90" BBC Short Tractor

     Adams Transit was founded in 1973 in response to the shipping needs of our parent warehousing company Cupery & De young Storage Corporation whose customers were in need of interstate transportation services which required the formation of Adams Transit to handle the increased volume and lanes of traffic to serve this additional business.

Adams Transit operated as an interstate only carrier while Cupery & De Young handled the intrastate portion of our warehouse business throughout the Seventies.  Due to increased growth in our customer base outside of our warehousing operations and the deregulation of the trucking industry in 1980, Adams Transit became both an intrastate and interstate carrier and performed all the trucking services that had previously been performed by the two companies.

The selection of leading edge operating equipment was a key component of our success in the early years.  We perfected palletized unboxed canned foodstuff transportation on flatbed trailers.  We utilized 44 foot long coupled with 90" short cab tractors which allowed us to haul an additional 12% of freight versus our competition. 

Day Cab with 58 foot Van

Perhaps one of our most unique designs was the use of a 48 foot long trailer operating within the Federal government's 55 foot length limit.  Wisconsin also had a length limit on the length of the trailer which was measured from the rearmost section of the tractor unit's frame to the rear of the trailer.  Our solution was to create a tractor trailer combination that consisted of a Cab Over Engine (COE) tractor with a maximum cab length of 63", short Detroit Diesel V8 or V6 engine, tandem rear axles, and an extended rear frame utilizing a 146" wheelbase.  The trailer was 13' 6" high with a 110" door opening to accommodate the tall product hauled and the king pin was mounted 72" from the front of the trailer to tuck the tractor as far as possible under the trailer to get as short as possible.  This close coupling required long air and electrical lines since the trailer nose would actually swing out at least a foot farther than the tractor when making turns.  Other than that the units operated normally.

Since this combination permitted an additional 25% hauling capacity for empty tin cans versus our competitors, it was a major threat to their operations.  Our equipment was measured many times by the Wisconsin State Patrol and much to consternation of our competition were found to be perfectly legal under existing regulations.  In the early eighties this concept was taken to the extreme by using the same short tractor pulling a 58 foot trailer while keeping under the 65 foot length limit imposed at that time.

Entering the mid eighties Adams Transit was among the first carriers to utilize thin wall trailers to allow even more cubic capacity for our customers.  What is now an industry standard has been a benefit our customers have enjoyed for over 20 years.

Our fleet started with one single axle E 22 Reo and one 32 foot Monon trailer and eventually grew to over 60 tractors and 110 trailers of various types and configurations in the late eighties.  The fleet of Adams Transit today is considerably smaller than that operating at our peak.  A change to private cartage by one of our core customers and the reduction in quantity of local manufacturing dictated we reduce fleet size and concentrate on our strengths. 

Over the 35 years that Adams Transit has been in service to our customers, the commitment to quality and timely service has remained the same.  While others may promise service first and worry about performance later our philosophy has always been to have our performance be our promise to our customers.