Fautras Provan Premium
2H straight load


  

Provan- Bright & airy!

AID System Butt Bars
Open & Close from the front!

Fautras Oblic 3 slant load
(with options)

The first is butt bars you can control from the front of the trailer. With Fautras’s patented AID System® butt bars, you can open and close the butt bars while standing near your horse’s head. We’re not suggesting that they’re better than having a horse trained to stand patiently, but if you have a horse that won’t give you the time to go back and secure the butt bars, the AID System may be the next best thing. The AID System is a standard feature on the Fautras Provan Premium straight load.

The second noteworthy feature is slant load dividers that let you unload all horses from the front. No need to back out or turn the horses around! And it’s easy! This clever design is a standard feature on the Fautras Oblic slant load models.

The third “what a great idea” feature is also found on the Oblic slant loads. Wouldn’t it be nice if you could change the stall sizes to accommodate different sized horses? In the Fautras Oblic series, you can do just that. That stall divider that lets you unload the horses from the front is adjustable for length. The wall mounts are also adjustable so you can make best use of the greater (or lesser) stall length.

More on these handy features later. But first, a few general comments about Fautras horse trailers…

Traveled Lane Trailers has long been a source of well-proven horse trailers designed to be pulled safely by smaller, more fuel efficient vehicles. Fautras is the most recent addition to our lineup of high quality, user-friendly fuel-savers. A very appealing aspect of Fautras is that not only do their trailers have innovative features, operation of those features is very natural and intuitive. We also like their use of durable, low-maintenance materials.

Fautras has been producing horse trailers since 1992. The designs benefit from the Fautras family’s century-plus of working with horses and their prior experience in selling horse trailers from other manufacturers. Fautras holds several patents and has received many awards for their innovative and practical designs. Fautras trailers are sold in many countries.

Fautras offers straight load models for 1.5 to 2 horses (math note: two Quarter Horses don’t make a half horse) and slant load models for 2 to 4 horses. As a result of their development in the European market, where large or dedicated tow vehicles are generally not practical, maximum tongue weights on Fautras’s two horse models range from 154 lbs. to 220 lbs. On their largest trailer, a 4H slant, the loaded tongue weight is under 310 lbs. For comparison, the loaded tongue weight on a domestic 2H bumper pull is typically in the 400-500 lb. range. With their efficient weight-saving construction and great balance, Fautras trailers can be pulled safely by many of the fuel efficient midsized SUVs and trucks on the market today.

We tend to sell more straight loads than slants, so in this writeup, we’re going to focus first on the Fautras straight load models. Even if you prefer slant loads, please read the Provan straight load section, as we cover many of the Fautras materials and designs in detail in that section. We’ve highlighted some items in bold print to call them to your attention. In many cases, those features apply to multiple models.

Fautras Provan Straight Loads

The Fautras model that really grabbed our attention is the Provan Premium. Provan is the name of Fautras’s most popular series of 2H straight loads. The Premium is the most fully featured in the Provan series. We’re showing the Provan Premium in Anthracite (dark) Grey and Pearl (light) Grey.

First of all, those AID System butt bars you control from the front of the trailer are standard on the Provan Premium. As shown in the pictures above, the control mechanism is recessed forward of each wall pad. You simply pull the curved handle to unlatch, pull the lever and the butt bar on that side swings out. To close, simply reverse the procedure. It’s actually quicker and easier to do than read about. (Please note that with the AID System, you can still open and close the butt bars at the rear of the trailer. That’s quick & easy, too.) We hope you found the pictures of the AID System helpful, but if you’d really like to get a good look, here’s a link to a Fautras video showing the AID System in action:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7TxSpo_WEZA (Please note: Trailers in video shown with options. Note also ease of loading and unloading.)

Even if you don’t need the convenience of the AID System, there’s a lot to like about the Provan. The Premium model has two large groom doors as standard. They’re tall and wide enough that horses can be unloaded from the front. There’s a sliding window with guard in each door and a cam bar latch that secures each door at the top and bottom. (The latch is similar to what you’d see on a commercial truck.) And in keeping with their clever minimalism, that same latch grabs a little nub on the tongue of the trailer to keep the door open, even in a strong breeze. If you’ve ever had a door blow closed unexpectedly, you’ll appreciate effective door holdbacks. (We have more to say on holdbacks at the back of the trailer a little later.)

Much of the interior of a Fautras is white, and when those big groom doors are open, the interior of the Provan Premium is extremely inviting and well ventilated. In addition to the windows in the doors, the Premium has a large fixed front window with guard. For added airflow, there’s a vent integrated into the horseshoe logo at the front of the trailer. Getting back to the groom doors for a moment, when the trailer is equipped with the optional tack locker, the locker swings out with the left door, freeing up space inside the trailer and putting the locker at a comfortable working height. And it’s large enough to hold a couple of Western saddles!

A clever (and safety-oriented) feature is to be found in the Provan breast bars. If a horse should climb over a breast bar, there’s an exterior emergency release. You don’t have to get inside with a panicking horse. Simply unscrew the exterior tie loop, which releases the breast bar wall mount. This allows the breast bar to drop, freeing the horse. You hope never to need this feature, but it’s nice to know Fautras has been thoughtful enough to include it.

What else? The Fautras Tech™ flexible stall divider gives the horses an improved sense of space and encourages them to balance naturally rather than lean. The divider is tough, yet light enough that it’s extremely easy to remove. The front stall post in the Provan removes easily as well.

Tired of removing mats to clean the floor? Fautras trailers feature a rotproof polyethylene floor panel. We encourage you to keep your floor clean so your horses will have good footing and to keep the trailer looking good, but from a longevity perspective, animal wastes don’t faze polyethylene. Sweep, hose or power wash - however you do it, keeping a Fautras floor clean is easy. The polyethylene is also very strong and has a bit of flexibility for cushion. (And please note, each Fautras has a rubber floor mat, bonded to the polyethylene floor, for added cushion and grip.) When you buy a Fautras, you’re even doing a little something for the environment. The floor panel contains recycled polyethylene – it takes less energy to produce and keeps some very-long-lasting material out of the landfills.

But wait, one more thing to say about the floor… In the Provan straight load series, there’s the Fautras patented Progressive Floor™ design. Not only is there the rotproof polyethylene panel mentioned above, but the rear portion of the floor steps down gradually in stages. This reduces the height for convenient loading and unloading. Fautras prefers that you not have to raise or lower a ramp, so there is no ramp. (Optional ramps are shown here on some models.) The low step-up height allows the horses to move comfortably in and out of the trailer as you hopefully saw in the video link earlier in this section. And if you didn’t view it then, here’s the link again:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7TxSpo_WEZA (Please note: Trailers in video shown with options.)

And while we’re at the back of the trailer…. There are two easy-to-handle doors at the rear, held securely at top and bottom by cam bar latches (as mentioned earlier, similar to what you’d see on commercial trucks).  The rear doors are skinned in tough, lightweight fiberglass, reinforced & protected by hard polypropylene kick panels. (Ditto for the side walls.  That is, fiberglass with polypropylene kick panels. More on that later.)  Each rear door has a 3-position sliding vent panel.  The beauty of the sliding panels is that they are much simpler than windows and, when fully open, produce an opening that’s twice (or more) as large as the sliding pane of the typical rear window.

A while back, we said we would say more about door holdbacks. Now’s the time.

Many trailers have what we call a “stick & socket” door holdback. The good thing about the stick & socket is that it’s a one-motion device. You swing the door around, the stick goes into the socket and the door stays open. The bad thing is that at lot of them don’t hold very well. Especially when the plastic components shrink with age.

Fautras has a one-motion holdback on each rear door, and it works very well. You just push the door around, it clicks past a stop, and it holds. Even in a strong wind. Press on the stop with your toe and it releases. Simple & effective. A door holdback may seem like a small thing, but if you’ve ever had a door blow closed on your ankle (we have) or had a horse spooked by an unexpectedly swinging door, an effective holdback isn’t a trivial thing.

But wait, one more thing on holdbacks.  The “one motion” rear door holdback comes into play when the doors are opened out to the sides (180 degrees from the closed position).  You can also position the rear doors straight back (90 degrees from closed), thanks to a second holdback on each door. That one can come in handy if you need to guide an animal in.  You hopefully noticed the various door positions in the pictures a few paragraphs earlier.  (Please note: On some trailers, the “straight back” position may be a little more than 90 degrees for a wider door spread.)

We’ve talked about the neat features on Fautras trailers, and specifically, on the Provan Premium straight load. But we haven’t talked about what will fit. Time to talk about that for a bit before we move on to the other models and some technical details.

The Provan straight load is sized for horses to about 16 hands. The body length is 10 feet, width is 64 inches and height is 7’5”. The empty weight is approximately 1980 lbs. and when loaded to the rated maximum, the tongue weight will be about 154 lbs. The light weight and light loaded tongue weight are major reasons why you can safely tow the Provan and other Fautras trailers with a smaller-than-typical tow vehicle. Remember, the Fautras design evolved in Europe where fuel is expensive. Their horses are just as big as ours, but they pull with their everyday vehicles, which are smaller (sometimes much smaller) than the tow vehicles common here in the States. The solution is a light, balanced trailer such as the Fautras. Fautras employs unitized construction, as on modern automobiles, to provide strength without excessive weight. We’ll talk a bit more about construction details and materials in the “Common Elements and Materials” section a little later on.

Fautras offers a few models in the Provan series. They’re all the same size, but differ in standard equipment. There’s the Club model, which has one groom door without window. It has regular butt bars. Stepping up the line, there’s the Provan Classic, which adds a window in the front and has the Safe Release System™ (which has a front-release strap to supplement regular butt bars). Both of those models are nice and we’ll offer them if customer demand is there, but we’re stocking the Provan Premium. It has two groom doors, more windows and the AID System butt bars as standard.

Attention drivers, here’s another interesting feature available on the Provan – a carriage platform. If you have a bumper pull trailer and are tired of muscling your carriage into the back of the truck or if you have an SUV and would like to be able to take a small carriage along, then the Provan with carriage platform may be just the trailer for you. When equipped with the carriage platform, the trailer is built with an extended tongue. There’s still a light loaded tongue weight and the platform is much lower than a truck bed for easier loading.

Fautras JMS Straight Loads for 1 to 1.5 Horses

Early on, we said that Fautras offers trailers for 1.5 horses.  That would be the JMS, in Club and Classic versions. They call this size a 1.5 because it’s wide enough to accommodate a mare and foal. Body width is 50 inches, so it’s only 14 inches narrower than a Provan 2H model. The width gives your horse (or horse and a half) good room while giving the trailer good stability and a look of substance.  The body on the JMS is nearly 10’ long and 7’5” tall, so it offers essentially the same length and height as the Provan.  The JMS has unitized construction similar to that of the Provan, meaning fiberglass body, polypropylene kick panels and galvanized steel frame with rollover protection.  There’s also the rotproof polyethylene floor panel with mats you don’t have to remove for cleaning and the Progressive Floor design for easier loading.  The JMS comes with one large groom door as standard and two rear doors with slide-down ventilation panels.  The JMS weighs about 1720 lbs. and has a loaded tongue weight under 135 lbs.

The Club is the more basic of the two JMS models. It’s available only in white and has no front window. The JMS Classic is available in several colors, has a front window with guard and has the Safe Release System, which has a front-releasable strap to supplement regular butt bars. The AID System front-controlled butt bars are available as an option on the JMS Classic. (If you skipped the Provan section, please note that many features applicable to the JMS are explained in greater detail in that section.)

Fautras Oblic SL Slant Load Models

Fautras offers a range of slant load models, the Oblic SL series. The Oblic 2 SL is for two horses, the Oblic 3 SL is for three horses and the Oblic 4 SL, as you may have guessed, is for four horses. As with the straight load models, the slants are designed to be pulled safely by fuel efficient vehicles such as mid-sized SUVs and trucks.

In characteristic Fautras fashion, the Oblics have innovative and practical features and are made of durable, low-maintenance materials.  Remember that “unload all horses from the front” feature we mentioned earlier? In the rightmost picture above, note how the stall divider is composed of two sections that meet near the middle.  As with the straight loads, the slant dividers are of smooth Fautras Tech. Light, tough and easy to handle, the split divider allows all horses to unload from the front, a very rare feature in a slant load.  No need to make the horses back out or turn around.

Now that you’ve read about the front unload feature, how about a chance to see it?  Following is a link to a neat video where Fautras removed the roof of an Oblic so you could get a birds-eye view of the trailer being loaded and unloaded.  You’ll get a good look at how that clever split divider comes into play.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6D3m7WjpgJk (Please note: Trailers in video shown with options.)

Remember the adjustable length stalls we mentioned in the beginning of this writeup? If you watched the video in the link just above, you saw how the Oblic dividers are split. Where the sections meet, there are adjustable straps, which let you shorten or lengthen each divider. The divider can be lengthened approximately 8 inches, which is a fair amount of adjustment. The wall mounts are adjustable as well to accommodate the changing divider lengths.

Each Oblic has a groom door on the left side at the first stall. In the right front area, there’s a spacious tack compartment with its own wide access door. A feature we found interesting is that, in the groom door, there’s a window contoured to follow the curve of the door. We’ve seen curved windows before, but what’s different about this one is that it’s a curved window that slides open for ventilation. Nice detail, Fautras!

Fautras Oblic models come with sliding windows on both sides for light & ventilation.  In addition, the dual rear doors have the sliding ventilation panels we spoke of in the Provan section.  As on the Provan, each open panel produces a much larger opening than the typical window for greater light & airflow.

Another Oblic feature that caught our attention is the optional side opening window. The upper section of the wall swings up, producing a very large opening at the heads of the 2^nd, 3^rd and 4^th horses, depending on the size of the trailer.  We’re showing the feature in some shots and if you viewed the videos, you may have seen it. It’s very inviting and provides great ventilation when the trailer is stopped.  (Please note: The side opening window is to be used only when the trailer is parked.)

As with the other Fautras models, the each Oblic features a galvanized steel frame with integrated rollover protection and a low-maintenance skin of fiberglass. However, the skin of the Oblic has something extra. Since the Oblic models are longer, the fiberglass side walls have a honeycomb core for additional strength. There are the typical-for-Fautras hard polypropylene kick panels on the walls and rear doors. And there’s the easy-to-clean rotproof polyethylene floor with bonded anti-skid mat.

Slant loads are often wider than straight loads, and that’s the case with the Oblics. The body width is 5’11”. Body height is a generous 7’5”. That height is the same as the straight loads and tall for a slant.

Here are some other specs on the Oblic models: The Oblic 2 has a body length of 11’4”, empty weight of 2491 lbs and a maximum loaded tongue weight of 220 lbs. The Oblic 3 has a body length of 14’7”, empty weight of 3263 lbs. and a maximum loaded tongue weight of 265 lbs. The Oblic 4 has a body length of 16’11”, empty weight of 3638 lbs. and a maximum loaded tongue weight of 308 lbs.

Fautras achieves a meaningful weight reduction through unitized construction (more on that shortly), but we hope you can see from the specs that these trailers have size and substance. Thanks to well balanced designs (mandated by European regulations), the loaded tongue weights in the 220 to 308 lb. range are far below the 600-1000 lb. tongue weights typical of domestic trailers in this size range. Lighter tongue weight helps the tow vehicle maintain a more level attitude for better steering control.

Following is a link to another Fautras video. It doesn’t focus on one feature in particular, but it’s nice to see how comfortably the mares and foals go in and out of the trailer during loading and unloading.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTZ0f7BPrRs (Please note: Trailers in video shown with options.)

Fautras Oblic 2 ST Straight Load

Fautras recently introduced a 2H straight load based on the Oblic 2 slant body shell.  The Provan is a great straight load, but the Oblic 2 ST was introduced for folks who want more length or width.  The Oblic 2 ST has a rounded front as on the Oblic slant loads. The Oblic 2 ST has a body width of 5’11” (Provan is 5’4”) and a body length of 11’4” (Provan is 10’).  The Oblic 2 ST has a tack locker option as on the Provan series.

Common Elements and Materials

This section is sort of a catch-all. We’re going to say a bit more about some topics we’ve already touched upon. And cover some topics about which we haven’t said anything. So here goes…

Many modern automobiles feature a unitized structure for strength and to reduce weight.  Instead of a body sitting on a separate chassis, the 3-dimensional “all in one” structure of a unitized vehicle is essentially a very strong “box.”  This approach allows the use of thinner and lighter materials than required with non-unitized construction.  Similarly, European trailers have long employed unitized construction to provide strength while keeping the weight relatively low.

In fact, a Fautras trailer does have a chassis. A surprisingly stout one, considering it’s a lightweight trailer. The chassis is of galvanized steel. Steel for toughness, galvanized for corrosion protection. The full-width floor panel contributes to the stiffness of the chassis. The 3-dimensional unit body aspect starts taking shape with a galvanized steel perimeter frame around the rear opening. In the straight load models, there’s also a galvanized “backbone” at roof level along the centerline of the trailer. This in turn gets additional support from the removable front stall divider post. Slant loads incorporate roof arches for added strength. More galvanized framing in doors and around door openings provides additional strength. These elements (and more) constitute Fautras’s integrated rollover protection.

We spoke earlier about the fiberglass skin. We’ll mention it again, but just to say that fiberglass is a tough, durable, relatively lightweight material that requires little maintenance. Fiberglass has proven its worth for decades in the boating industry. Wash and wax it periodically and it can be kept looking good for a long time. Ignore it and it won’t look as nice, but it will continue doing the job. Similarly, the polyethylene floor and polypropylene kick panels were specified for their low-maintenance toughness.

Some of the basic models are offered only in white, but most models are offered in six colors, all of which we have tried to show in this section: White, Anthracite (dark) Grey, Pearl (light) Grey, Bordeaux, Green and Navy Blue. Regardless of wall color, the roof will be in cool white fiberglass. Interior walls (in areas not covered by kick panels) are in a bright and inviting white.

Fautras trailers feature smooth riding torsion axles (with shock absorbers, a feature you won’t find on many brands) and mechanical Inertia brakes.  Please note, with Inertia brakes, you don’t need a brake controller in the tow vehicle!  As the tow vehicle brakes, the Inertia brakes apply braking force automatically in proportion to the load in the trailer.  With Inertia brakes, there’s even a parking brake! (But don’t leave it on for extended periods.)  Fautras trailers are equipped with radial tires and bright, reliable LED tail and marker lights as standard.

Fautras trailers include another feature you may appreciate as you’re about to go out on the road. The side of the coupler is marked with “X,” “+” and “-“ zones.  When you lower the coupler onto the ball, if it reads “+,” the coupler is latched properly and secure. If it reads “X,” better check it again, because it’s not on the ball securely. If it reads “-,” also check it again, because this indicates that the ball is too small or worn. The coupler status indicator isn’t meant to take the place of paying attention while you do the trailer connection, but it’s a thoughtful touch.

See them at Traveled Lane Trailers
We invite you to visit Traveled Lane Trailers to see Fautras trailers and use the clever features you’ve read about here. In fact, if you have your intended tow vehicle (and a safe driving record!), come on by and take a test drive!