6 spd. 7.3 Diesel 4wd with a wrecker bed!!!

Nice, just watched that the other night.

That dad wasn't fucking around.  Need to cross a busy road?  Fire bomb it!

Raptor.

Maybe upgrade the engine. I went with a 94 f150 351w roller motor. I think in 84 they had a whopping 160 hp or something silly and a 2 barrel carb. Simple to work on, can still get parts, good mobility in most terrains. Not great mpg, but definitely hardy.

That is not a pic of mine btw, but a man can dream. Mine needs paint badly.

The SHTF? I suspect a lot of folks are gonna go new truck “shopping” at the local stealerships….

Cops, and likely the dealers, will have other things to worry about, if it’s all coming down.


I’m sticking with my 4Runner Trail.

I'm pretty solidly in the 4Runner camp. Things are unbreakable and go everywhere.

Busted.

This.  The bandits will be heavily armed.

Honestly, I'd choose a HMMWV and uparmor it.  I'd expect it to make one trip from point A to final bug out location point B.

I could uparmor a HMMWV for anyone who could afford it.  Dyneema, plate steel, bulletproof glass, I could do all of it.  But it certainly won't be cheap.

Eco sport

Nothing drives faster then a rental.

Tacoma TRD Offroad 4x4.

I'm surprised it took 3 pages for someone to mention a military humvee tbh

With a forestry mulcher, just in case.

It has to be something diesel powered. If everything shuts down you'd think diesel supplies would last longer than gas, and it certainly stores better.

Diesel Land Cruisers.    Can’t be broken.  Crew serve weapons ready.

There's just nothing close.  It's simple as hell.  It's heavy duty enough to shove cars out of the way or actually drive over them or drag them out of the way.  It's designed entirely around capability that you might need.  It comes with steel wheels with run flats.  It's also relatively easy to get a well taken care of older one with a 6.5 or 6.2 diesel and a 3 speed transmission for $15k-20k.  Plus it's easy to get a trailer for it that matches its off road ability perfectly.

The cons are:

1)  Could be argued is more expensive, but it really depends on what you're comparing it to.
2)  Wider.  If you expect to have to go through forested Jeep trails, expect to have to cut down trees.  If you're going through vehicles on a deserted highway with only a gap wide enough for a Jeep, now it's not wide enough for you.  Etc.  While it USED to be that the Humvee was ridiculously wider than any other passenger vehicle, now it's only a fraction of an inch wider than a Ford Raptor, and Jeeps have gotten so wide that it's not much different either.
3)  A different AWD system.  It's not really 4WD.  And the Torsen differentials are likely different than anything you've ever driven.  And the inboard mounted brakes combined with the half shafts with the heavy wheels can result in snapped half shafts if you haven't learned how to drive the truck.  You can lessen the risk of breakages further by getting an A2 truck.  Off road, there are downsides to its drive system, but it is extremely capable and handles very well on the road as long as it's properly aligned and has upgraded Civvy tires.
4)  Low power.  A huge downside for acceleration and highway driving.  But the gearing is so low and with a high torque diesel engine gives it a TON of torque in the low ranges.
5)  Weak outer shell.  Encased in aluminum tub with a SMC (like fiberglass) hood, you have to get a heavy duty brushguard and bumper to do any serious pushing of other vehicles.  I make some for this.  Ibis-Tek makes some for this.
6)  Rare-ish.
7)  Sticks out like a sore thumb.  You will either be targeted heavily because you're in a Humvee.  Or people will think that you have air support and give you a wide berth, just to exaggerate.

Negative. 1999 was moar better.
Attached File

If it got wild I’d bust out the aervoe or use gaffers tape to spell “press / tv” along the side.

I can vouch for this.  Have a 10 year old and all its required is fluids and tires.  100K no problems.

Mine prefered would be  2000 7.3 diesel Super Duty.

Yeah, that's freakin crazy! It makes me feel pretty confident with my Taco.

Jeep Rubicon (used) can be or at least could be had for under $50K last time I checked.

The AR15 of Jeeps.   Easy to work on by the end user, easy to modify, wide selection of available parts both MOPAR and after market, and a large number of Jeep Clubs with highly experienced Jeep owners who can provide valuable partners when it comes to learn how to drive off road, maintenance, repair, etc. and so forth. Not to mention the Jeep community are some of the coolest friendliest people I've ever met.  Heck, I'll just say it "Jeep people are like a cult almost."    I meet Jeep folks like myself and I find 99% of the time I like them, we've got things to talk about as we have similar mindset and there is strength in a community my friend.  

The Rubicon is formidable right off the lot as well for off road use.  I love mine and I mean it brings me joy and I've become a "car guy" because of it.  Love working on my Jeep, love driving it, love taking it Overlanding, and I'll tell ya every single person I take for a ride in it loves it as well.  I've got the dual tops and man I love running the top down as well, take the doors off no problem...you just gotta experience it once in your life.  If you haven't bought a Jeep at least once in your life you're missing out man.

I gotta say one of the great things about the Jeep is I find everyone respects every Jeep model.  Even the two door no thrills Sports get respect, because they're still pretty damn capable. The guys running the older CJ's and TJ's get much love.  A Jeep is a Jeep, it's great.

The only down side to the jeep is there isn't much carrying capacity.

Air cooled VW.

I understood that reference.  


ETA: would make a hell of a lot more sense if I'd quoted the pic...  

Compact Track Loader, aka- skid steer.

I was thinking pallet forks with an oversized apron.

Used Suburban 1500

You can carry a ton of crap in it.
You can sleep in it.
You can carry 8 people in it.  
You can carry long stuff (boards/pipes, etc) in it.
You can comfortably do 80-90 MPH in it.
It's "gray man" from a visual standpoint
Parts are plentiful and common to many GM models.

The only answer here is a 22R equipped Toyota.

Id say a jeep XJ,   but in reality  if it got that bad  you'd  want to be attracting zero attention , meaning look at backpacks.

Best ?

Probably a white ford f150 4x4 utility truck with ladder racks, extended fuel tanks and other goodies.

Such a truck can slip thru where others cant. Locally we had roads closed due to tornado. I have the above truck, with flashing lights, spot light etc.

I flipped on flashing lights and got waived thru roadblocks by local cops while others were turned away, cops barely glanced at me, .because white utility trucks were everywhere, power, water, gas, etc and they assumed i was just another utility truck, etc. And waived me thru. Driving such a truck  Could easily get you thru road blocks, or ignored when roads are closed, etc. Add a clipboard, hardhat, and magnetic door sign and make you look 10x more official. Sort of like driving a gov vehicle...without.

My truck.. used to be a tennessee highway dept truck. Has the 5.0 engine, spotlight, hidden  10,000lb warn winch, emergency strobes in lights.

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Sherman land mine clearing tank.

Power Wagon.

Jeep guy as well. The gas tank is a concern, but I'm set up to carry extra fuel on my WJ and XJ. Bugging out is not a consideration where I am in Ohio, and has never factored into any planning here. This is my home, and I'll be damned if I'm running away.

My Jeeps are set up as troop carriers.

agreed...just like my Tahoe thoughts...very close. and hits all the needs.

Why are you guys so fascinated with manual hubs?  I've broken a hell of a lot of things on my trucks, but never has an automatic hub failed me.  

What is best ride for SHTF?  The one you have that is full of fuel.  If shit really hit the fan there will be plenty of choices available.

Depends on how long you can keep it running without parts and how long it needs to keep running, most new vehicles will be dead in a few years of rough use

Ah gotcha! Plus could provide a good foundation to up-armor for a personal tank.

These are actually really good points - I hadn't even considered this level of "camo", and I can imagine where it could be useful

Probably my Tundra, but depending on the situation we also have a minivan that gets 36MPG and can discretely carry a lot of people and supplies.  No good off road obviously.

This for me. Attached File

Unimog or 15 Jeep Cherokee XJs

It would have to be identical to yours because the other 14million of them are rusted to shit and barely run

In my experience it’s not been the hub break but rather the system that activates them. Ford used Vacuum for a long time and it’s easy for the hoses to dry and crack. Though the same could be said for auto transfer cases my bronco was powered by a electric motor that would freeze up had to crawl under the truck and smack it. Luckily on the super duty’s they had vacuum hubs but manual override so not as big an issue.

The one you know and can fix or bypass to keep it running

I have a Nissan Xterra, but any similar vehicle
4wd, low range, reliable

Jeep gets more capability, less reliability and storage

I have front and rear lockers, front and rear plate bumpers, winch, full plate steel skids, rock sliders and most importantly know how to fix it, what it’s weakness and strengths are, have spare parts and tools, and with the number of frontiers made, have a shit ton of spare parts out there

Drawback is gas mileage, 15mpg on a good day

Long terms definitely a horse or mule.

That and they are unreliable as fuck.

I have three Jeeps, and enough parts to build another one.  I can keep one going for a long time if the SHTF, but for the average fiat "Jeep" owner, fuck no.

Your average joe would be best suited with a 3rd gen 4runner or a Tacoma from that same era.  

I love my Jeeps, but they get shit mileage, and they are at the bottom of the barrel for reliability.  

The Toyotas last forever, but they get shit MPG too.

Something like a deuce and a half for capability and multiple fuel use, although damn and the mpg and maint on those.

Something like this would be good.  4bt has been swapped in for excellent fuel economy and you could use bio diesel/ fryer grease in a pinch.  Good cargo area.  Excellent gearing.

But you could swap a 4bt into a 4runner and have the same thing.

1.  1992-1996 Ford F-150, 300 I6 (4.9L), manual transmission, maybe 4x4 depending on your opinion of the added complexity of the twin traction beams relative to the advantage of 4wd.
1a.  Toyota 4-Runner (any year).

As several others have pointed out, in a SHTF scenario power supply is going to be the critical issue. Without the juice to go your vehicle will be at most a poorly locked storage cabinet for stuff.

Fortunately there is one modern tech that offers a significant advantage to all the other power options and that is a PHEV. It has the maximum range of any vehicle (of the same class) when fully charged and fueled. You can power it with gas when that is available, save that gas in the tank when electricity is available, and if all gas supplies run out, it still has usable range as an EV being able to charge from any source of electricity.

They usually come with smaller gas tanks to accommodate the HV battery pack, but if you remedy that with some extra gas cans, you could be have a range of a couple thousand miles total even for a small SUV.

I think most brands have at least one of those in their lineup, something like a Toyota RAV4, Ford Explorer, Mitsubishi Outlander etc. It appears the Jeep Wrangler 4xe is just barely out of your stated price range. Even that monster should get 20 mpg with the 2.0L and hybrid drive, and could have the Rubicon upgrades, although the US version EV range is only 20 miles (here they promise 30 mi with the same 17.3 kW battery pack under the Euro EV range standard).