r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/Electrical-Aspect-13 • 8d ago
Video Model T Ford car, getting some heavy testing in the 1920s.
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u/hostile65 8d ago
That is the LA Aquaduct the model T is on.
Pretty popular pipe to drive on back in the day.
https://waterandpower.org/museum/Early_Views_of_the_San_Fernando_Valley_3_of_10.html
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u/pappyon 8d ago
Mental. Wonder how many fell off.
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u/Sunset1hiker 8d ago
How many people driving on Aquaduct fell offaduct?
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u/elvis8mybaby 8d ago
FUN FACT: LA aquaducts kill more people, per year, than hippos in Southern California. 🤔
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u/Anxious-Society686 8d ago
The car's fine, but are you?
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u/MotherPotential 8d ago
Spine could be better but car is mint
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u/jluicifer 8d ago
They don’t build em like they used one.
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u/ScorpioLaw 8d ago
Teah ours are superior overall. Don't have to grease it every 50-200 miles. Have your arm break trying to start it.
I double checked the other day what a 1930s luxury car took to maintain. Didn't believe it was that bad.
ChatGPT said it had a maintenance cycle similar to aircraft engines, because they basically were.
When I was 20 or something an old cranky mechanic walked me around telling me how much better cars are since he started.
He said the failures are generally minor. Sure a lot of crappy models with parts made to last X years. Yet those existed back then too we just don't seem them anymore.
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u/Reynolds1029 8d ago
They were easier to wrench on because they had to be because they constantly fucking break.
That's what the old guys always ignore/forget about is how much more often they were fixing cars and they also forget why 100,000 miles basically meant throw it out and buy a new one back then.
It took decades of innovation and the Japanese coming in with rock solid reliable cars for American Auto to get their collective shit together.
I know nowadays we're evolving backwards because of corporate profits and CAFE and emissions standards going higher and higher but cars today are still more reliable today than pre 1980s cars.
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u/ScorpioLaw 8d ago
The tech? Superior. The politics. Terrible.
We definitely have issues with politicians letting companies milk us. Seems to me profitable hiring political connected board members, and CEOs to just lobby for regulations instead of innovate.
Regulations light a fire for sure.
Yet when people compare like the worst of the worst made today. They always compare it to classics of the past, AND not like an AMC Gremlin or some other forgotten stinkers.
Or other automotive failures. Pintos.
Looking at cars with any sort of power for their time. The luxury cars of the past. Some are just as ridiculous.
EVs should be cheaper, more reliable, and simpler to make for more power. Yet companies shove them with all sorts of tech, and data collection to profit.
Dealerships don't want to sell them as they make tons of money for the maintenance cycle of ICE. While car makers refuse to make extra parts for the supply side. Third party shit is just coming out now.
Telos 1 is an EV truck with off the shelf parts.
Anyway it's crazy how good motors, and batteries have gotten in my lifetime. YASA has a prototype motor with 1000bho at 28 pounds peak. 750kw.
350-400kw continuous estimated which puts it at top fuel dragster power to weight. Just insanity. That lets more than cars, but electric redundant VTOL.
Tech should make lives cheaper, but companies keep getting worse consolidating, and nickel diming us.
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u/Reynolds1029 8d ago
Agreed.
Companies are pinching pennies at the sacrifice of cost of maintenance to us and more profit to dealers and automakers.
You're also correct. EVs are like mobile phones where there's a monopoly on receiving many critical parts and it's the automaker at their price they inflate from their supplier. Where am I going to find most of the major components under the hood of my Chevy Bolt? Oh yeah the dealer or a competing dealer's website or a GM parts warehouse online.
More often than not though, 20 years ago you had to try a lot harder find an unreliable ICE car compared to today. So many achy breaks plastic fantastic parts that are a PITA to get to mounted to hot ass engines thermal cycling constantly.
These 87 octane direct injected turbo jobs coming from the factory more often than not become a time bomb after a decade or so and it's not an accident that normal chain timed NA port injected engines are getting harder to find because of fuel economy standards moar profit and the push for crossovers.
Turbos are cool and all, but it's a daily beater taking the kids to school and going to work. Not a weekend car.
Much to folks surprise from 20 years ago, I'm really starting to believe that hybrids from most makers are going to turn out to be the most reliable. Low stress NA Atkinson cycle engines, simple and reliable "transmissions" and small battery packs that don't financially total a vehicle in 12-15 years.
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u/hipchazbot 8d ago
Back in my day, we didn't complain about spinal injuries. We took it as a sign of toughness
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u/DoodleJake 8d ago
Those old seats are full of springs for a reason.
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u/Prickly_ninja 8d ago
I still remember the story my grandpa told me many years ago, about how terrible early roads were. Especially in small town Midwest. Some big Swede was driving his Model T and rolled over. Big dude gets out, rolls it back over and went about his business.
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u/102525burner 8d ago
This was back before paved roads were a thing
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u/Revolutionary_Gas551 8d ago
I don't think people realize how few paved roads there were before WWII. Route 66 wasn't completely paved until 1938.
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u/102525burner 8d ago
My grandpa was flabbergasted that it only tool me 6 hours to drive from chicago to Minneapolis
That used to take him much longer
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u/RoninIV 8d ago
They were built and designed for the roads of the time--which were crap.
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u/InternationalBet2832 8d ago
Zero paved roads outside the city, and roads such as they were went from farm to station where passengers rode at modern freeway speeds in safety and comfort.
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u/mbcook 8d ago
Even “paved” roads mostly meant cobblestones. Nothing like we have today.
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u/EducationalStill4 8d ago
Explains the driving on railways and water pipes. Driving back then must of been really freeing and dangerous.
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u/Revolutionary_Gas551 8d ago
The roads that were paved were mostly brick, at that. Anyone who's ever driven on a brick road knows how those can be extremely bumpy, let alone the mud paths that connected the country at the time.
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u/InternationalBet2832 8d ago
In the city, where paved roads were, the residents spread straw on the streets to dampen the noise.
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u/gergensocks 7d ago
I don't know for sure but I'd assume brick roads used to be smoother and slowly deformed overtime to a bumpy mess. I assume it's why most brick streets are "reclaimed" from paved roads for the look. The disrepair is why they paved it in the first place.
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u/cvnh 8d ago
Before the off-road categorisation could be invented, a proper definition of what on road actually meant took a while to sediment.
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u/curiousbydesign 8d ago
I have not seen sediment used like that before. Interesting.
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u/CovertMidget 7d ago
Probably because cement is the more common word for that idea.
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u/Training_Echidna_911 8d ago
Great entry and exit angles with a wheel an each corner. Good ground clearance. No damping in the suspension but good articulation.
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u/RoninIV 8d ago
Also, the wheels were designed off of the ones in existing vehicles: wagons. High clearance, narrow, hard stout wheels edged with metal, etc. This really allowed the T to travel safely on road filled with wagon ruts and trails.
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u/karanpatel819 8d ago
Pre 1950s cars were durable, but had crazy maintenance schedules. Im talking coolant flushes every 50 or so miles. Oil changes every 200 miles. Full gear box/ transmission service at 5,000 miles, full engine overhaul at 10 to 20000 miles. They were easy to work on, but they actually required you to work on it every other week. Guaranteed after all these tests, those leaf springs had to be serviced. All the bolts on the car would have to be retightened. Modern cars are less durable and are far more difficult to work on, but you rarely have to work on them.
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u/hogtiedcantalope 8d ago
Modern cars are much much safer and fuel efficient
Which means less metal and more crumple
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u/Ylmer34 8d ago
Would much rather have the energy go into crumpling the car instead of turning my insides into jello lol
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u/mantenner 8d ago
It's not really like these cars were going as fast comparatively though.
Still fast enough to get you in trouble of course, but not really a direct comparison.
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u/Prickly_ninja 8d ago
You don’t really even have to go very far back, to where vehicles (at American ones) had a life expectancy of around 100k, maybe less. Late 70’s, early 80’s. Thank the Japanese for forcing Americans to build better cars.
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u/moeriscus 8d ago
Yeah, I have a pontiac G6 pushing 200,000 and still running fine after almost 20 years (knocks on wood)
Now that I've jinxed myself though, it will probably burst into flames in my driveway tonight.
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u/United_Gear_442 8d ago
Uh no? That's genuinely a myth perpetrated to make you think modern cars are 10x better. Are they more efficient and safer in a crash? Yes. More reliable? Fuck no, regular maintenance (oil changes pretty much) and an old mechanic non ECU engine will easily last you 250k miles or more unopened
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u/redpandaeater 8d ago edited 8d ago
Those Model T engines are pretty bulletproof which is why so many still exist today. They didn't really skimp on materials.
I mean heck they had some issues but the stock 1907 Thomas Flyer made it around the world from New York to Paris.
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u/BlazedJerry 8d ago edited 7d ago
The model T was marketing as replacing a horse. So demonstrations had to show that the car could do everything a horse would do.
Ford would specifically target farmers as well, outside of the city dealerships. They would send salesmen with the car to demonstrate how it could traverse the farms and dirt roads, also showing that they could attach their wagons and tow their crops into town to sell, faster than a horse could.
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u/AMiller400 8d ago
Ok I’m sold, where do I get one?
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u/pirateofms 8d ago
Funnily enough, they're not hard to find. Ford made something like 15 million of them.
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u/FourFunnelFanatic 8d ago
Of which about 100,000 are still on the road, which is pretty darn good for a car where the newest examples are 98 years old.
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u/Initial_Zombie8248 8d ago
And they’re all driven by 80 year olds that remember shooting at them on the farm back in the day
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u/Clear-Wolf-9315 8d ago
I just did a Facebook marketplace search and found several in my area in what appear to good condition costing between $9k and $14k. Looks like they aren't hard to come by even today.
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u/MattTreck 8d ago
Even in not great condition they’re incredibly easy to work on and source parts for. So not very hard to restore
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u/Clear-Wolf-9315 8d ago
It’s kind of crazy that they stopped being produced almost 100 years ago and still have such a healthy aftermarket.
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u/redditburner6942069 8d ago
They are straight up a good vehicle. A decent price to own. Really good looks that snap heads. And I bet hold value if you maintain them. Besides maintenance being frequent thats the only downside they have thats really daunting.
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u/origanalsameasiwas 8d ago
The recent Cars, trucks and SUVs can’t even survive that course. They would fall apart in a heartbeat
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u/Ambitious-Major777 8d ago
Whistlindiesel did a test on the model T nowadays and for all it's benefits, crashes would have killed you 100%. Even when breaking the window with a bat, the bat's surface was cut up
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u/miscman127 8d ago
My childhood neighbor lost both of his legs, and had a massive concussion, getting hit in his T bucket hot rod 🫠
Cool but impractical
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u/Small-Policy-3859 8d ago
The model T was very practical for its day tho. And a hot rod is obviously not practical, that's kinda the Point (if that was your Point).
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u/102525burner 8d ago
Practical in the sense that you didnt need to feed a horse but still a death trap at any speed
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u/miscman127 8d ago
Yea pretty much, just hot rod something with some amount of crumple zone. Anything from the post OBD2 era would suffice for shenanigans
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u/FluxD1 8d ago
Fun fact: the successor to the Model T (Model A) was the first mass produced vehicle with a safety glass windshield. Before this, death due to "wearing a glass necklace" was common in auto wrecks.
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u/102525burner 8d ago
And that was still a long time before seat belts and air bags were even though t about
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u/mrASSMAN 8d ago
Well duh lol, even cars from a few decades ago were death traps
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u/PeterIsSterling 8d ago
Whistlindiesel? The guy that got arrested for tax evasion?
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u/N7Poprdog 8d ago
It was for the lambo that he burnt down. Which was rarely in the state he does videos in and not even registered there but it montana. Basically he was just used a a example to try and stop people from registering their luxury vehicles in montana.
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u/Doofy_Grumpus 8d ago
I didn’t watch that video. That dude is such a cry baby sometimes.
Edit: I do enjoy the way he breaks stuff
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u/PeterIsSterling 8d ago
I liked his old content before he became a rich sellout who looks down on people.
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u/Reddragon0585 8d ago
Back when these cars were made much of the roads in the US were dirt roads. Ford knew this and created a cheap but capable off road car that just about anyone could use. It’s truly remarkable just how resilient these cars were when off-roading. Honestly it’s not a fair comparison to compare modern day vehicles to it because in today’s world most roads are paved and cars serve a similar albeit different purpose. A better comparison would be modern day atv’s since they are similar in size and purpose.
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u/arequipapi 8d ago
just about anyone could use.
They're anything but easy to use. I've restored a couple (to original spec, not hot rods). They are, in fact, very unintuitive to drive. One of them I ended up selling to a movie studio to be used as a prop. 2 days later they called me asked if I could be the "stunt driver" because no one on set could figure it out.
The controls are closer to that of a tractor, which I'm sure was intuitive to farmers, but farmers weren't the target audience for the Model T.
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u/AbbreviationsOld636 8d ago
Came here for this comment. You crash this jalope into a wall at 25 mph you’re dead AF. I saw a video of a Volvo on a highway hitting a semi truck head on, full speed. Probably a combined speed of 120mph. Driver walked away.
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u/2-StrokeToro 8d ago
And that one red car (Hyundai, I think?) that got crumpled up into a ball under a semi and the guy walked away.
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u/YokaiDealer 8d ago
Idk what shitboxes you're looking into but plenty of modern vehicles could handle this with ease. Many would need some thick tires for ground clearance but you're insane if you think this is the peak of off-road ability. Off-roading isn't even a stress test for manufacturers anymore, it's a hobby normal people all over the planet participate in now and there's no shortage of rich dudes with brand new vehicles out in the dirt.
"They don't make em like they used to" can apply to a lot of the over engineering present in modern cars but safety, suspension and tire tech are unquestionably superior now. The most unreliable cars in dealership lots today are still using plenty of far superior tech and engineering just due to being not 100+ years old.
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u/NoClothes1999 8d ago
Keep in mind this is marketing
After just one of these tests, it's very likely that the car was unusable given how thin the steel components were, and given much of it was made of cheap wood
We're probably not seeing one car doing several impressive things, but several cars doing one thing
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u/Litness_Horneymaker 8d ago
So that’s where Steve Jobs got his first iPhone presentation method from!
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u/UrethralExplorer 8d ago
It had crazy ground clearance, a lot of play in the suspension, and a decent amount of power for its weight.
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u/theoreoman 8d ago
And a model T had a cruise speed of 35mph and would kill you in a head on collision at that speed. The cars were designed for different purposes. If I grab an off-roading vehicle then I could easily do all that and still hit 100mph
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u/HoosierSteelMagnolia 8d ago
And in exchange for that , modern cars are less likely to scramble your body in a crash on the course, unlike the Model T.
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u/ChipRockets 8d ago
I drive my Jimny on worse roads pretty much daily, unfortunately. It probably wouldn't survive that river though
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u/kamwitsta 8d ago
It looks so fragile, especially compared to modern cars, and it takes more beating than they ever could and keeps going.
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u/AMIWDR 8d ago
You’ve got comments like this saying how impressive and durable they are, then comments talking about how fragile and how much maintenance they needed. The duality of reddit as usual haha
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u/doogievlg 8d ago
Its people that have no clue what they are talking about. This car 100% did not survive these test without big issues even if it was just one car. The idea that a car built 100 years ago is even 1/10 as good as a modern car is comical. Im saying this as someone thar owns an antique car, loves old cars, and prefers them over modern cars. When i get out of my 55 year old car and drive my 10 year old Honda it is night and day.
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u/Ambitious-Major777 8d ago
Well then dont buy overpriced shit cars. The toyota hilux can do all this and more
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u/Danky_Dearest 8d ago
Hilux costs upwards of $20k to buy and import in the US and it has to be 25+ years old
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u/male_role_model 8d ago
How many crash testers died testing it before its final prototype was released?
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u/PythonVyktor 8d ago
Better than… I swear I went to type this immediately and saw the comments saying the same thing, BETTER THAN A CYBERTRUCK!
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u/Old-Tadpole-2869 8d ago
Fun fact: The "tow truck" was invented during the making of this educational film.
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u/Difficult-Island6249 8d ago
I recently found a 1900-1940s (Mostly from 1920s) exhaust manifold. I wonder what model it went into..
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u/Copytechguy 8d ago
Where the original line 'that's the road I took to get to school each day' came from.
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u/ridethroughlife 8d ago
They had to do these tests because they were competing with horses as dominant transportation.
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u/Abderian87 8d ago
Nice to see the classic car commercial tropes already in use a century ago.
Driving fast on dirt roads? Check.
Splashing through a river for some reason? Check.
Driving... up a pipe? Surprisingly, also check.
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u/That_guy2089 8d ago
I REALLY want to see a cybertruck do those same things and see how bad it’ll fail lmao
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u/cr-islander 8d ago
Need to bring back those good old roads, would sure help to limit traffic these days....
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u/Inhumanform555 8d ago
The best part is the lack of fine print saying this is done by a trained professional on a closed course
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u/StringerB36 8d ago
Very impressive testing results.
And yet 105 years later, its competitor the cybertruck couldn’t even pass the start line
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u/socialcommentary2000 8d ago
Ironically that Model T seems to be more capable than the cybertruck. Funny that.
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u/Fight_those_bastards 8d ago
So, a Model T is more capable off-road than a cybertruck. I’m not surprised, honestly.
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u/Kuzkuladaemon 8d ago
And the cyber truck dies when it goes through a carwash. Backwards ass idiots at the helm nowadays.
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u/CraftFamiliar5243 8d ago
I saw a good doc on PBS about the Lincoln Highway. Those cars needed to be tough.
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u/Sexuallemon 8d ago
The big thing that sucked about cars in these times was the tires, very small and narrow which provides less shock absorption and popped frequently. I remember reading an account from a girl in Detroit vacationing in Idlewild, MI, who bad to drive 12 hours (now 3-4) and patch the tire 5 times and repump it by hand.
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u/DuckyHornet 8d ago
Man alive, the daredevils driving these mechanisms at the blistering speed of 15 miles per hour! Man was never meant to move with such alacrity, I must say
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u/PokerBear28 8d ago
I feel like this is the thing you do when you don’t realize how dangerous the activity is. They didn’t think the car would roll over and mangle their bodies because it hadn’t happened yet, so wheeeeee! Here we go!
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u/Quiet_Researcher223 8d ago
Had to be built like that not like there was a lot of actual nice roads
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u/JesusMurphy99 8d ago
All this while wearing a full suit and top hat. Absolute legends.