A fully automatic ventilation system with optional (G3) filtration mats. Automatic temperature control, constantly monitored. A drinking water system. Overpressure in the perfectly illuminated interior. Insulated roof and sides. Now just to be clear, those are some hallmarks of modern livestock bodies.
But I’m sure the driver doesn’t want for anything either, sitting high and comfortably in the Volvo cab, both overseeing and overlooking things. The truck is powered by a 12.8 liter turbo-compound diesel engine with a maximum power output of 510 DIN-hp.
The rig’s configuration is higly common: a truck with three axles (usually with a 6×2 drivetrain), towing a full trailer with three axles, thus forming a 50 metric tons combination (equal to the Dutch gross vehicle weight limit).
The Cuppers company built the full trailer and both livestock bodies. Fresh air is brought into the interior from the right side, through all the vents you see in the picture. The air leaves the interior through the vents in the left side panels. This cross ventilation system also secures an overpressure inside the bodies.
Here’s another “cattlecruiser” for the Hans Snel hauling company, also built by Cuppers. By now, the national and international transport of livestock is only done by specialized and experienced professionals, who invest heavily in the latest and most animal friendly equipment. And that’s a good thing.
Related article:
Modern livestock trailer bodies… – In the EU. What I see rolling around the roads here to transport animals do as much or more to put me off Big Meat as anything the anti-meat groups can muster. Large trailers, usually two to three levels inside with 6″ or so round ventilation holes in the sides. Animals sticking their snouts out the holes, and *stuff* dripping from the sides and rear. Gotta be able to offer it for less than $3/pound for hamburger or pork at the store, no matter what it takes, I guess.
Nice Volvo.
Food is too cheap. In the western world, that is. Meat and pretty much everything else. Take something simple: an egg. Dutch inflation-corrected, an egg is three times cheaper than it was 60 years ago.
Nice Volvo, indeed.
Here’s a good article about one cattle rancher doing it very differently, and barely hanging on. His 180 degree change in practices was triggered by seeing the typical American livestock trailer in action:
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-05-15/the-biggest-ideas-in-farming-today-are-also-the-oldest?srnd=premium&sref=LoTvRBZZ
We buy most of our meat from local producers, of which there are a number of them. More expensive, bt we’re eating quite a bit less of it than we used to.
Thanks for the link, makes perfect sense to me… I went to college with a guy that now is a butcher/farmer in Sebastopol, CA (Victorian Farmstead Meat Company); Adam seems to purely source from people such as the one you referenced, and I believe they raise their own chickens as well as a few other animals. Prices are high but the quality seems excellent and he seems to have a loyal clientele. He had trouble too about a decade ago but seems to have pulled through now. If more people did the same and others supported that way of doing things, everyone would be better off, some financially and everyone else from a health perspective.