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BUICK TRUCKS


Guest imported_MrEarl

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3 hours ago, Mark Shaw said:

 

No, and neither does this Caballero with Buick wheels...  I bought it for swap meets, but don't drive it enough; so it's for sale.

685468286_1986Caballero.thumb.jpg.d4c82fc31ed8b79b02b1904b650298d5.jpg

Yeah, I know.  Just like the Sprint / Caballero are rebadged El Caminios.  There are also refendered Pontiacs and other GM intermediates of the era.  I just thought that if this hadn't been seen by someone, he might enjoy looking at it.  The one thing that most of these  Grand National El Caminos have that makes them more Buick is that they also have the Grand National's turbo V6 and the dash and interior.

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20 minutes ago, Tinindian said:

Flxible sold these vehicles as .Flower Cars

I noted that they were cars that had been converted but because they're now used to haul things except for peope, I'm wondering if they're now trucks.  Kind of the same thing Chevrolet did in 1959 when they came out with the El Camino. 

 

For anyone down under.  Are Utes registered as cars or trucks?

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31 minutes ago, RivNut said:

For anyone down under.  Are Utes registered as cars or trucks?

Cars. (light vehicle)

https://www.vicroads.vic.gov.au/registration/new-registration/register-a-vehicle

https://www.vicroads.vic.gov.au/registration/registration-fees/vehicle-registration-fees

But some road toll operators charge the tolls as if a commercial truck. So more $ than a car of the same weight/length/size.

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When I was a boy about 10 my family was on vacation in the southern Missouri Ozarks.  We stopped somewhere for gas and the man at the station had a 51 or 52 Buick converted to a pickup.  Very good bodywork.  The back of the “cab” was closed off with what looked like the back of a 50s pickup.   Chevy maybe.  The inside of the bed/box was made of diamond plate.  The outside was the original car body.  I don’t recall anything about the tailgate.   I know, no pictures then it didn’t happen.   😎

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2 hours ago, 50ChevyFrank said:

I wish I could read Spanish.    Probably an interesting article.  

 

Here ya go.

 

THE CRANES OF KNIVES WORKSHOPS THIS POST IS A COLLABORATION OF FEDERICO NAVAJAS ARIZA, NIETO DEL FUNDADOR, OF WORKSHOPS NAVAJAS, DON FEDERICO NAVAJAS RAMOS My grandfather, Federico Navajas Ramos, since he opened the workshop in 1960 at No. 162 of the old Carretera de Cádiz, today Hero of Sostoa, was already turning his head to put a car crane into service, because he gave he tells that at that time there were hardly any cranes around Malaga, that the car park was getting bigger, that there were more and more foreign tourists with modern cars that were not typical nationals and that this required a service that was not available in the city. In addition to the tremendous traffic that began to have the Carretera de los Montes, a lot of breakdowns and accidents were occurring, which needed a crane that lowered cars to the city quickly and not in trucks or towing with another car as it was done until then. So taking advantage of the good situation of the workshop on the Carretera de Cádiz, the only entrance and exit from Malaga to the west, which was the most tourist in the province, he decided to look for a light crane, not a truck, because cranes as we know it today, they did not exist, they had to be handcrafted vehicles for that purpose. He was looking for something like an American Pick-up or similar, until he realized that he could serve a powerful car and transform it into a crane, so nothing better than an American car or an "aiga" of those who by their consumption were already in disuse or half abandoned. From a friend he learned in 1962 that a doctor named Ruiz de Portal was selling a Buick for 5,000 pts that was fine and had him half abandoned in a house in Vélez Málaga. There he went with the Dauphine that he had, accompanied by his two children (my father and my uncle), a can of gasoline and a 6v battery. They found a Buick Super Eight model 1942 red and black sedanet body (2 doors), license plate B-71362 (registered in 1943), with an inline 8-cylinder engine, two carburetors, 4,100 cc, 125 hp and three speeds, and I had been standing for quite some time. It was the ideal car to make the crane I had in mind. Doing that today would be a sacrilege, but it was another era.

 

Photo of the vehicle in 1990 As a good American he started as soon as he smelled gasoline and took him walking to the workshop in Malaga, he was given a good cleaning and enjoyed it as a private vehicle for a little while, until he took it to a chapista-bodybuilder workshop called “Soto y Galván ”, located in a courtyard near the Aurora, just behind the Church of Carmen and next to a very famous vehicle upholstery in the world called“ Quancas Tapestry ”. Pedro Galván and Soto, who at the request of my grandfather, cut the back of the car and closed the part of the cabin with three windows, making a pick up type. In the rear, just above the rear axle, Federico Navajas himself manufactured an extendable pen to which a Trackter was attached, the rear suspension was reinforced with two Ballamis in side semicantilever and another cross on the axle, all of them also manufactured exprocess in some workshops of the Aurora. A ratchet was attached to the primary axis of the gearbox, which was manually coupled so that it did not spit the first speed when making great efforts or pulls.

 

With all these modifications and once approved in industry (in the documentation it comes as a “light truck”), the transport card was requested and the Buick of Knives began to work as it was known in the Malaga workshops.

 

1968 sticker and calendar Talleres Navajas was fortunate to take advantage of the tourist boom of the sixties as well as the tremendous influx of both domestic and foreign cars that came to Malaga, so it can be said that it had almost the exclusive of the Carretera de los Montes or Colmenar de the breakdowns and accidents that required a crane, so much so that it was rare that the day did not raise the crane several times to the Montes to pick up a car. Not only did it work on this road but also anywhere else in the province. The majority of the services that were done in the Montes were heaters, vehicles without brakes (they were heated due to excessive use), accidents and even many falls by the embankments, hence the “Extractions Service” that is read on the cards and workshop bills. We must think that at that time, as bad as the vehicle was, everything was fixed and repaired. When the wrecked vehicle was very far from the road or the crane could not, then it was called Head Cranes and they climbed with a Pegasus with an extendable boom, removed the car, left it on the road and Buick was already pulling it down.

 

Invoice model of the 90s. Extractions service.   The drivers of the crane were both Federico Navajas and his sons Manuel and Antonio with some boy or apprentice of the workshop that was going as an assistant. The three alternated so that the repair shop would not be left unattended. There was such a volume of work that the services of another crane were needed. At first Federico Navajas asked him to borrow a Land Rover crane registration MA-59000 (1966) that was from the Garage Bevan (VW Dealer located in the Guindos), but in the end they reached an agreement and bought it from them. This crane was a Land Rover Santana 1st series (of which unfortunately no photos were ever taken) with a two-speed crank boom and height adjustment. He also carried a mechanical winch with a gearbox socket. Being painted light green, the Buick was painted with the same colors. It was in operation until 1984. Not all the cars that the crane picked up were for Razor Workshops, most were services that were performed for other workshops or individuals. Almost all official dealerships lacked a crane, so most required the services of these such as the Mercedes of R. Benet, Sertasa, Citroen or for special services such as the Renault de Maldonado on the Cádiz road. These had other facilities on Avenida de la Paloma (currently it is a Hipercor) with several floors and on the upper floor was sheet metal and paint, to access it I had to climb the car through narrow circular ramps. When the vehicle could not get on or off, then the only crane that passed was the Razor. The rest of the workshops when seeing that the cranes were a certain business, some curious vehicles like cranes began to work: * Pedro Galván (Chapistas Soto and Galván) found another Buick but from 47 and did the same operation as that of Navajas but was shortly in operation. * The Ford de Higuera dealership had a 1960 Ford F-100 pick up painted red as a crane but with a diesel engine coupled to an Austin truck. This crane was until 1989 or 1990 in Desguaces Cristóbal, in front of the Los Alamos gas station, on the same edge of the road next to the famous twin-engine aircraft of Havilan that was there. (I also did not take photos, but I got to ride inside both).

 

* The Martin Almendros Seat dealership, in front of the La Paz neighborhood, had a Dodge ¾ Tom, possibly from a military auction, converted into a crane. I don't know what happened to him, although I saw him in the mid-80s in a workshop at the entrance of Coín.

 

 Workshops Manolito de Colmenar had a Jeep Wyllis, it would also be a military auction. This worked between the mid-60s and the 70s by the Montes. When the new access was inaugurated, this Workshop went to Casabermeja and the Jeep as well. The photo is taken in July 2013, in a residential area at the entrance of Colmenar, you can still see the small crane boom. I guess it will still be there.

 

Photo taken in July 2013 When the New Access of Malaga (Casabermeja road) was opened and traffic was reduced by Colmenar, the services went down a little, but it was hardly noticed because it is also true that the car park increased greatly during those years. Already well into the 80s the crane market in Malaga increased. It was when, for example, Júuto Cranes began whose workshop was in Gerona Street. Almost all of that time were platforms whose drawback was its large size and length. As Razors continued with the smaller and more articulated drag, they were easily accessible to underground garages, narrow workshops and circulating through the increasingly collapsed downtown streets of vehicles. In 1979, the 1942 Buick was terminated due to its age (not due to breakdown). In 1984, the 1966 Land Rover was removed as a crane and sold to a village workshop. That same year Navajas bought another Land Rover Santana new crane from Talleres Molina (dealership of the brand, located in what is now Velázquez avenue just before Barriada el Torcal). With license plate MA-9673-V and a striking orange color, it was already manufactured as a crane by Santana herself, with electric motor in the boom and reinforced suspensions

 

Land Rover Santana Crane 1984 (photo taken in 1998) The tow cranes should have three important accessories: -1 The main one, was the so-called bed, a triangle of extendable tubes and chains, which was where the lower part of the vehicles rested and that on the one hand was hooked to the crane and on the other to the hook of the boom that He was the one who raised and lowered it. Photo where the bed is appreciated -2 The board, collapsed in the back of the towed vehicle and carried the registration of the crane and the steering, brake and position pilots Photo where the table is appreciated -3 The bar was literally a bar with a ring at each end and served to tow a vehicle on its four wheels but needed another driver in tow. It was used when the vehicle was very heavy or very large. This Land Rover was running daily until May 2002, when the Workshop was closed. The anecdote of this crane is that in November 1989, the day after the floods, it carried out 25 services of extractions of garage vehicles in a single day, and many others in later days when the water was already lowered and the mud appeared. Being drag and 4x4, it could enter all underground garages without problems. Taken once the water level dropped. Floods 1989 Regarding the Buick, after 17 years of service as a crane, he left due to problems with the renewal of the transport card. He parked for a while in a corner of the workshop. Subsequently, about 1981, he moved to the classroom workshop of the F.P. Guadaljaire (at the end of the Avenida de Europa in Barriada San Andrés) where the Navajas brothers worked as automotive teachers. In 1990 he moved to the family farm where a slow restoration began. In March 1996, it started again and circulated again in the surrounding roads perfectly. Currently still in restoration. Nor do we have photos of when the Buick worked as a crane. All are later. Photo showing the 8 cylinders in line.

 

 

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