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  Fleet of the City of St. Petersburg, Florida (circa 1958) shows a mix of Leach Packmasters and Gar Wood Load-Packers running on White, International and Ford tilt-cab trucks What's New at CRT July 4, 2010 CRT CELEBRATES SIX YEARS The sixth anniversary of Classic Refuse Trucks kicks off with completely revised and updated Load-Master album. When CRT went online back in July of 2004, Load-Master was the first album posted and until now had never been updated. Though Load-Masters have always been a sentimental favorite of mine, finding information on the brand has proven to be somewhat difficult. Load-Master did not buy a lot of advertising, and does not seem to have patented their early models and thus has left a small historical footprint. An all-new eight chapter article will hopefully go along way toward remedying this, and is packed (no pun intended) with over 70 new photos and illustrations of the Load-Master, inside and out. Contributing to the new album were John Thomas who worked for City Tank Corporation before moving over to Heil in the late 1960's, and Dana Gregory who shares his recollections of Load-Master's introduction to the Boston area. As luck would have it, mid-way through writing the article, I was contacted by Michael Tully, owner of Tully Disposal in northern Massachusetts. He sent along photos of a beautiful 1971 Loadmaster LM-300 that he owns, the featured truck for this issue. Tully acquired this classic from its original owner about fifteen years ago, and has been using it as spare. It is very rare to see a refuse packer from this era still on its original truck chassis, in this case an International Harvester Fleetstar 2110A. This is truly a refuse truck time-machine! Michael also informs CRT that the truck is for sale, and interested persons should contact him directly for details and to make a reasonable offer: Of course, the Load-Master album would not be complete without a history of Roto-Pac, its predecessor from City Tank Corporation. The new Roto-Pac album features the very interesting history of a brand that almost didn't get past the starting gate, yet recovered quickly to become the biggest supplier of refuse trucks to New York City for nearly two decades. Included are 17 new images, including a rare photo of the 1948 Roto-Pac pulverizer being demonstrated for the City of New York.
GODZILLA VS. GLENDALE Ronnie Keshishian informs us that the SWANA International Truck Road-E-O will be held indoors at Glendale, Arizona, on September 4th. The Arizona Chapter is sponsoring the event, and Ronnie is putting together a video display of classic Arizona iron for the event. Unofficially scheduled to make a live appearance at this event is the famous Son of Godzilla truck #254 owned by the City of Scottsdale. In the early 1970's, the City shop converted this Maxon front loader into one of the world's first automated residential loaders. Miraculously, this pioneering truck has been preserved, along with the rich history of their groundbreaking work in automating the industry. (See the City of Scottsdale Album here at CRT for details) If indeed this truck were to be shown, it would be a rare opportunity to see a truly historic refuse truck. It is the only surviving example of the original Scottsdale trucks, and probably the only Western Jet/Maxon Full Pack in existence anywhere. The details for the event that I have at this time are as follows: DATE: September 4, 2010 LOCATION: University of Phoenix/Arizona Cardinals Stadium-Glendale, Arizona INFORMATION: SWANA/Arizona Chapter As stated above, the Godzilla appearance has not been officially confirmed. If any more information about this event becomes available, I will post it on the bulletin board at the Member's Area REFUSE BODY MANUFACTURERS  Several new makes have been added to the list, the first by way of the CRT Members Area Message Board and member tersol_98 who posted the URL for Currahee Waste Products of Georgia, which has brought back the famous Dempster Route King II design in a smaller package with a new curved shell body. The eleven cubic yard Li'l Boss debuted at Waste Expo 2010 in Atlanta, with 20 and 25 cubic yard versions planned for introduction by Fall 2011. It's good to see this classic rear loader back on the market after a long hiatus.
Zachary Geroux provided new pictures of several hard-to-find California trucks during a trip to Los Angeles. He spotted this front loader at the Puente Hills landfill, which at first glance appears to be a late-model Amrep. However, after talking with the driver, he learned that that it was in fact built by American Vehicles Inc. of Pomona, California. This particular truck is an ex-Los Angeles front loader, so there may be a few more of these still working. A check of the address listed on the body ID tag indicates that AVI has ceased operations, or moved to an unknown location.
Zachary reports also that Local Rubbish's ancient Spartan Top Pack front loader has been permanently retired. "The Dinosaur", as it was affectionately named, was in all likelihood the last working example of a Spartan front loader, a micro-brand from Southern California. Here at CRT, the Dinosaur will live forever (in pictures) in the Local Rubbish Album. To see Zachary's complete post on his L.A. trip with links to numerous pictures and video, see the Discussion Board posting at the CRT Members Area. From Down Under, Stevo Dibattista sends information on the consolidation of the Australian refuse body industry. Transpacific Industries Group (TPI) has absorbed Compaction Systems, Papas, RiteWay and Superior Pak. This conglomerate is one of the largest solid waste handling firms in Australia, and also manufactures a wide variety of refuse bodies under the Superior Pak name. It has a wide array of models, including some formerly built by Compaction Systems and Papas. Scott Watson (a.k.a. trashman242) sent in a URL and some pictures from a Mexican manufacturer called Universal Group, which may finally explain the mysterious 'Universal' brand front loaders that have occasionally surfaced in Southern California. I had believed Universal to be a micro-builder in Los Angeles, but this longtime Mexican truck body builder may have been the source all along, and may even have a U.S. distributor somewhere in Southwest. Scott noted that the Universal front loader shown on their website bears a strong resemblance to the now-defunct STS/Stagg design. If not made under license, it may simply be a close copy, for which there is ample precedent among California front loaders! Scott also sent in some pictures of a rare STS manual side loader, one of which I post now post for your enjoyment: 
This information has been added to the CRT Refuse Body Database, a comprehensive list of refuse body manufacturers (past and present) listed alphabetically. The list features links to company websites, CRT articles, and in some cases other photos and videos. To keep up to date, the Refuse Body Database is updated whenever new information becomes available. COLLECTORS CORNER Once again, there is no separate edition of Collectors Corner, but here's something Matthew Robinson forwarded: another amazing hand-crafted Schorling 2-R replica with working hydraulics: THE 10K MARK The CRT Members Area at Flickr.com reached a milestone in April, when FormerWMDriver posted the 10,000th picture. For those of you new to CRT, the Members area is our related discussion board and photo pool. The Members Area is not limited to 'classic' trucks; anything related to the solid waste industry is fair game, and best of all...it's free! Group photos may be viewed without membership, or you may join the group absolutely free of charge and post your own photos, join in discussions or start your own topic. 
© 2010 Eric Voytko All Rights Reserved Logos shown are the trademarks of respective manufacturers Photos from factory brochures/trade advertisements except as noted |