A Rustic Barn Style Prefab Home Design
Prefab home buyers, wouldn’t some of you be happy in a barn style prefab house? The look of a barn is one so many people like, it seems like, but when you think of living in an actual barn (the kind I’m familiar with anyway), you think about the thin walls, large drafty space, and wonder how you could heat it.
Then when a person looks at this prefab house plan based on a barn (it’s also based on Scandanavian design, as you might be able to tell from the photo), you might think well, this looks like a tight, compact, well insulated modular house with a barn style but with a cleanly finished wood-style exterior.
This prefab house design is by CARGO Architecture. It’s set in the forested mountains of easter Quebec, Canada. They call it the “Villa Boreale”. It’s used as a family home but it has a lot of sleeping space.
It sleeps up to 14. It has three bedrooms. Maybe they like to have a lot of family come visit. Maybe they could rent their prefab house out to skiiers. It’s nearby the Le Massif ski center.
You can see some of the ski-oriented theme in that lift chair they’re repurposed and put in the front of the prefab home.
That light exterior wood you see in the photo above is Eastern white cedar. And it contrasts against metal — black metal cladding. To see more of CARGO Architecture’s work, find them in our Prefab Home Builders and Designers Directory (click here).
Big Custom Motorcoach
This big custom motorhome slash semi tractor is the work of a custom motorcoach company we’ve featured here a couple of times, Davies Motor Company, because their work has caught our attention and other peoples attention as well.
They take semi tractors (which don’t look much like these finished toterhome products they come up with) and strip them down and re-build them up into these luxury motorhomes. Basically toterhomes. They seem to have their own style though, Davies motorcoachs I mean.
The process: they buy a semi tractor, strip it, stretch the frame out, lift the sleeper off with a folk lift (if there is a sleeper on the truck).
Then they modify the cab and hood: they cut open the back of the cab wider (if needs be), rework the wheel fenders, remove the hood and pretty much everything else, paint prep by grinding and filling, do a paint prep layeer over the whole truck (all the parts that will be painted), mount new steps, boxes and other chrome features.
Then then built the sleeper frame and put the sleeper walls on — I’ve seen them use these big ones like the photo above, studio sleeper units some call them, put in windows, build the roof of the sleeper, grind it all for painting, brace it all for strength, secure the skylights, and then mount the sleeper on the frame.
They paint the truck body with its final paint, paint the sleeper with its, and then assemble the two parts.
Then they do finishing work by adding lights, frame metal, and other features, decals, and any semi truck customization.
Then there’s just the interior to customize. These are usually custom luxury interiors or even just custom comfortable interiors, depending on what the buyer wants to do with the RV.
To visit Davies Motor Company, click here.
Long Luxury Motorhome
What qualifies this luxury RV as “big”? Just the length of the motorhome part of this toterhome is 15.8 meters. That’s 52 feet. Then you add on the trailer which is 38 feet. Plus the 4 feet to the hitch. That means this luxury RV is 94 feet long.
The base of this motorhome/5th wheel combo is a Volvo VN which many consider to be an already impressive RV vehicle, but with the bodywork and then harnessed to the trailer, it might be even more impressive. Just to give an idea of the length, a semi in France measures at 16.50 m almost the length of this Volvo RV. In the “small” trailer the owner can load through a hatch two other cars. In the other photo we include, the garage can be seen within a hydraulic stage. I wonder how much this thing weighs fully loaded?
The interior is of course top-of-the-line luxury for a vehicle of this type. But nothing is missing as usual and the layout is classic, a large back room with bathroom and toilet and the front kitchen diner. In the original truck cab there is a sofa and a third big chair. Also two extra folding berths.
The Volvo is equipped with a 550 horsepower Cummins engine, helped by an auto box, which would come in handy when on a trip in our continent, crossing the Rockies, for example. An anti-collision radar is equipped in front.
For maneuvers, eight mini-cameras help the driver. Which would probably help. Can you imagine cornering or backing this thing into some parking spot? This is quite the luxury RV motorhome (or tractor-trailer, depending on which you decide it is). Here’s some interiors they put on these luxury RV coaches.
This 18 Wheel House! Semi/Home Hybrid
What do you think of this hybrid Freightliner semi tractor and a custom house trailer?
It looks like turning may be completely out of the question, but it also features 3 levels and a full-sized kitchen and bath. Pretty good strengths?
This semi/home hybrid was reviewed byanother trucking site, but the actual owner of the truck later commented on a post that that review the other site did was actually not true, and that the guy who wrote that he had reviewed the vehicle had never actually driven it, so, we’re now updating this post with information straight from the owner about it:
The truck belongs to a couple, John and Rebecca Simons Pooley, and they were kind enough to answer a few questions about their giant house on wheels for everybody:
The couple isn’t rich. This isn’t just a rich person’s luxury RV. They worked for years for this vehicle, which isn’t an extra home — they live in it fulltime. The husband, John, worked as a cabinetmaker and home builder for over 30 years.
And this house on wheels you see took over 8 years of evenings and weekends to build.
Actually, the vehicle isn’t being used by the couple as a recreational vehicle these days — it’s now a parked home on wheels. They haven’t travelled with it for the last four years, and it’s currently parked on their acreage.
Ultimate Recreational Vehicle Made From Freightliner Argosy
Call that a sleeper cab mate..? NAH…THIS is a sleeper cab! – Mic Dundee if he was a trucker…
Twins Custom Coaches webmaster Kioko Muthui is the source of bringing this find to the internet.
“As I was doing some research for my next project I cam across a truck cab that just blew me away!” Muthui wrote Biglorryblog.
He wrote about a fabulous story of how Twons Custom Coaches converts a Freightliner Argosy into the ultimate Recreational Vehicle–with or without a trailer…
35 feet long.
Its a stretched out body and frame with much room for the box.
It was put together in 2007 by Todd and Mickey Larson’s Portland, Oregon-based
The Argosy breaks down like this:
Manufacturer
Daimler Trucks North America
Production 1998-present
Body and chassis
Class Heavy Duty Truck
Body style COE
Powertrain
Engine
Cummins 500/6 IL
Cummins 620/6 IL
Series 60 470/6 IL
Series 60 500/6 IL
Cummins 530/6 IL
Transmission
18-speed Eaton-Fuller UltraShift – PLUS
18-Speed Eaton-Fuller Autoshift Eaton-Fuller 10 speed, 13 speed, and 15 speed.
Here’s some more Freightliner Argosy’s to give an idea of what these are like.
The Too-Big RV Tractor
Tow a trailer behind this and you’d have a condo on 18 Wheels!
Any use for a trailer big enough to fit a football team inside?
This trailer was reportedly owned by a fellow in Michigan, but was later sold to a fellow in
Iowa.
The sleeper is a 234 inch with a lot of creature comforts, by Arvin.
In the unit there was a leather set of a fouton and two recliners with round pedestool tables. It had a full-lighted mirror ceiling. It also had a full bathroom with a house camode and a ceramic pedestool sink.
The Michigan guy hauled a 50-foot gooseneck specialized motorcycle trailer with this.
The Iowa owner hauled race car trailers to races on weekends.
Could you imagine pulling a 53′ behind it? What about backing up or cornering? Would it be legal to pull anything other than a 28 pup?
Anyone have more any more information on this RV trailer? Read our update here. What about the interior of this big semi tractor? There hasn’t been a lot of images for this rig floating around, but one I’ve seen everywhere around the web has the too-big semi tractor paired up with a nearly all-white interior. Is that what this thing looks like inside? Then I’ve found some similar things, which people will probably enjoy. One’s almost the same rig (or is the same rig), then there’s big Davies motor coach, and then another tractor / toy hauler combo. Which is your favorite? How much do you think these things cost?
