A short while back, I started a thread on the BangShift forums letting people know I had mounted new Firestone tires on my truck Goliath. I included some sneak peek photos before the actual story ran on our blog. The thread turned into an interesting debate about the truck, and the fact it is limited to a speed of about 60mph due to the steep gearing it has. Many guys seemed to be mystified about my okay-ness with that fact and my lack of any sort of plan to “fix it”.
It got me to thinking about the truck a lot and why I am pretty much Hell bent on keeping it as is. There’s more than one reason, other than my history with big, old trucks. There’s the cool factor of having the original motor and transmission in the truck, the semi-unique factor that it is a very early 292ci inline-six, the fact that I have no plans to take it on a road trip of major significance, and lastly, because it is my truck. The debate was all in good spirit and fun. The suggestions made were all good ones and for someone looking to modernize and old truck adding an overdrive transmission like an NV4500 from a Dodge would allow for a lot more cruising speed and better all-around ratios than the current SM420 crash box has.
In my mind, I modernized it by adding a bench seat from an ’88 GMC I found at the junkyard. That’s as far as I am willing to go.
A couple of the comments stuck with me and as I am want to do, I spent some time thinking about them. The first one eluded to the fact that the truck is not going to be a worker, only a fun vehicle and a cruiser to buzz around my local area with. The commenter’s point was pretty clear. He thought that if the truck’s only job was entertainment, why not make it more modern and user-friendly. Again, it is impossible to attack his logic. After some thought, my answer to that concern is that going slowly down the road in the truck WILL be my entertainment.
Like lots of people, my life seems to be moving at 150mph at all times. Driving this truck will force me to slow down and get there when I get there. Given the opportunity of more gears, a more powerful motor, or more modern suspension, I’d never do that. I welcome the fact that rushing isn’t an option with Goliath because the vast majority of my life is spent doing just that, and usually for someone else’s benefit. I can load the boys or my wife into the cab of the truck and mosey down the road, getting my doors blown off by every other vehicle out there.
I’ll wave as they go by.
The second comment kind of brought me to a personal revelation. It was made in reference to guys who restore Model Ts rather than make hot rods out of them. The poster said it was something he just didn’t get. Up until I met this truck, I didn’t either, but I certainly do now.
Their motivation is the same as mine and it is very simple. I want, like they do, to have a 100% authentic driving experience. I want to be rolling down the road just like the first guy who drove the truck did in the mid-1960s. That’s a big appeal to me personally. Adding a nice overdrive trans, a big block, etc would take that away.
Like the Model T restorer, I want the stuff that’s viewed as a shortcoming in the modern world. In my case it is the SM420 transmission and 7.20 geared rear-end. With the Model T it is the myriad of levers, buttons and foot pedals that need to be manipulated to even get the car to move. It takes a pair of stones and some skill to drive a real Model T out in modern traffic. You have to be on top of your stuff or there will absolutely be a crash.
This is not a shot at the way other people build their cars or what there preferences are, but driving an old car with modern underpinnings isn’t the same as driving an old car as it left the factory. For better or worse.
An experience I had a couple years back working with the guys at Hot Rod Magazine on a story called the “Road Thrash” planted a seed forever in my head. That was a road trip where we took a bunch of different cars for a long drive through California. There were Steve Strope machines, old race cars that were barely street legal, traditional hot rods, stock muscle cars, and some heap called the F-Bomb. After driving the traditional rod, and we’re talking a legit,Wayne headed, straight six powered Deuce, with Lincoln brakes, it was like someone had hit me with a hammer. Driving that car was time traveling.
Driving the modern stuff was awesome, because it drove better in all aspects, was faster, etc, but it didn’t grab me by the sack like that little rod did.
Truth be told the thing was hairy to drive. We’re coddled now, and the raw nature of an old car like that just really turned my crank. It required constant attention and awareness. Snoozing or drifting off into space wasn’t an option. Marlan Davis was having an audible panic attack driving it more than 35mph.
I got the keys for that particular car on an extended highway stint. Lots of the drive to that point had been on back roads. On the highway it wandered, got blown around by semi tractors, needed to be rowed up hills, and the straight six was worked pretty hard to keep the little rod running with the pack. It was like heaven because it was authentic. It put me right there with the rest of the crazies from the late 1940s and 1950s who built their junk at home with varying levels of finish quality. It set the hook for wanting something of my own that brought me to the same gearhead place. So consider Goliath a giant, mutated, version of that hot rod.
Rightly or wrongly, I’m not planning any major changes to Goliath. Whether you argree with that or not, I’m ok. I know that you won’t be able to miss me coming down the road. I’ll be sawing at the wheel, turning about 3,000rpm as you blow by me with a grin about four feet wide across my face.
Thanks for reading,
Brian
