Quote:
Originally Posted by Kraftwerk
Therefore you see all of them with disproportionate small cargo spaces and two gearboxes in series, with the second being locked in first gear.
Some get converted to single gearbox and full cargo space when the owner turns 18, but lose A-Traktor status, some get passed on, and so forth. I always found the concept interesting.
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It is interesting. Many of them seem to have an amazing amount of effort put in. Impressive builds even if it is hard to understand the functional reasons for doing any more than the bare minimum to meet the regs and let a kid get behind the wheel. But it seems like more of a cultural thing - A Traktors being almost a bit of a fetishized concept unique to Sweden, rather than a practical use. Perhaps a bit like lowriders or minitrucks here in the US, which have their own followings and cultures and are often built to a very impressive and high level of quality with massive time/expertise/resources devoted to them, yet make no sense at all (other than curiosity) to those who don't share the interest.
How do they fit a second gearbox in the tunnel???
With regular gearing and a full cargo box rather than the little 1m one I can see one of these being a useful vehicle, a pickup yet with decent ride and mileage. I don't think the RWD Volvo chassis load capacity is much less than many small standard pickups have anyway. Overload springs would make it better yet. Similar car-pickup conversions are becoming common for some car models, same basic idea. Smyth conversions seem especially popular.
https://www.smythkitcars.com/