My former office the T250 and E250 had the same storage.?ÿ Full partition with door behind the seats.?ÿ On the partition was first aid, aed, fire extinguisher, and various hooks for vets and jackets.?ÿ The drawers are ?ÿbehind the driver, space in front was for cooler, drills, instruments, and cones.?ÿ The T250 you cannot attach a cone holder to the front bumper as on the E250.?ÿ The drawers at the rear doors hold a lot of equipment.?ÿ There are four tripods, four prism bags, hand tools, stakes, three signs bases, metal detector, and other equipment.?ÿ Very well organized.?ÿ Everything is Adrian Steel.?ÿ The pull-out drawer are about $1,500 each, so all in it was about $6,000 for this setup.
My first ever Survey vehicle was a Nissan C20 Vanette 1.5l in 1985, for highway and local jobs.?ÿ Borrowed a supervisors Isusu 4wd for occasional off road jobs, where the van wouldn't make it.
Later had Mitsubishi L300 SWB vans, 2.5l diesel and later petrol.?ÿ The diesel was really good.
Then variety of small utility vehicles mostly Toyota Hilux.
Worked out of a GMC Safari for my entire time as a crew chief.?ÿ Had to beef up the rear suspension to handle the weight of the box, but it was a pretty good rig for suburban/rural mid-atlantic work.
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In High School we "worked" out of one as well.... ????ÿ
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@fairbanksls That is until you get a few iron rods stuck under it rendering it useless.
We usually turn of the DCS in stage rally cars.?ÿ It does not seem to work well when you are really hammering the car.?ÿ Besides, it is hell on rear brakes.
It's the shagging wagon.?ÿ
Went to high school in the 70's and drove a dodge polara station wagon, next best thing at the drive-in.?ÿ A drive-in is a big field with a large screen where they once showed movies.?ÿ I explained that for the younger people in surveying but I realized there are no younger people in surveying.?ÿ Sorry
I was forever damaged at the drive in at 4 yo when I watched the godfather and the horse head scene.
I recovered from the trauma enough to take my 94' 4rumner to the drive in and man, the fm transmission of the soundtrack far exceeded my expectations.
@james-fleming Man you just dated yourself. ???
Just because I'm paranoid, doesn't mean they aren't out to get me.
I thought it was a documentary?ÿ
It wasn't?
Everything had it's place in the equipment box and I never had?ÿ anything get stuck under it.?ÿ?ÿ
I??ve used everything from a Lincoln Towncar to a F-250 pickup. 2 companies I worked for used vans. By far my favorite. Especially the 4wd flavor.?ÿSo much more room to organize equipment and supplies to your liking. Newer trucks and their shorter beds present issues for storing longer stuff and keeping it organized.?ÿ
The E350 standard length with 5.4 and tow package has been pretty good to work out of in the city. It's an open differential with very stiff springs (rated 4400 lbs. capacity, cargo + passengers) and it will get stuck in its own shadow if there is no weight in it.
A new van with factory insulation hopefully has the condensation mildew problem solved unlike the DIY insulated hardwood floor I just removed.
I had a box of 1/2" plywood top and bottom and 4 2x12's for the sides and middle supports, all left storebought size (4' by 8' sheets and 8' lengths). Perfect size for milk crates and instrument boxes, and gives channels for shovels, axes, digging bars, 2m GPS rods, etc.
I used a ladder rack to attach 4 Siemens 75 watt solar panels, wired to a Renogy controller and an AGM deep cycle battery in a box. A 300 watt pure sine wave inverter powers the Leica and X90-OPUS chargers, phone chargers, laptops, etc. To do it over I would use those flexible marine solar panels you can glue on.
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@ryancj31 After having to work out of a short bed Silverado with the back seats removed to make room for instrument cases, no room to shoe horn in a second guy or his gear, I concluded a van setup would be the most ideal for what I do. How it will work out, time will tell.
Just because I'm paranoid, doesn't mean they aren't out to get me.
