Date: Mon, 3 Oct 1994 14:08:45 -0500 (CDT)
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From: dakhlia@wuecona.wustl.edu (Sami Dakhlia)
Subject: Re: Five Year Dream Car Pick
>ooh! ooh! i forgot all about the fabulous Unimog!!! :) yes, indeedy! now THAT
>would be REAL intimidation on the road! wow! for those of you who don't know
>what a Unimog is, it's a large multi-purpose/multi-configuration truck made
>by Mercedes. you CAN get them in the states (there's a guy in new york that
>imports them), but they start at over $100,000. you can put snow plows, snow
$100,000?!?!? Why?! They most definitely don't cost that much in Germany.
UniMoGs are plain old utility vehicules, often used by the forestry
departments. I know a farmer in my Mom's native village in Lower Saxony,
who owns one; and he wouldn't be that rich.
It is my impression that Mercedes hasn't build those in a while. They were
replaced by the MB-tracs, farm tractors with 4 equally large wheels, 50-50
weight distribution, and the cab up in the middle. I used them to plough
fields, spray pesticides, and to haul two trailers full of sugar beets to
the sugar factory or wheat to the silos. Max speed is about 50 km/h. Now
THOSE are expensive, 80,000 DM about 9 years ago, if I remember
correctly. Back then, the $1 was worth close to 3 DM, so that's about
$27,000. Today, I'd say 120,000 DM for the MB-trac 800 and $1 for 1.50 DM
and that's $80,000. Actually, that's pretty close to the $100,000 for the
collector's UniMoG. So, OK, maybe you're telling the truth, Joel.:)
/--------------------------------------------\
/-------/======================================)\
/ /| ||============|| | | =)\
/ / | ||============|| | | =)\
_\ _\___/__|O_______||============||__|_________| =)\
/ \\-----|-----------|-------------------------------)
( ))==M | |Sami, dakhlia@wuecona.wustl.edu|
( )) | |Dept. Economics, Box 1208 |
\ // ( ) | |Washington U. in St.Louis |
| | /====|MO 63130-4899, USA_______ |
|_______|_____// \\ (314) 935-7472 // \\ |
(|=|===== )_____/ (O) \______________/ (O) \____))
\===/ \\ / \===/ \\ /
|