Shall I sell lorry? Will a trailer do?

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barneyhunter

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My horse has now been diagnosed as having damaged his sacroiliac joint and ligaments so won't be competing (or coming out of the stable) for several months and I tend to do less during the winter anyway. I have a 7.5t lorry which is lush and everything I always wanted (shame I didn't have it a couple of years ago when eventing), the horses travel in it very well.

However, I have run out of reasons to keep a lorry parked on the drive for probably a minimum of 6 months with maybe the odd trip to the vets in the mean time. I just seem to be spending all the time on it, just had new battery, front tyres and now due for plating (although our lorry man was out to check it today and said it will sail through).

As my horse has never been in a lorry and I do want a small area where I can get changed (and not covered in hay at the same time) so I was thinking of changing lorry to a Space Trekka and Shogun. This would mean that the trailer/car combination could cope with other halfs horse too if necessary. OH could use it over winter for hunting (lorry was banned from such events unless I checked the parking first).

Has anyone towed with a Shogun (SWB prob) and any experience of the Show trekka? Or should I keep the lorry and hope horse gets better (although I could do with saving the money and if I sell and buy car/trailer I would still have quite alot left over).

Or will I always be frustrated without a lorry. Don't want to spend the extra for the Star Trekka and the tow car needed would be more too.

Thank you
 
Personally I wouldn't tow a big trailer with a SWB car due to size/weight ratios. I have an IW HB510 trailer but would love to have a lorry to get the tack lockers and space for all the bits and bobs I need to take around so you may well find yourself missing that. I used to share my tow car (have a "normal" car for day to day) and had to empty it out after every show and then reload from scratch each time, now it's all mine I can keep a lot of bits loaded which I wouldn't be able to do if it was my main car so you may well miss the sheer convenience of permanent storage with the lorry.

Also, carefully calculate what it would cost you to run a shogun day to day as if I ran my LR as my main car it would cost me an extra £2500 a year in diesel so is much cheaper to keep it as second car even when you factor in running costs and depreciation which probably makes it similar cost wise to a lorry.

It's a difficult one, pros and cons to each decision. It does sound like you've got a good lorry though which can be hard to find so I'd be reluctant to let it go if I were you....
 
Only constructive thing I have to add would be get a lwb shogun, pref the 2.8 td as it has a chain not belt. Boot space is non existant in swb and I do not like the towing experience as much. The towing capacity would be perfect for the trailer and two big horses- say 650 kilos each, 1300 plus unlden show treka at 1280 ish.... And shogun has a max of 3300kg in the lwb. Te swb 2.8 is around 2800kg from memory, and the 2.5 swb about the same, less in some
models.

I love my shogun- could you guess??
 
I towed with a SWB Shogun and it was fab. Yes boot space is very limited but my water and tack fitted in the front of the trailer. It had plenty of power and towed really well. Being short it was super easy to manouvre the trailer and my reversing was much admired!

Downside - it was very thirsty!
 
Thank you for the replies.

I would love a Disco but apart from saving running a separate vehicle they are just too expensive to buy in the first place. My mum is also going to use the car as her vehicle (she does about 25 miles per week so fuel isnt realy an issue) so it needs to be relatively easy for her to drive.

MB - your point about storage is a sticky point. You are absolutely right, it is great to have the lorry all set up ready to go day or night, just need to load horse and tack and then we are off. I may need to rationalise drastically all the odds and ends that get kept in lorry.

Has anyone used the Show Trekka - I have heard about the axle issues but do the horses like them, are they as easy to use as they look?
 
I am doing exactly the same...hoping to sell my 7.5 ton DAF & get a Toyota Landcuiser & Show Trekka. Sadly, within the next 30 mins my lorry is about to fail to sell on eBay for the 3rd time, despite a ton of help from people on here to fine tune my advert...!!

I am fed up with the headache of plating & maintenance, when (after more angst than you can possibly believe) my choice is from a v expensive mechanic who causes more probs than he fixes & a very good one who left me MOT-less for 3 months this year because he wouldn't answer the effing phone...
 
barneyhunter said:
Thank you for the replies.

I would love a Disco but apart from saving running a separate vehicle they are just too expensive to buy in the first place. My mum is also going to use the car as her vehicle (she does about 25 miles per week so fuel isnt realy an issue) so it needs to be relatively easy for her to drive.

MB - your point about storage is a sticky point. You are absolutely right, it is great to have the lorry all set up ready to go day or night, just need to load horse and tack and then we are off. I may need to rationalise drastically all the odds and ends that get kept in lorry.

Has anyone used the Show Trekka - I have heard about the axle issues but do the horses like them, are they as easy to use as they look?
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I think what ever you have lorry or 4x4 and trailer there are downsides, sadly horse transport is expensive but costs can be kept down by buying wisely im confused why you say a discovery is too expensive as any 4x4 that is up to towing a bigger trailer will be simalar money, its a plus point that it will do few miles a week so try and find something tidy that has done a higher mileage than average or a petrol to get a bargain dont know what your budget is but you should be able something very reasonble for £3000 to £6000 but upwards of £1500 would get something suitable ....
 
I was told that the older Disco are very unreliable (and I'm not prepared to worry about an old car starting etc on a cold winters day when lorry started first time when surrounded by snow) and cost a fortune to run - dont shoot me it is what I have been told.

Thought we could spend £5k on an 02/03 shogun, mum would prefer SWB but the LWB would give us more le-way on the weight.

Stangely Dad seems to prefer the idea of not having any of my horse vehicles on the drive (OH and I live somewhere where we cant park and cant park at yard either) so it all needs to look reasonably smart. Lorry is super smart just rather bright so a white trailer should be no problem.
 
My friend has a show trekka, im impressed with it and she has had it away several times and although not a 5 star hotel its pretty comfortable! I think it would be more than adequate for changing in :)
Q
 
I tow with a Shogun. Admittedly it's K-reg (circa 1992) so a little older than what you are looking at. However, I find it very good to tow with. Very stable, very smooth. Built like a tank too. I can't advise on the trailer as I have an old Rice. However, I am just a little wary of trailers which purport to have too much living or storage. I'd want the trailer to be as light as possible. All of my kit - water, tack, the lot - goes in the car when I tow.
 
I have seen horse trailers with tack lockers which you can access from outside at a few events - I am useless so dont know brand but some1 on here might be able to kindly help? They look pretty handy to might be worth looking at?

As for boot space: I have a large hard plastic travel box packed to go at all times which reduces risk of forgetting things and reduces the amount of kit you need to load up into the car! I keep the box in the spare side of trailer as only travel one horse and find its ideal to keep spares in along with travel groom kit etc and I also keep water and bucket in spare side too.
 
What about a Diahatsu Fortrak as a tow vehicle? I know they haven't been made for a couple of years but my old boss used to take his old wooden hunting trailer with 2 huge hunters out and towed with one and I never heard him complain. Although I don't suppose many people talked about max weights then! I think they tow over 3t?

I dont mind a reliable vehicle that you can get spares for easily thats about 10yrs old?
 
Barney hunter- great tow vehicles. But sadly, finding them is like rocking horse ****!! The only ones available when we looked to replace ours were rusted and rotted.
 
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