Mental Exercise: Design a Hoosier style Gun Truck/Technical...

[BigMoose]

Okay I have been thinking of this for a bit..

It's Indiana, we have a lot of medium duty farm trucks around.

What would you do if you ever had to improvise and up armor said truck. The quintessential Hoosier GUN TRUCK. A corn haulin truck, Hoosier engineered into a fighting machine in a pinch.

Some ground rules.
1995 and older trucks only.
Budget around $1000 bucks not including the truck, or money used to make said truck safe (Brakes, Engine, Trans etc, fix up stuff)

Some examples of base trucks would be C50,C65, or C60 trucks as a base. Or some old international. But it need not be that, but it has to be a truck made in the USA.

 

[BigMoose]

Okay here is my entry, thoughts.

First thing I would do is a reinforced bumper.
Now there are a lot of fancy expensive things out there.. but what is inexpensive and cheap. Railroad lumber. Crossties.
The front would have 3 of those with a welded frame to hold them, if you wanted to get fancy you could put them on old coil springs to help cushion any impacts. You want them low, so things don't get under the wheels. But not so low as they get jammed on something.

The back would be a wood flatbed. But I would use more railroad crossties to create a Stake Bed.. with the cross ties around the sides to create a "pickup truck bed" that goes up about four feet. A canopy would protect from the sun. The inside of the bed could be lined with some steel if desired. At the three foot level some strategic ports would be left open.

Fuel tanks would be relocated to a spot between the cab and the wood bed. It would be tastefully hid using more railroad lumber.

I would not go to mad max with it. I think it could be done tastefully,

Make it look like a farm truck.. that isn't quite one.

 

[SnoopLoggyDog]

Top one was made for Fury Road. Next two are home grown beasts that would fit right in with roaming the post-modern desolation.

 

[VostocK]

It should be camo to blend into the Indiana landscape.

 

[Brian Ski]

Hypothetical. Engine and tires are the weak spot. And windshield too. Tough to make it really unstoppable.

 

[worddoer]

Well.....if you want to keep with the compact truck theme...it would have to be either a Ford Ranger or a Chevy Colorado. No rice burners for Indiana.

However, in reality, you would most likely see some sort of full size rusted up Chevy.

 

[Gingerbeardman]

Quickly removable panels covering the tires. Auxiliary fuel tanks and spare tires. Basic tools for fixing truck. A couple winches on receiver hitch mounts. Extra lights. 4 wheel drive. I think 4 door long bed.