[Remoteness]

Thanks folks,

Like I said before, I was reluctant to show any pictures of the expando due to the fact that the truck is not complete. I don't have a lot of sweet looking shots but, in an effort to do the right thing for the Gearslutz Remote Possibilities community, I complied. And I'm happy I did.

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Craig,

I lust for my expando (and my newest "killer" idea for a mobile unit) every time I walk into ELROY or search my thoughts. Believe it or not, I don't have to get psyc'd looking at any other remote truck. I come up with an idea and that is what fuels me into a world of "remote possibilities."

Oh, and one more thing -- IMO, there is nothing wrong with "Fischer Price." You have to start somewhere. Think about it for a second -- Fischer Price does better numbers than all of the remotesters in the world. So, in an economic comparison we cannot even compete. Plastic is here to stay.

If you're ever in the NYC area or if we're in your town, come see the rig.

Finding ELROY is a hard to believe long arse story. Let me see if I can keep it under thousand words.

Back in the summer of 1998 I was hanging in my living room with a friend and he asked me if I built another truck what would it look like. I said, I would never build another truck with my money. At that time I was done with building trucks. He said, what if you built it for someone else -- what would it look like? Well, I grabbed a piece of paper and scribbled down a drawing of a dual sided expando body on a straight truck. It's interior setup up completely differently than the expando is today but, the outside idea and concept was exactly like ELROY today. *Note: I had to adapt my original interior design to fit with the expando I purchased used.

About a week or so later I got a call from my buddy saying, he saw my truck in Hauppauge, NY. I looked out the window and saw that my one and only truck (at the time) was parked comfortably in my driveway. I said to him, What are you talking about? My truck is in my driveway. He said, No, the expando truck, the one you showed me at your place -- it's for sale on Cassell Motor's truck lot in Long Island. I said, Really... He said, It's looks just like the one you showed me. I headed down to the place like a bat out of hell. I walked into the sales office and spoke to the guy there. He told me that they were trying to sell this truck for quite sometime but, no one wanted it because of the expanding body. Everyone wanted the truck chassis without the body. The company that owned the vehicle originally wanted a lot of bread for it and did not want to sell the truck piece meal so, they ended up just paid rent and kept it on that lot. I told the guy I was interested in buying the rig but, he said, he was not selling it anymore and if I was interested I should call the company that owned it directly. I call the company and got on the phone with their CPA. We haggled back and forth and came up with an amazing number. I gave him a deposit and was waiting to find out when I can pay the balance and pick up the truck.

Well, a few days later I got a call from the guy and he said, he had bad news for me. He stated that their CEO was in town from Germany and told him, if we have to sell this truck to an outsider for that kind of money (I got it for a steal) we should offer it to our companies in Canada and Mexico first. If they don't go for it, we'll sell it to this guy.

Man, I was devastated. Two weeks before all this I wouldn't build another truck again and now, I'm going nuts because I potentially lost the truck of my dreams. The CPA did say, It's your truck if the other companies don't want it. I promise I will call you when it's the right time. Damn, we all heard that one before... I didn't know what to do, I though of suing but what would that yield me. I looked around locally and all over the Net for another truck like this. The closest I got was having someone build me one for $300,000.00. And that was just for the body. Well, needless I say, that wasn't going to happen. Based on the budget I originally had for that expando the only thing I could come up with was to build a new facility based around a racing car trailer. Remember, I wasn't gonna build another rig and now I'm going nuts trying to make it so.

For about nine months straight I called, faxed and email this guy trying to find more news about the truck. He did get back to me to say, Canada past but Mexico was showing signs of interest. After about nine months of constant communication my interest finally started to fade out. It was like loosing something or someone you really loved. It was tough and very difficult for me to deal with but, I got over it. I really wanted that truck but, it was over in my mind and I was good about it. It didn't hurt anymore.

Believe it or not, about fourteen or so months from the time I first saw the truck I had a meeting to discuss working on a bunch of gigs for Good Morning America at their new television studios in Times Square. While prepping for the meeting I pulled out my GMA file I noticed the expando truck file. The company's name started with an "F" and it was right next to my GMA file. I smiled and took out that file, placed it on my desk and said to myself, Self, just for the f*uck of it, call these folks when you get back from the GMA meeting. Here's the spooky part of this story. After I finished the meeting I asked Jeff at the studio if I could use his phone to check my answering machine. He said, OK so I dialed in. One of the messages on the machine was from Mike, the CPA guy, he stated, I don't know if you remember me but, you had interest in our expando truck sometime ago and I was wondering if you still wanted it for the same amount of money? Mexico past on the deal because it was going to cost more to ship it to them than they were going to pay for it. About $5,000.00 US more... Man, I went nuts -- I called the dude, then raced back to my office to cut a check in full so I can overnight it to them. The following month I had it in my possession and started the work.

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7rojo7,

Have you shown the pictures to your wife yet? Did she throw you out of the house?

Because of the "a la carte" concept our rates vary quite a bit. It's all relative to what you need to accomplish. The trucks can go out from $2000.00 to $10,000.00 per day depending on crew, type of gear and their function. Furthermore, a client or outside engineer can install their own gear or completely outfit it with equipment from a rental house. It can setup any which way you want.

Don't let these photos fool you. An engineer or client can design the interior setup any way they want. Want to use Tube Traps as speaker stands and surround the rest of the place with them, go for it. Want to fill the control cabin with walls of gear, it up to you, we have the interface and plenty of patchbay to handle it. Want to turn the place into a lounge with a killer surround theater system, give us the heads up. We had a four piece band with PA in there last year. I have a client that wants to use the facility as a mobile "home base," a mobile interview booth of sorts. The sky is the limit with this baby.

I hope you post more pictures of your racks. Take some pictures of them my man!
Come see the "love and light" in the expando control cabin when you're in town. Just give us a call!

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Daire,

Hey, I'm really motivated to get this done for the summer.

Observation could be done through the clear "glass" bi-folding studio doors I plan to install at the rear of the control cabin. It's gonna be awesome!

I know what you mean, D'Uva and I were talking about that... We filled the room with gear, chairs and traps and we still had room to play around in.

We setup our Blue Sky 5.1 system for the 5.1 mix session. We also, setup our Genelec 1031As for the down mix pair. This was not only a beta test, we mixed for an iNDEMAND iNHD PPV music concert... I really liked how the system sounds. I don't really hear the room and I haven't finished the room treatment yet.