Back when gas was about $1/gallon, it made sense for me to use my old Ford 3/4 ton 4x4 as a spare car, rather than buying and insuring something that got better gas mileage than the 11 the 460 Ford would usually get. I think at that time I was putting 4K or 5k on the pickup per year and probably less than 10% of those miles were hauling anything but me. I need to have a pickup once in awhile, and after having a 4x4, I doubt that I would be satisfied with a 2wd again. And the big Ford will pull my car hauling trailer if I need it to and also will handle my camper if I want to travel that way.
But when gas went up to about $2/gallon, I decided that putting most of my second vehicle miles on a small car would work out better. I found and bought an old Mazda Protege with only about 60K miles on it for $2K. It consistently gets over 30mpg and works just fine for my needs. I do have to insure it, but with only the coverage required by our state law, it doesn't add that much to our insurance bill, especially when adding the Mazda caused the pickup rate to go down somewhat.
So now the pickup just sits there most of the time, ready when I need it, but not costing me much to own. At this rate, it will probably last for the rest of my life. I do keep a trickle charger on it, so the battery does not go dead.
I keep my wife in a fairly new, low mileage car, and she seems to put about 25K miles on it every year. I want her to have something that is totally dependable and which meets our family's needs, as well as getting good mileage. Our Pontiac Vibe does that very well, and I am able to use it when we go somewhere together or plan to go long distance.
Over the years I have had good luck in buying cars that were several years old, but which had fairly low mileage. I am always looking for what I think will be a good deal.
For a long time, I thought I would upgrade my pickup to a newer diesel. But at the high price of diesel now, and the relatively low number of miles I HAVE TO put on a pickup per year, I don't think I could EVER come out on it. So I have decided to just keep my old pickup, which might get a new paint job one of these days.
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Today's Featured Article - The Day Mom Drove the 8N - by Brian Browning. My Dad was wanting to put in a garden but couldn't operate the 8N and handle the old horse drawn plow he had found and rigged up to use with the tractor. Well, he decided to go get Mom out of the house and have her drive the tractor while he walked behind the plow. You got to understand that while my Mom is a hard worker who will always help whenever she can... she had never operated farm machinery before that day. Dad got her out there, explained how the clutch was the same as in our o
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