The Civic Pickup (light duty, enclosed)
 

Here are the 8' 10' and 12' 1x4s and a 2x4 Clear Redwood boards for an 8' outdoor dinning table that I am making for my wife's birthday. This is just after I extracted them from the Civic. They only stuck out the trunk 2.5' because when I remove the passenger seat I have almost a ten foot span from the front of the front passenger foot well to the tail of the trunk lid, almost unobstructed.
:thumbup:

It's like a clown car, sometimes. My neighbor with his mini pickup truck was impressed. :D

http://ecomodder.com/forum/attachmen...1&d=1401575529

I can get 8 foot long pieces in the Fiesta without having the hatch open.

regards
Mech

Call it the Civic Duty?

I was always pleasantly surprised by how much stuff my '74 Nova hatchback could haul.

I'm continually disappointed in the relative lack of hauling capacity in regular sedans and coupes that normally don't feature any pass-thru from the trunk to the back seat area... and I'm loathe to remove the back seat and start cutting braces away on a car in nice condition.

Wish hatchbacks were more popular in N. America.

I looked at Civic hatchbacks and Fits because of this. I could actually get my dog in the Fit. I know because when I looked at a new one I had the salesman close the trunk while I was in there on my hands and knees, simulating my dog...

But, I was looking in the $6,000 range and could not find a Fit that cheap and the Civic hatches were priced too high or had too many performance mods (well, so-called performance mods) on them.

I have put six bags of mulch in my Civic's trunk, lumber, bikes, a really good day of shopping at Costco's boxes and bags, and my treestand/gun/hunting stuff. It's funny, because my good buddy that bought a 2014 F-150 Ecoboost (loaded, really really nice truck) just told me he finally went to the city dump for the first time in it after a year of owing it. One of the reasons he sold himself on a $49,000 truck that gets 14.5 mpg is so he could make dump runs since he worked on the house so much. He commutes in it and put 20,000 miles on it in the first year.

Ouch! That really hurts financially. Gotta be careful. I use the civic for hauling firewood, taking cuttings to the dump, and moving whatever. To be honest, my little enclosed light duty pickup is really limited, but not as limited as people imagine. It serves my needs.

One-time TOOLS should be used ONCE...and then returned to the rental place.

We have the Mazda for bigger loads. I just hauled 10 bags of mulch in it, with the middle seats still up. It can hold a lot.

If I need a truck, I call my buddy with the F-150!

Yes. This is my argument against people buying trucks because they own a house. Buying a sheet of plywood once a year isn't a valid reason to buy a truck as a daily driver.

Though, I'd love to get a hunting truck. I will someday, and it will most likely be a second Gen Ram, maybe a third Gen (depending on price...), but it will be used to go hunting, buy big things at Home Depot and pull my 1971 Dodge Dart around as I restore it and buy parts for it. So basically, I will put very little miles on it.

I present to you a full door with window and hardware fitting in the back with the hatch closed. The parts guy thought it was impossible, but i knew better. The car seemed to like the rear to front weight displacement, and the extra momentum on the highway was acceptable. The sucker was heavy for an aluminum door! It'll carry a lot of volume fine, sleeping in the back is quite comfy on trips.The only victim has been my 14ft Kayak that's been unused for three years.
http://i177.photobucket.com/albums/w...e/GEDC0595.jpg
http://i177.photobucket.com/albums/w...e/GEDC0596.jpg
http://i177.photobucket.com/albums/w...e/GEDC0598.jpg

I managed to get a Tempo hood in a Tempo back seat.

Getting the light hauling done in compact cars is not really so hard, but some people are either too reckless to try it or just look for an excuse to get a big truck with a boat-anchor engine.

I haven't had the Fit long enough to haul much, but last week I had a 100 foot roll of 1.25" PVC hose. I had to unwrap it and feed it in because it was too big to fit in the hatch as one piece.

http://ecomodder.com/forum/attachmen...7&d=1401802854

For several years I used to take my push mower, blower, weed eater, hedge trimmer, etc . . . in my Festiva to mowing jobs.
I made two short ramps from 2x4 PT scrap, and just had to fold the mower handle down to fit it in the back.
I saved enough money mowing to buy a 40" riding mower this year, and if I could fit that beast in the Festiva I'd do it.

My Jetta was great for hauling stuff!

http://www.blogcdn.com/www.autoblog....usters-opt.jpg

:P

My Civic does a decent job as a parts chaser. I've hauled a door, a full set of 29" tall tires/wheels, and 900lbs of electric motors (evenly distributed about the car). Not all in the same trip.

This reminds me of something I saw this weekend. A guy was riding his bicycle with a homemade trailer carrying a mower, gas cans, and a weed eater with a sign on the side advertising his mowing business.

http://www.blogcdn.com/www.autoblog....usters-opt.jpg

Must be retar- I mean, related.

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r...psbf868e86.jpg

Possibly. :D

Look a little harder at who is driving "my" car...

Kim Jong-un?

Ive hauled a lot of crap in my insight too, but I get a lot of over sized items that either need to be trailer or tied on top. A pickup truck would be nice considering I do yard and land scape and the city gives free dirt to its residents. Its hard to load the back of an insight with a front end loader of dirt, then unload it later. :eek:

Same with the insight. Put them in cross wise rear driver to front passenger. I can do ten feet, 12 feet with passenger window open. :D

The guys at home depot love watching me make large pieces of lumber disapear inside my car. :D

Do you ride that instead of driving the Festiva? :)

I've had 2 sheets of plywood (cut in half lenth wise) inside my Civic, hatch closed. I could have loaded it without cutting the sheets in half but I would have had to drive leaning out the opened drivers door, Ace Ventura style. As it was I was nervous driving with the plywood resting on my right sholder. Thankfully Home Depot is only a mile away.

Thats what I like about the roof line of the insight, if you do not mind riding slouched down in the seat you can easily shove a full size door over top the seats and close the hatch. :thumbup:

Table complete
 

I want to share the completed table project that was part of the OP in this thread. I posted a pic of it and description of the project here:
http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthrea...tml#post430230

:D