other boroughs. Regular rush hour and daytime traffic can often turn a 6 mile trip into a 2-3 hour journey so these trucks have to haul ass in a vehicle that is extremely wide and heavy and shoot gaps that are inches wider than the truck. I have an old friend who used to drive one of these trucks and he used to tell me stories about weaving through traffic and changing courses to make that delivery. At one point, he may have even dinged one of Vin Diesel’s side mirrors but was very cool about the whole experience.

The risk of wastage is not really about the cost, since a truck of concrete is only around $1,500 (peanuts compared to the total construction cost in the tens or hundreds of millions) but rather to the production process of the construction project. Concrete slab-pouring crews are well-oiled machines that run around the clock during working shifts and any sort of downtime, even the loss of a truck or two of concrete, can throw off their pace of work and due to the incredibly high overhead cost, cut into their profits significantly. These drivers definitely have a significant amount of pressure to deliver their goods very quickly!

Submitted by: oddseth

This Wild Amphibious RV Started Life As A Milk Tanker

Every week I receive mail from readers asking me to write more about weird RVs and buses. The world is full of wacky RV builds and this one is a doozy. I’m talking about the Dobbertin Surface Orbiter; an amphibious RV capable of sailing around the world.

You read that right, this thing isn’t just a vehicle that can travel around the country, it can sail around the world, too!

To fully embrace this wonderful creation, you should know a little about its builder, Rick Dobbertin. Before building a spaceship for the sea, Dobbertin made his mark building beautiful hot rods. His Pontiac J2000 Pro Street car featured a Chevy 350 V8 with a shocking number of go-fast parts, reports Hot Rod. We’re talking dual superchargers and dual turbos. The whole thing was dolled up in striking paint, polished aluminum, and stainless steel.

While his award-winning car builds are awesome enough, Dobbertin and his wife, Karen, wanted to build something even more ambitious.

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According to Dobbertin’s site on the build, they started with a 1959 Heil stainless steel milk tanker. Using a milk tanker for the platform meant the Dobbertins would benefit from strong double walls filled with 2.5-inch foam insulation.

The tanker’s size and shape were perfect for the application of a seafaring vehicle with a living space inside. Dobbertin grafted a cockpit to the front of the tanker, giving it major spaceship vibes. A story from Syracuse reported that, at 32.5 feet, the vehicle was so long that the Dobbertins had to extend their garage to fit it inside.

The Surface Orbiter is put together using 910 pieces of stainless steel. Inside, there are living quarters, a toilet and a kitchen. There are some additional creature comforts too, like heating and air conditioning. Loaded, the massive vessel weighs in at 18,000 pounds.

All of that weight is carried along by a 6.5-liter GM turbodiesel converted for marine use. That engine drives the wheels through a four-speed automatic connected to a 4×4 transfer case and Dana axles. That’s right, this baby is four-wheel drive!

The engine can also sail the rig through the sea via a single 22-inch propeller. It can go 70 mph on land and 10 knots on the water. If you were curious how much fuel it drinks, the quantity is equally massive. It gets up to 12 mpg on land and only 2 on the water. No surprise, then, that it can carry a fuel load of 340 gallons.

The rig is piloted through a unique cockpit upfront. The left side features all the controls and instrumentation for land travel while the right side is for sailing.

When all was said and done, the Dobbertin couple spent four-and-a-half years and 14,000 hours turning a dream into a reality. The team then departed on an impressive trek. Their goal? Circumnavigate the world in one go, entirely by this amphibious vehicle.

Over the course of a couple years, the two took the Surface Orbiter to 30 countries and multiple continents. Dobbertin’s site notes that they racked up 33,000 miles on the odometer and traveled an additional 3,000 miles by sea, including through the Panama Canal.

However, not everything was cherry. The beast encountered many issues — including a capsizing while docked — and the project strained the couple’s relationship to the breaking point. Eventually, the Dobbertins ran out of money and worse, they split up. The journey came to an end, short of its goal.

That didn’t stop Rick Dobbertin, however. Years later he sold the Surface Orbiter to fund his next project. He wanted to try his hand at amphibious vehicles again with his Dobbertin HydroCar. This one was never finished, but Dobbertin had the goal of making an amphibious car that could top out at 60 miles-per-hour on water. The vehicle would do so with deployable pontoons, however, Dobbertin was never able to get it to work correctly. We reported that it came up for sale years ago. However, it’s since disappeared.

Builds like these always excite me. I love to see builders repurpose existing vehicles into something entirely different. Who knew you could turn a milk tanker into a 4×4 RV that can travel the world.

Find out more about the Surface Orbiter at Dobbertin’s site dedicated to his builds!

Ford pickup trucks over the years: A brief pictorial history

The first F-150s made their appearance for the 1975 model year | Ford photos

America’s best-selling vehicle for nearly 40 years — the Ford F-Series trucks — didn’t get there overnight.

The Ford F-Series and Ford F-150 pickup has been around for much longer than that. Ford’s history of building trucks spans 103 years of moving, hauling, lugging, towing, transporting, carrying…you get the picture.

But with the 14th generation of the the F-Series full-size pickup unveiled Thursday, we can look back at how far it’s come. The full-size Ford has evolved from a boxy, utilitarian hauler to an even bigger, four-door family hauler available as a luxury car in everything but the name.

With the first F-150 Hybrid available soon and an electric version on the way, the F-150 has come a long way – and there’s a long way left to go.

1917 Ford Model TT

Based on the Model T, the Model TT was the automaker’s first pickup truck and initially it was sold chassis-only – buyers had to supply their own bodies. According to a 1923 brochure for the Model TT, the automaker could supply a body that year, which became standard practice for all trucks the next year. The 1923 Model TT chassis cost $380, which inflation-adjusted for today would be $5,697.64.

Ride and comfort may have been questionable – Ford fit solid tires on the TT from the factory.

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1935 Ford Model 50

Closer in looks to today’s trucks, the Model 50 was produced beginning in 1935 and was powered by a Flathead V8. The familiar cab and box would be a signal for the F-Series to come later, and the Model 50 was built until 1941 when the truckmaker paused production to help with the war effort.

In 1941, an 85- or 95-horsepower V8 was offered in the trucks or a 30-hp inline-4.

1948 Ford F1

“New, New, Brand New” read the 1948 Ford Truck brochure. The 1948 F1 was part a series of light-duty pickups that included the F2, F3, and F4, which were 3/4-ton, 3/4-ton heavy-duty, and 1-ton versions of the truck. Powered by a 95-hp Rogue inline-6 or one of two “lusty” V8s, according to the brochure, the F1 was the first generation of the F-Series and a precursor of future F-150s to follow.

1953 Ford F100

The 1953 F100 replaced the F1 (the F2 and F3 were replaced by the F-250, and F4 was replaced by the F-350 nameplates). It was initially offered with an 101-hp inline-6 or 100-hp Flathead V8, although both were replaced by more powerful units in 1954, which were marketed as the “Cost Clipper 6” and “Power King 8.” The F100 was the first F-Series to offer an automatic transmission, and it rode on a 110-inch wheelbase with up to 1,465 pounds of payload capacity.

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1957 Ford F100

The 1957 F100 was the first year of the F-Series’ third generation –and also the first year for the Ranchero. The “Styleside” body was new and offered more usable bed space than the flareside pickups that had preceded it. The “Styleside” name is still used today. The truck was initially offered with a 139-hp inline-6 or 171-hp V8, although a larger V8 was added later.

1961 Ford F100

Perhaps more remarkable than the fourth-generation F-Series pickup that debuted in 1961, was the first generation of something that didn’t last long at all. In 1961, Ford debuted a integrated cab and body construction for the F-Series that lasted only until 1962. The reason? According to owners, overloading the bed jammed the doors shut due to flex. Some even reported doors popping open at railroad crossings. The integrated body and bed was only available on rear-wheel-drive trucks, and Ford quickly scrapped that.

Mecum Auctions photo

1975 Ford F-150

The F-150 name first appeared in 1975, the sixth generation for the truck, and was sandwiched between the F-100 and F-250 already on sale. (The F-100 nameplate would endure up until the early 1980s.) The 1970s Fords would preview some styling features that would last until today, including “Ford” stamped across the grille in block lettering and a SuperCab extended cab body style.

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1993 Ford F-150

The first year of the F-150 SVT Lighting pickup. The precursor to the current Raptor, although Lightning would appear again—and perhaps in the future?

1999 Ford F-150

Or, “the soap bar.” The 10th-generation F-150 added a four-door SuperCrew body style in 2001, which would become the most popular body style for retail buyers quickly. The Lightning returned with an Eaton supercharged 5.4-liter V8 that made 360 horsepower initially, and the soap bar spun off a Lincoln variant, called the Blackwood.

2004 Ford F-150

Fully boxed frame, new and definitely not a soap bar.

2010 Ford F-150 Raptor

The F-150 Raptor bowed for 2010 and was available with a 5.4-liter V8 or 6.2-liter V8 borrowed from the heavy-duty pickups. In 2011, Ford introduced for the first time a 3.5-liter twin-turbo V6, dubbed EcoBoost.

2015 Ford F-150

The precursor to the 2021 F-150 and the first Ford pickup with an aluminum-heavy exterior that proved controversial when it was launched.

This article was originally published by Motor Authority, an editorial partner of ClassicCars.com.