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Will it hold my garbage cans? (I miss Wagons and SUVs, not liking CUVs.)

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B

B_E_V

Member
Apr 18, 2021
158
197
New Hampshire
#1
I want my next vehicle to be a BEV. However, I have five requirements which so far I haven't been able to simultaneously meet.
  1. My budget limit is around $50,000.
  2. AWD or 4-Wheel drive so that with studded tires it will reliably make it up my driveway in the winter, even when my driveway is covered with black ice.
  3. Support for a roof rack to haul sea kayaks, with reasonable front and rear tie-down points.
  4. At 6'3" with most of that in my legs, the car must be comfortable for me to drive.
  5. Must have room to haul my garbage cans inside the vehicle. (I normally haul the two big ones shown below, plus boxes of recycling, and a smaller can.)
The garbage can constraint is so far proving the most difficult to satisfy. When I bought the garbage cans shown in the picture I was driving a Volvo XC70 which handled all my garbage hauling with ease. My 2009 CRV just barely accommodates a normal load, but everything does fit inside. Alas the more aerodynamic CUV profile does not work so well.

GarbageCanCollage.jpg


This is mostly just an I'm disappointed vent post. After a few months of BEV research, and after playing with A Better Routeplanner, I had concluded that Tesla had recently opened enough superchargers in NH and Maine to cover my routine trips to visit relatives, ski, and kayak. So I spent about two hours driving my CRV yesterday for a Model Y test drive. Unfortunately, my garbage cans didn't fit. Today I briefly looked at an ID.4 and a Mach-E, but didn't even sit in them after I confirmed my garbage cans would not fit.

I don't know of any other BEV options currently available that meet my requirements, and frankly until NH gets more non-Tesla Level 3 chargers I would need a very long range BEV vehicle to cover my routine trips during the winter. So I think I am back to waiting for new vehicle announcements. Though my wife and sister-in-law are suggesting I shop for smaller trash cans and drive to the transfer station more frequently. :rolleyes:

If anyone knows of other BEV options I should consider, please let me know. Otherwise, thank you for reading my vent post.
 
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#3
B_E_V said:
I want my next vehicle to be a BEV. However, I have five requirements which so far I haven't been able to simultaneously meet.
  1. My budget limit is around $50,000.
  2. AWD or 4-Wheel drive so that with studded tires it will reliably make it up my driveway in the winter, even when my driveway is covered with black ice.
  3. Support for a roof rack to haul sea kayaks, with reasonable front and rear tie-down points.
  4. At 6'3" with most of that in my legs, the car must be comfortable for me to drive.
  5. Must have room to haul my garbage cans inside the vehicle. (I normally haul the two big ones shown below, plus boxes of recycling, and a smaller can.)
The garbage can constraint is so far proving the most difficult to satisfy. When I bought the garbage cans shown in the picture I was driving a Volvo XC70 which handled all my garbage hauling with ease. My 2009 CRV just barely accommodates a normal load, but everything does fit inside. Alas the more aerodynamic CUV profile does not work so well.

View attachment 658529

This is mostly just an I'm disappointed vent post. After a few months of BEV research, and after playing with A Better Routeplanner, I had concluded that Tesla had recently opened enough superchargers in NH and Maine to cover my routine trips to visit relatives, ski, and kayak. So I spent about two hours driving my CRV yesterday for a Model Y test drive. Unfortunately, my garbage cans didn't fit. Today I briefly looked at an ID.4 and a Mach-E, but didn't even sit in them after I confirmed my garbage cans would not fit.

I don't know of any other BEV options currently available that meet my requirements, and frankly until NH gets more non-Tesla Level 3 chargers I would need a very long range BEV vehicle to cover my routine trips during the winter. So I think I am back to waiting for new vehicle announcements. Though my wife and sister-in-law are suggesting I shop for smaller trash cans and drive to the transfer station more frequently. :rolleyes:

If anyone knows of other BEV options I should consider, please let me know. Otherwise, thank you for reading my vent post.
Click to expand...


I just want to say "kudos" to you for doing research on something like this that you have as a requirement (like carrying the trash cans). It looks like you took them with you when you went car shopping, to see if they fit. So many (so many) people dont make a list of things that are "must haves" for themselves when shopping for a vehicle, and then get disappointed with something like this not fitting.

Anyway, I dont have an answer to your question, other than to speculate that, perhaps this time next year there will be more options, maybe with larger SUV style vehicles (instead of crossovers) that have a better chance of meeting that requirement.

You could also get smaller cans (but I am 100% positive you considered that, and that likely means more trips for you hauling stuff so is definitely not ideal).

Anyway, good luck in your continued search, and welcome to TMC.
 
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#6
My last boss bought one of those ATVs that has a pickup truck bed for hauling trash cans from his garage down his long driveway. I assume this won’t work, and you need to hit a public roadway with your garbage hauling vehicle?

I hate to say this, but if the only thing stopping you from a model Y is garbage hauling, you may want to explore if there are other shaped trash receptacles, for example throw the rear seats down and put the trash bags In storage sterilize horizontal tubs on wheels? That or start composting and not buy anything you can’t reuse :)
 
#9
yourhero said:
My cans, my precious antique cans, aw look what you done to em
Click to expand...
I can see how you read it that way. However, my objection is actually "My time, my precious dwindling time. You want me to spend more of it going to the dump?"

If somebody sold "Tesla Model Y perfect fit trash cans" which would let me haul the same amount of trash per trip in a Model Y as my current cans in the CRV you would find me buying the most expensive trash cans of my life in an instant. Those old Home Depot cans would quickly (Estimated Delivery: 6-9 weeks) find a new use, or a new home.
 
#11
SabrToothSqrl said:
my wife had to made sure the dog crates would fit in her car... i guess we all have our own vehicle requirements.
Click to expand...
My wife's deal breaker requirement is that her dog ramp work with her car. Our old dog cannot make it into and out of the car without the ramp anymore, but still loves the two daily drives to the conservation area for walks when the weather permits. Yes became WAY more interested in the Tesla when I mentioned Dog Mode.
 
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#16
Sorry OP, I assume that either:

A. you do not have enough steam to navigate the long driveway or
B. you have to haul your trash miles away after the THC zombies on the local council decided to make you do it.
C. you work for La Mafia:eek:

In the first case my octogenarian neighbor built a cart from 2" PVC pipes, he now comfortably carries both bins to curbside.
There are multiple other solutions including the old Radio Flyer from the grandkids.

Second scenario, I strongly advise you to get a small trailer as trash cans do not belong inside a car, or they do?

Third case, omertà!
 
Last edited:
#20
Would anyone on the forum with a Model Y who uses it to haul their household garbage care to share their solution?

To clarify my situation and my thoughts on some of the suggested alternatives.
  • My driveway is paved, but so steep you would need a zoning waiver to build it today. It is almost 1/10th of a mile long, and when covered in black ice during the winter even my old Volvo XC 70 with AWD could not make it up the driveway with winter tires unless they were studded.
  • Private trash services will pickup at the curbside on our street. They use their own large wheeled totes, probably 96 gallon, for which their trucks have mechanical grabbers that pick the totes up and dump them into the top of the truck. The garbage men of my youth who dumped barrels into the back of a truck are long gone.
  • Dragging a full wheeled tote down my driveway when icy in the winter is not an option I am willing to risk. Picking up a full wheeled tote by myself to put it in/on some other vehicle would have been challenging when I lifted weights in my 30s.
  • My other trash disposal alternative is to load trash into a vehicle and drive it to the town's transfer station. At the transfer station you park in one area to unload bulk steel, move the vehicle to another area to unload most recycling, move to a third area for "trash," then a fourth area for cardboard. The transfer station is open for two half-days during the week, and is a mob scene on Saturday. I'm retired, so I go during the week.
  • I hope to still be hauling trash in my next car when I turn 70. Though other alternatives include having replaced the car because of a wreck, moved to assisted living, or just being dead.
  • The picture in my base post shows my 32 gallon trash cans, which during a current dump trip are usually filled to overflowing with trash bags. My research on alternative sizes suggests that 20 gallons is the next "standard" size down. Hauling 40 gallons of trash instead of 64 gallons per trip would obviously require more trips. I do not enjoy my trips to the transfer station.
  • The equivalent 20 gallon Rubbermaid Brute is not as tall, but is almost as wide as the 32 gallon cans I currently use. I would have to purchase two, and spend two hours driving to Massachusetts for another test drive to determine if the Model Y could fit both, and I would still be increasing my number of garbage trips per month.
  • Skipping the trash cans, and just loading the trash bags directly into the Model Y would fit. However, then I remember the yucky liquid that I poured out of one of the cans two trips ago, and think I don't really like that solution.
  • I do wonder a little bit about Collapsible Camping Trash Cans, but the ones I've found so far tend to have comments like "tore on the first day." I think they are built for light intermittent duty, not year round use.
  • The added cost of buying a ATV, hopefully a BEV ATV, would push the combined cost with a MY LR AWD out of my budget. I think it would also require the addition of a shed abutting the driveway to store the ATV if I want access to it in the winter. That combination really blows the budget!
  • Getting a trailer to haul garbage has the same where do you store it accessible in the winter problem as getting an ATV. Our driveway doesn't have any spare parking spaces, and we definitely do not have any spare garage space. So the variants on that solution all blow the BEV budget.
  • The hitch mounted carrier alternative does not meet my "cans inside the vehicle" requirement. That requirement exists because I have seen many vehicles, such as pickup trucks, headed to the transfer station with their trash outside the vehicle spread much of their trash along the roadside. It also exists because at my transfer station I need to unload the recycling before I dump the big cans of trash. So I greatly prefer a loading system which does not require unloading and reloading the big heavier cans to access the recycling. Currently flattened cardboard goes on the bottom, the 32 gallon cans on top, the other recycling goes in boxes on the seats and around the edges of the cans.
  • However, even neglecting my "inside" requirement, I could not find a mounted carrier that was large enough to hold my two 32 gallon cans that didn't also specify at least a class 3 hitch. The Model Y factory hitch is a lighter weight class 2 hitch. I'm also quite skeptical that mounting and dismounting the carrier is going to be super easy when I'm a 70 year old, or improve my "enjoyment" of going to the transfer station.
  • I had decided this was the first year it was practical to get a BEV after years of dreaming, and I am disappointed and grouchy that this will probably not be the year.
  • However, I can certainly keep my CRV running for another few years.
  • On the bright side, every year I wait the effective cost of BEVs is likely to decline, while the range, charging speed, safety features, a choices are likely to increase.
  • If I wait long enough, the VW ID.Buzz Microbus will almost certainly hold my garbage cans!
  • If I wait even longer, Level 5 Autonomy might even become available, which would probably be a very good thing as I become an elderly driver.
Thank you for all the responses so far. Especially for your support @jjrandorin.

If someone can find a cheap, reliable, easy solution that satisfies all my constraints, I will be happy and impressed.

There are enough Model Y's out there that somebody else must be using one to haul garbage. Anyone care to share their solution?
 
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