Re: RC: Slide In Campers??

["Linda B. Merims" <lbm@naisp.net>]

"Roger Rittenhouse" <roger@vmaxept.com> said:

> Hello Linda,
>     These rigs tandem are legal in most states, but some cops will
>     still give a ticket.
> 
>     I have thought about a horse van with living qts in the front. I
>     was going to make my big truck that way but due the business - I
>     chose to make it all LQ..
>     OF course now I want to sell it.
> 
>     I thought about the horse van with the camper trailer. May still
>     look into that.

Have you ever stopped off to talk with Mr. Branson at the Branson
Trailer Works in Bristol, Virginia right over the Tennessee line?
You can see them right from 81, on the right going north, right
after the biggest Bristol exit.

Branson made those wonderful streamlined stainless steel-sided
horse vans--beautiful silver fluted metal sides with colorful rounded
tops.  You still see them all over the place.  The small ones were
6-horse+dressing room mounted on a truck, while the biggest rigs
were 17-horse set up to be hauled by a tractor truck.  His father
started the business in the 1930's and they made the "Bentley" of
horse vans right up until Mr. Branson made his last one in January
of, I believe, 1998.  He has a photo album of all the vans they ever
made in his office.

His son started a Featherlite dealership and that's proved to be more
profitable than the van business, so Mr. Branson stopped making them.
He still does minor refurbish work on his old vans, and there's usually
a few in the shop getting worked on or on his lot for sale used (he
only takes in the ones in excellent shape already).  He had a gorgeous
"cream puff" 6-horse with an International truck under it with only
35,000 miles on it on his lot at Thanksgiving.   Alas, not cheap:
$40K.  

Anyway, I think the two of you would get on swimmingly.  He loves
to talk about the reasons for details in design and all the thinking that
went into his vans.

Old Mr. Imperator in Pennsylvania near the Ohio border is still
going strong, too.  His are the most famous "box-style" vans that
you still see all over the place.  He no longer makes them new, but
refurbishes his old ones.  I've never visited, but I've talked to him
on the phone.  I've got his number somewhere...

I'm a big van fan.  Only thing is, all horse vans tend to be "man scale"
in the strength required to use them.  Ramps and solid plywood (or,
in the case of Branson, oak) partitions just require more strength
to deploy and move than I am able to summon.  If I can't handle a
machine by myself, I can't use it.  There was a wonderful Branson in
pretty fair shape here in Massachusetts a few years ago for sale for
only $5000.  I only passed on it for just that reason.

Linda B. Merims
lbm@naisp.net
Massachusetts, USA