I have a JDM truck, a 94 Daihatsu Hijet, which I have raised a couple of inches.
I bought it to carry a snow plow in the winter. A vehicle with a real enclosed cab, windows, wipers and a heater is much more enjoyable than any ATV/UTV for plowing snow.
I put a bit of a lift, and heavier springs on the front, after the first time I trial fitted the plow, and the front springs bottomed out. I added a leaf to the rear when I weighed both axles with the plow mounted and figured out that I needed to add about 400 to 500-lbs, to the back to get the weight distribution back to 50-50, and to bring the rear even with the front.
As said, they are quite capable at low speeds off road, but are not anything you can run at speed and go jumping over bumps, and catching big air in. I out grew that in my thirties. So, not an issue with me.
Mine has a scissors dump bed, so it can raise vertically, as well as dump. The highway legal load in Japan is 350kg, (800-lbs). However Daihatsu imported them, as utility vehicles in the eighties, and early nineties, and they said they could carry 1500-lbs, at speeds below 15-mph.
For around the place, and putting around town on city and county roads, I much prefer it to any of the ATVs I have driven. We have a Razor at work we use to cruise old timber sale roads, when we are figuring out what it will take to open them up for new timber sales, or use as fire breaks/roads. I am certain the tiny truck is fully capable of doing 90% of that work. But it wouldn’t do it as fast.
When I built the bumper to mount the snow plow, I put 2-inch reciever on the miidle, and both ends. I have a polarized lead to power the plow, and set up a 4500-lb winch to mount in the receivers, and hook to the same power feed. I made the rear bumpers the same, and ran a power feed to the rear bumper. I can mount the winch on all four corners and the middle at both ends. So, I can get a good angle to pull on most things. Add an electric chain saw, hilift and tire patch kit and I’m ready to, go play in the woods.
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