[ChevLoRay]

When the gummint got involved in our automotive safety a number of years ago, a whole generation of folks grew up thinking that there has to be an interlock for everything ever built all the way back to the Model T.

In the beginning, women couldn't drive automobiles because they were a machine.....and women didn't have any business in one.

As technology advanced, women became drivers and certain inventions were heralded as something to make it easier for women to drive...like the electric starter. I'm willing to bet that a large number of women in the early days of automobiles were well able to crank an engine using a crank....not a starter button. Automatic transmissions are another that were supposed to help make it easier for women to drive. My aunt drove a "wiggle stick" (manual gearbox) well into her 80's....didn't like automatics.

So, the idea that all vehicles have neutral start safety switches, or interlocks designed to disable the starter unless the clutch is disengaged became well entrenched during the Seventies. How many of you remember the seat belt interlocks? During '74-75, they were required. So, people left the seat belts connected and just sat on them. That defeated the necessity of hooking up your seat belt so your engine would start. Mfr's pursuaded the gummint to allow them to be disabled. That's why we have the seat belt lights/bells/buzzers when you sit in the seat and turn the key on. Oh, now we have laws that say we have to buckle up....but we also have laws against speeding.....Y3.

These trucks, if equipped with a manual gearbox, have no interlocks that I am aware of. If you fail to disengage the clutch and crank the engine with the tranmission in gear....you'll be the first (or second) to know.