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Awesome! Way to work the Mite!
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Mighty Mite on the obstacle course at NWMF
- Thread starter Mike_Pop
- Start date
Catching air in the Mighty Mite!
Speeding down a trail and hitting a couple jumps in the Mite:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2URD0qo0L7M&feature=related
Speeding down a trail and hitting a couple jumps in the Mite:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2URD0qo0L7M&feature=related
Tx75Pinz
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RE: Catching air in the Mighty Mite!
Mike, really good pictures. The Mite is way cool.
The little Jap-minis are good up to a point. Out here in the sticks problem one is the lack of ground clearence. Problem two; Texas will not let you license it to run on the highway. Just puttering around on the ranches they get pretty good gas mileage. Can't give a number because the fuel tank at the ranch doesnt show how much was dispensed and the odometer on the one I use doesn't work. I have run it on the ranch all day hunting, probably at 5 -10 mph and barely had the needle move off of full. Payload for the bed is something like 1,200 pounds.
Mike, really good pictures. The Mite is way cool.
The little Jap-minis are good up to a point. Out here in the sticks problem one is the lack of ground clearence. Problem two; Texas will not let you license it to run on the highway. Just puttering around on the ranches they get pretty good gas mileage. Can't give a number because the fuel tank at the ranch doesnt show how much was dispensed and the odometer on the one I use doesn't work. I have run it on the ranch all day hunting, probably at 5 -10 mph and barely had the needle move off of full. Payload for the bed is something like 1,200 pounds.
saddamsnightmare
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August 29th, 2008.
DEAR MIKE:
DID I HEAR SOMEONE SAY THEY PRETTY MUCH KEPT UP WITH THE UNIMOGS???? AND ALL THE PINZGAUERS??????
Your tires aren't quite issue military NDT's and the bridge plate's a little over the top for a 1750lb truck...... BUT I did say that with a skilled driver the Unimog would be hard pressed for agility with an M422A1 on it's tail. You have learned to drive your Mighty Mite, now you must leave the Monastery and spread the word........ I could have kept up with yours with the military NDT's..... except in deep snow (remember the skid plate, man!) for theMighty Mite was designed almost expressly for Vietnam..... Their noisy, slow, agile as hades, and with enough weight in the rear end... a little climbing demon. I never drove one with a Mite trailer, bet life could get strange there.....35 MPG plus if you don't go like 45MPH!!!!
GO Marines.... GO Mites!!!! HOORAH
Thumbs Up!!!
Kyle F. McGrogan
1971 Kaiser Jeep M35A2 Wo/W "Saddam's Nightmare" Desert Storm & Vietnam Veteran Deuce
1968 Johnson Corp M105A2 trailer
1967 Hercules MEP023A gas Gen-Set APU
1963 Swiss Army Cargo Unimog S.404.114 MB
Former owner of:1961 M422A1 USMC Mighty Mite Sn 2043 hood No.
DEAR MIKE:
DID I HEAR SOMEONE SAY THEY PRETTY MUCH KEPT UP WITH THE UNIMOGS???? AND ALL THE PINZGAUERS??????
Your tires aren't quite issue military NDT's and the bridge plate's a little over the top for a 1750lb truck...... BUT I did say that with a skilled driver the Unimog would be hard pressed for agility with an M422A1 on it's tail. You have learned to drive your Mighty Mite, now you must leave the Monastery and spread the word........ I could have kept up with yours with the military NDT's..... except in deep snow (remember the skid plate, man!) for theMighty Mite was designed almost expressly for Vietnam..... Their noisy, slow, agile as hades, and with enough weight in the rear end... a little climbing demon. I never drove one with a Mite trailer, bet life could get strange there.....35 MPG plus if you don't go like 45MPH!!!!
GO Marines.... GO Mites!!!! HOORAH
Thumbs Up!!!
Kyle F. McGrogan
1971 Kaiser Jeep M35A2 Wo/W "Saddam's Nightmare" Desert Storm & Vietnam Veteran Deuce
1968 Johnson Corp M105A2 trailer
1967 Hercules MEP023A gas Gen-Set APU
1963 Swiss Army Cargo Unimog S.404.114 MB
Former owner of:1961 M422A1 USMC Mighty Mite Sn 2043 hood No.
Kyle,
Yes, I did say that I kept up with some of the Mogs and all of the Pinzs. However, I will not accept that a Mite can go anywhere a Mog can go. It simply does not have the ground clearance and articulation that a Mog has.
Overall, I was impressed with it's performance. It did much more than I thought it would.
As far as the tires, that's what it had on it when I bought it last year. the bridge plate is just for looks. (I hate when people who restore vehicles are so freaking technical about it. I just want to drive them. I don't care about accuracy.)
Yes, I did say that I kept up with some of the Mogs and all of the Pinzs. However, I will not accept that a Mite can go anywhere a Mog can go. It simply does not have the ground clearance and articulation that a Mog has.
Overall, I was impressed with it's performance. It did much more than I thought it would.
As far as the tires, that's what it had on it when I bought it last year. the bridge plate is just for looks. (I hate when people who restore vehicles are so freaking technical about it. I just want to drive them. I don't care about accuracy.)
saddamsnightmare
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August 29th, 2008.
Dear Mike:
Touchy, Touchy.... I CAN guarantee your mighty mite will go places no mog can do unless your carrying a very big honkin chainsaw with you..... I do believe the mighty might is much narrower, much shorter, much more stable with the four wheel independent suspension (the shot of you in that hole almost turned over in the drivers side defines pucker factor for me), and at least in the east..... I could always find some rocks when I needed to climb over a tree too big..... BUT generally I found a way around it....
I've driven both, and a fifty HP mighty mite has it uses (particularly when gas is $$$$$$ high), no, it doesn't have the ground clearance a Unimog does..... But a Unimog can't be picked up with a chopper little larger then a loach.....a Mighty Mite can..... who needs to climb over them when you can fly over them???
My experience with the Mite was that it could ascend a 45 degree slope diagonally, with two diagonally opposite tires in the air if it had the momentum to cross that spot and engage at least 3 wheels on the ground.... AND NO Unimog ever claimed to be able to run on three wheels only for any distance... I did that frequently when busting a front hub bolt. And the mighty mite manual says it can't be done, but with a jack, a chain and some weight in the back, she will do it slowly and carefully. Plus Mites don't have those big honkin solid axles to encumber them....
All jests aside, Mike, I just paid a repair bill on my S.404.114 to correct a bad fuel and electrical system problem that could've bought me two deuces from GL and TWO mites when I bought mine back in 1977!!! The Unimogs have their points, but they aren't 1/4 reconoissance trucks and they aren't deuces.... and with the exchange rate, I don't see Unimogs getting any cheaper. My S.404.114's greatest liability at present is that I will have to find a skilled canvas worker to make a new cab paulin and cargo tarpauling....given the userous rates that some of the German AND stateside dealers want for them...... THE OTHER weak point is that cursed throwout bearing.... I can think of only a couple of other designs as boneheaded as that , given the items size, inaccessability and inability to be relubed except by hand.....Only a MB engineer could design something like that....
Thumbs Up.... and don't let 4 Marines catch you, or they could pick her up by the corner hooks and carry you and it back to the Corps..... Be careful, be safe, and Go Mites...OUAH RAH!
Regards,
Kyle F. McGrogan
N.B. Besides, that bridge plate musta increased your mite's weight by what, 5 lbs???![[thumbzup]](https://www.steelsoldiers.com/images/smilies/icon_smile_thumzup.gif "Thumbs Up [thumbzup]")
The M422A1 will run on three wheels, but you should chain the offending hub arm up to the frame and counterbalance with weight on the side that has the two wheels on it left(looking from either the left or right side). Since I usually had front hub bolts fail, the weight went on the opposite side rear and was usually a couple of sincrete blocks. If you get to the Mountain in West Virginia, you will find that few vehicles wider then a mite can go anywhere off road without a chainsaw. and yes, I could always find enough rocks or logs to make a ramp on either side of a downed tree, if I couldn't get around it for some reason. The Unimog does have ground clearance, but it's not as agile and it wont fit or turn where a M422A1 will. trust me on that one!
Dear Mike:
Touchy, Touchy.... I CAN guarantee your mighty mite will go places no mog can do unless your carrying a very big honkin chainsaw with you..... I do believe the mighty might is much narrower, much shorter, much more stable with the four wheel independent suspension (the shot of you in that hole almost turned over in the drivers side defines pucker factor for me), and at least in the east..... I could always find some rocks when I needed to climb over a tree too big..... BUT generally I found a way around it....
I've driven both, and a fifty HP mighty mite has it uses (particularly when gas is $$$$$$ high), no, it doesn't have the ground clearance a Unimog does..... But a Unimog can't be picked up with a chopper little larger then a loach.....a Mighty Mite can..... who needs to climb over them when you can fly over them???
My experience with the Mite was that it could ascend a 45 degree slope diagonally, with two diagonally opposite tires in the air if it had the momentum to cross that spot and engage at least 3 wheels on the ground.... AND NO Unimog ever claimed to be able to run on three wheels only for any distance... I did that frequently when busting a front hub bolt. And the mighty mite manual says it can't be done, but with a jack, a chain and some weight in the back, she will do it slowly and carefully. Plus Mites don't have those big honkin solid axles to encumber them....
All jests aside, Mike, I just paid a repair bill on my S.404.114 to correct a bad fuel and electrical system problem that could've bought me two deuces from GL and TWO mites when I bought mine back in 1977!!! The Unimogs have their points, but they aren't 1/4 reconoissance trucks and they aren't deuces.... and with the exchange rate, I don't see Unimogs getting any cheaper. My S.404.114's greatest liability at present is that I will have to find a skilled canvas worker to make a new cab paulin and cargo tarpauling....given the userous rates that some of the German AND stateside dealers want for them...... THE OTHER weak point is that cursed throwout bearing.... I can think of only a couple of other designs as boneheaded as that , given the items size, inaccessability and inability to be relubed except by hand.....Only a MB engineer could design something like that....
Thumbs Up.... and don't let 4 Marines catch you, or they could pick her up by the corner hooks and carry you and it back to the Corps..... Be careful, be safe, and Go Mites...OUAH RAH!Regards,
Kyle F. McGrogan
N.B. Besides, that bridge plate musta increased your mite's weight by what, 5 lbs???
The M422A1 will run on three wheels, but you should chain the offending hub arm up to the frame and counterbalance with weight on the side that has the two wheels on it left(looking from either the left or right side). Since I usually had front hub bolts fail, the weight went on the opposite side rear and was usually a couple of sincrete blocks. If you get to the Mountain in West Virginia, you will find that few vehicles wider then a mite can go anywhere off road without a chainsaw. and yes, I could always find enough rocks or logs to make a ramp on either side of a downed tree, if I couldn't get around it for some reason. The Unimog does have ground clearance, but it's not as agile and it wont fit or turn where a M422A1 will. trust me on that one!
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Kyle,
I owned a Unimog U1300L and there is no way that the Mite can go where the Mog could go. You have mentioned that the Mite can go anywhere a Mog can but you always state that you go around things. That isn't the same thing. The Mite is cool, fun, capable but certainly not a Unimog and never could do what my Mog did.
As far as running on three wheels, I tried with my Mite but even with weigh on the opposing corner, it still didn't have enough to keep the hub off the ground. Is the three wheel idea only for the M422 or both the M422 and the M422A1?
I owned a Unimog U1300L and there is no way that the Mite can go where the Mog could go. You have mentioned that the Mite can go anywhere a Mog can but you always state that you go around things. That isn't the same thing. The Mite is cool, fun, capable but certainly not a Unimog and never could do what my Mog did.
As far as running on three wheels, I tried with my Mite but even with weigh on the opposing corner, it still didn't have enough to keep the hub off the ground. Is the three wheel idea only for the M422 or both the M422 and the M422A1?
mog1218
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Great photos Mike!
I went for a ride with Mike on the obstacle course at NWMF and was very impressed. Later Mike and I followed a Unimog up a hill climb but at the top was a large downed tree. The Unimog simply drove over it. Mike elected to turn around. The Mite just didn't have the clearance (Neather would my Haflinger). I am sure if I was riding in Mike's duece or 1300 there would had been no hesition to follow.
I went for a ride with Mike on the obstacle course at NWMF and was very impressed. Later Mike and I followed a Unimog up a hill climb but at the top was a large downed tree. The Unimog simply drove over it. Mike elected to turn around. The Mite just didn't have the clearance (Neather would my Haflinger). I am sure if I was riding in Mike's duece or 1300 there would had been no hesition to follow.