Owning a small horse box

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Blackers

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Hi everybody
Although I have been reading the forum for a while, I am new to posting - so hello!

My daughter competes her mare successfully in dressage and has for a couple of years been using a local transport company to get to competitions. However, sadly this small family run company has become a victim of the times and has folded and there are no other alternatives where she lives.

This has left her with two options - to stop competing or acquire a small horse box of her own, which is where Mum & Dad Bank comes into the picture.

We have never owned such a vehicle, and I am wondering whether you could give me some idea of annual running costs (MOT, service, road tax etc) for a 3.5 ton 2 horse box to be driven on a standard licence. Also what to look for - good and bad - when buying, and are any manufacturers better or worse than others?

Changing her car to a 4-wheel drive and buying a trailer is not an option, as her horse has had a couple of bad experiences in trailers, and although this doesn't seem to have put off her horse, it has put off my daughter towing her horse.

Thanks for your time
 
The standard costs, e.g. MOT, tax, insurance (as long as your daughter is over 25 years old), recovery, are all very reasonable can be calculated in advance. What might catch you out badly are the maintenance and repair costs which will depend on the age of the vehicle, the mileage it has done and how new the box is. Obviously if you buy a new chassis and purpose build a new box on it you should have very few of these problems, but that will cost you very serious money. As an estimate I think you should allow a couple of thousand pounds a year to be on the safe side.

When looking for a lorry, ideally you want someone who knows about engines to inspect it and give you an idea of any maintenance problems. You also need to check the conversion is suitable for horses, e.g. the ramp and floor are sturdy, the weight is distributed appropriately, etc. Building horseboxes is quite a specialist job, if done badly the vehicle can be really dangerous.

You also need to think about payload. Ideally take the vehicle to a public weigh bridge (or see a recent certificate from one) to establish what kind of weight it can carry. A 3.5 tonne will have a limited payload. Some models claim to have 1.4 tonnes, but I doubt older conversions, done with heavier matterials are anywhere near that. You then need to know the weight of the horses you want to carry and don't forget to add to that the weight of driver, passengers, tack, equipment, haylage, water, a tank of fuel, safety equipment, etc.

Good luck!
 
Thanks for the replies, very helpful. You can always rely on this forum for help :o)

There would only be 1 horse (a 16hh TB type) in the box at a time, so hope additional weight would not be a problem.

jemima_too - Many thanks for the link to the previous post, very useful and informative. If I had been a bit more observant I could have saved you and booboos time in reading and replying ;o)

booboos - thanks for your comprehensive comments. Quite a lot to consider. I have a mechanic nephew and could hopefully bribe him to come along. Hubby also knows about the engine part, but none of us (incl nephew to some extent) are familiar with the conversion part of a box. Will do some more investigation before comitting ourselves.
 
Hi I have a relatively new 3.5 tonne box. The tax isn't too bad at £185 per year, I recently got it serviced and that cost around £200 - however the box I bought is in excellent condition mechanically so I'm sure this firgure could go up!
 
ive a 3.5t evo II
insurance fully comp plus breakdown for any driver over 25 was £300 with anthony evans
service £120 per year
Tax £185 per year
MOT-same as normal car £55
fuel consumption is very good. i compete fairly locally once a week plus take the horse to lessons locally too, normally a full tank (£80) lasts about 3months
 
Blackers said:
Again, thanks for your advice.

One more question - Would £8,000-10,000 get me a good reliable secondhand box?
Click to expand...

yes! that's a good budget.

but just be very careful as some (most) 3.5t aren't great... as i discovered when searching for a lorry. i bought a 3.5t in the end, hated it, so sold it and bought a 5t (well, actually she's rated as 7.5t but is the size of a 5t). i'd recommend going for a bigger one if you passed your licence before 1997. you can get a lot more box for your money if you look at the over 3.5t ones. they tend to be more solid and powerful. however, some people do manage to find decent 3.5t, esp in your price range.

mine's for sale but is not in your budget range (although i'd happily accept 10k... she's only on for 3950!... :D ). the link to photos of her is in my sig, if you're interested in looking at that sort of size.

i love having a lorry, and am gutted i've got to go back to a trailer! have fun on your search! how exciting for you all! :D
 
Clipcloppop - many thanks for your thoughts. It is very helpful hearing of people's experiences good and bad.

Unfortunately my daughter who will be the driver, did not pass her test before 1997 and is rather apprehensive of driving a van, so a larger box is probably a no-no.

Yes, exciting and fun looking for a new mode of transport - but at the same time a bit scary!
 
I'm trying to find a lorry for myself and have been given some good advice. If you are going to get a 3.5t lorry, try and get it weighed unladen before you buy it. Some small lorries weigh more than you think and some may not be able to take a 16hh and all the tack etc without going overweight. Best to check first.

Clipcloppop your lorry looks perfect for me! Pity I live in Glasgow.
 
I changed from a 4x4 and trailer to a Renault Master van last summer. I got an old van conversion first to check if it was the right type of van for me, and it was, so since last autumn I've been looking for a newer Renault Master, with a budget of £8-9k.

I particularly wanted the newer Master (03 onwards) as it has a dash-mounted gearstick and 6 gears, and looks nicer IMO than the earlier models. I came close to buying 2 different van conversions, but they were quite far away and I was slightly suspicious about the build quality.

In the end, I saw a coachbuilt 04 model for sale with a local dealer for £12k, and althought it was more than I'd wanted to pay, it was local, came with a warranty, and the coachbuilt ones keep their value better than the van conversions, so I went for it!

I guess one of the first things you need to decide is whether you want to go for a newer van conversion (takes up to about 16hh) or a slightly older coachbuilt model.
 
Just a thought: I can appreciate why your daughter may find the idea of a larger, heavier lorry scarier, but she may well find that a 5-6 tonne lorry is much more stable and easier to drive with a horse in than a 3.5 tonne. My old 3.5 tonne was quite scary when it was windy and was all over the place when big truck overtook us, but my 5.2 tonne drives almost like a car.

It's quite a huge investment and it might be worth her getting some lessons in a proper truck to see how she feels about driving one - it might be a lot better than she expects and you'll end up with a safer vehicle.
 
There is a firm in south wales, the wife/daughter(?) sometimes posts on the forum and I think they do endurance or Trec.

They have a very informative website giving quite of lot of things to consider and look out for when buying a small lorry. But, I am sorry, I can't find the website!
They have lorries in to sell and your budget seems to be reasonable.
 
ORANGEHORSE said:
There is a firm in south wales, the wife/daughter(?) sometimes posts on the forum and I think they do endurance or Trec.

They have a very informative website giving quite of lot of things to consider and look out for when buying a small lorry. But, I am sorry, I can't find the website!
They have lorries in to sell and your budget seems to be reasonable.
Click to expand...

It's TravelTwo, but their website seems to be down this evening - was fine yesterday!
http://www.freewebs.com/traveltwo/

They're the people I bought mine from, and I agree, they were very knowledgable and helpful.
 
I have a 3.5t for my 16hh TB. It has cost a fortune in repairs and maintenance. Costs since last September are as follows. New battery, clutch, and slave cylinder £540.
Recently had new gear box bearings (you cannot check the gearbox, so could happen to anyone), new alternator, new cambelt, service and MOT - £1050. Now managed 6 journeys without having to call recovery - nothing short of a miracle, however I love driving it - easy and gives the horse a good ride. Mine is not coachbuilt, but is sturdy - a 2004 vauxhall movano. Be more careful who you get your recovery with. You can get cheap recovery which sounds great until you actually have to use it, only to find you are left for nearly four hours on the motorway and then they front lift your box with the horse still inside. Not ideal, and not what I thought I was paying for....
 
i would say your budget is fine.
get a mechanic to look at it and get it to the weigh bridge before buying!
mine has been ace so far and i love it!
horsebox.jpg
 
Thank you all for your help and advice which has all been taken onboard.

Also thanks to xena_wales for the web site. That will come in very handy as daughter in Wales.

Amandaco2 - Looks just like what is on our wish list!

Will start a serious search very soon and hopefully we find what we are looking for quickly, and fairly local as well!
 
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