Hello everyone

Being a newbie to this forum I would like to spend a few words on myself and my ride

I am a 42 years old married male German. I am living in a small town in the Stuttgart vincinity.
Being a traditional archer and owning a Dodge Ram truck have led to my handle "The Ram Archer" - for those of you, who are curious what made me choose this nickname.

My truck is a black coated 1994 Dodge Ram PU 2500, 5.9l-Cummins Turbodiesel, 300+HP (estimated), regular cab, 8'-bed, Lund fastback, AFE-air-intake, cam-plate, 4"-WarpSpeed exhaust (turbo-back-system, cat eliminated, free flow muffler), Rancho-5000 front & rear, some chrome accents (sweet tooth grille, ram hood ornament, door & tail gate handle covers), custom bed cover.

After being run in the US for a few years, this truck got imported to Austria and had seen two owners there before I bought it and brought it to Germany in 2002. Unfortunally, the truck had been neglected in the technical area for quite a while and some amateurish "repairs" by the previous owners may have been ok as short-term solutions but caused damage in the long run; meanwhile, the truck is back a good shape.

Owning an American truck in Germany is still seen as kind of exotic, however, there is a still growing community of US-car-owners over here and I am a member to a german forum dedicated to US-cars (http://www.uscar-forum.de).

Contrary to the US, Germany is THE no.1 country, where everything is forbidden unless explicitly permitted! - Technical inspection for vehicles (TUV) every two years is mandatory and failing to pass the test will cause the loss of registration. Additions or customization of vehicles are deemed illegal in the first place and can be made street-legal with the formal acceptance of TUV only; to achieve this acceptance one would have to provide all kind of expert certificates, manufacturers go-ahead, etc. - just getting non-stock rims and tires accepted is a nightmare!

I have registered to the Dodge Forum in order to rummage about occasionally and maybe find some solutions to arising problems with my truck or just getting some inspiration on further customization.

Tom

 

Welcome to DF!!! This place is very informative!!

 

Welcome to the forum!!

Nice looking truck!! I am also a traditional archer. I have an older Martin X-200 53lb recurve, and I use cedar shafted arrows. have mostly done target archery with very little hunting. What kind of bow do you have.

 

Thanks for the welcome.

I started off with Hoyt recurve for Olympic archery, changed to a PSE Compund bow for both, olympic and field archery, and finally sold all this tech stuff. Shot a 60lbs yew longbow (beautiful but poor performance) for a while then changed to hunting recurves. I used to have various hunting recurves from 45lbs to 55lbs with cedar arrows for a long time. No hunting at all (yet another illegal thing in Germany) but 3D-target (McKenzie and the like) shooting. After having had some severe problems with the right shoulder I went down to a 35lbs hunting recurve, handmade by a fellow archer and bowmaker (http://www.bogenstadl.de/), that I shoot with featherweight easton aluminum arrows - great speed and accuracy

 

Self nocked arrows with what looks like footers? Also very good merging between the feathers.
Very nice!![sm=smiley20.gif]
Did you make them yourself or did your friend make them?

Yeah, I know what you mean about the longbows, very beautiful, but a pain to draw and not very efficient. Sorry to hear about the shoulder. I am recuperating myself. Tore the ligaments off the bone, now I have several titanium anchors holding things in place. I am slowly getting myself back up to pulling my bow, for now I am using my daughter's 35 pounder.

Anyway, I had made some arrows in the past, but I was considering starting again and trying to make some self-nocking arrows.

 

Welcome to the site.

 

Welcome to DF. You'll like the site. It's very informative.

 

welcome to DF

 

Welcome to DF. This is the place to come for getting ideas, checking out other peoples rides, asking questions and sharing knowledge. Lots of good people here. Glad to have you aboard.

When I was stationed in Okinawa, Japan (early '80's) they had similar laws. Was rough owning and operating a car there. The owner of a bar where my unit hung out had a Camaro and he had the same kind of difficulties with his car and the government as you have had.

Best of luck and enjoy you Dodge.

 

The self nocked cedar shafts actually were a prize I won in a club tournament, made by a fellow archer. The spiral two-tone dying, coating and the featherwork were added by myself