So, my In-laws just got themselves a new "car"
Looks kinda like this:
I'm going back home in Feburary and the wife and I are going to try to convince them to make some more environmentally-friendly decisions.
(I.E.-using reusable coffee cups instead of disposable.)
It occurs to me that they have a new huge "opportunity" sitting in their driveway now.
So, I'm trying to come up with ideas to green up their transport situation.
First the basic facts.
They commute 30 miles/day (roundtrip) and have two cars, one is an Olds Alero, the other is the F350 dually diesel.
Once every 2 weeks they have to haul 2 pallets of magazines a few hundred miles. They would prefer to be able to load these magazines with a forklift, so they don't have to stack and unstack them when loading and unloading.
They need to have one vehicle that can haul their current horse trailer (1-2 horses) or a similarly sized camper or trailer.
They pretty much only buy American cars, they may be convinced to buy an import, but it would take some doing.
So far I've been thinking of recommending a
Dodge sprinter van, it's diesel and has a cavernous amount of space (it'll fit 3 4'x4' pallets or 3000lbs) but is still EPA rated for 26/30mpg.
I assume from it's size that it'll have at least a class II receiver hitch, so that would do fine from a trailer perspective.
The other thing that I've considered recommending is a WVO/SVO conversion.
dinofuelalternatives.com sells the "vegistroke" conversion kit. I just don't know if WVO is going to be user friendly enough for them. Running the truck on WVO isn't the problem, it's the collecting and filtering. That might sink it.
Plus the startup cost, but I'm sure that argument will get easier with summer gas prices
Anyone else have any ideas?