Comments about the all truck nationals...

[loweredlimitz97dime]

This year was my first year to get to go to the all truck nats, and the first year my truck has not been on the road...strange. But anyway, after going me and my wife plan on making an entire weekend out of it in 2005. The only complaint i have about the show was i would have liked to seen a little bit better coverage. (More online pictures after the show was over with) But the show itself was awsome, and i hope that the beauty contest will grow into one of greatness.

[Carlisle Marketing Dept]

We know that this has been a concern since we launched the new Web site. We have plans to launch a photo gallery before the 2005 season to address this issue.

[Rocket]

Great idea!!!

[Ford for life]

This was my second year at the ATN, and I very much enjoyed myself. I'll be sure to let my truck club (Ford Truck World) know about this forum. We're all looking forward to next year's show.

[bigjsp]

positive and couple negative comments from a first timer this year.

On the positive I enjoyed the fact that the trucks had to be driven over to the judging lanes. Proving that they can move under their own power.

on the negative

GRANDSTAND SHUTDOWN: the crowd control method of metering the people into the stands for the beauty, high low dance and burn out ---- totally baffled many of us first timers. Basically you had to be in your seat 15 minute for the first of these and stay there for the duration. Children or spouses left to use the restroom couldn't get back in even and the stands were no where near full, and got emptier. My wife and freinds were in the stands with seats for us. I got there at about 10 minutes before the show with my 10 year old daughter and mother and father in law (older and a little slower). Very frustrating. Particularly when more youthful people were scaling the side to get in.

BURNOUT COMPETITION-- stock 6 cyl ford into the rev limitor for 10 minutes until it blew the tires. Even the most diehard of burnout fans was bored stiff until the tread started hitting the quarters. How about a 2-3 minute time limit? or 2 classes "2-3 minute burn out" and "unlimited wreck your vehicle"

[blazinlow]

My complaint is this, and it will prevent me from attending future shows.

Police were VERY selective in who they were giving traffic tickets to. I was pulled over 10 minutes after I got into town for doing 10mph over the speed limit which wasnt even posted. Not being familiar with the area, I was simply following the rate of traffic. I even saw the cop on the side of the road before I past him, saw my speedo at 45mph, and didnt even think I was in danger of a ticket. 3 Points and $131 fine, which now I have to take another day out of my schedule to fight in court.

I even mentioned to the officer that I felt he was being selective in who he pulled over. He told me I was last in line, so I was the target. After I was done with him, I watched him for about another 20 minutes. I saw him pull over 3 other show trucks, even one time driving in the opposing lane around 'regular' cars to pull these trucks over.

This seems to be the problem with these car shows in general. Cops busting people's you know what for no reason. Its a great way to ruin your weekend. With the cost of show admission, travel, hotel, and a inflated ticket...I could have gone on vacation.

[ddavidv]

I only live about 45 minutes from Carlisle, so I attend a lot of their shows. The Truck show is the one I have the biggest gripes about. I'm putting them up here so the events staff is aware of them, and others can comment, not just to rant and rave to see myself in print.

1) COST: Fees at Carlisle in general are a colossal ripoff, but it's their playground, so I put up with it to some degree. I draw the line at charging $35 or whatever for the "Fun Show Field"...what this amounts to is getting parking inside the gate, in no particular order or with your club if you have one. Park us on the steep-ass hill? Yup, they do that. I get absolutely nothing for paying this...I may as well just pay the $10 or whatever and park in the regular parking lot. Then I have another $25 to buy lunch (gotta love $8 sausage sandwiches and $3 cokes!). :rolleyes: Every year it seems to get more expensive to just show up, before I even attempt to buy any products from the vendors. I'm frankly sick of it...Carlisle Productions is raking in the dough, and yet still feels the need to gouge us. I've got a nice truck but have no interest in showing it for a trophy. I'll bet I'm not the only one who agrees. This is why the non-trophy display areas are not full.

2) General disarray: the show field is a mess, in my opinion. I can't make much sense out of how they are divided up.

3) Ignoring the market: This show seems to only cater to the Monster Truck or Low Rider crowd...there is a notable lack of stock restored and I'd call them Mild Custom/Regular Driver types of trucks. Joe Sixpack has little incentive to bring his restored '58 Ford to a show where he will be surrounded by these other groups and lost in the shuffle. CP needs to solicit these guys to get their trucks out there, because the vendors are there with the parts for them.

4) So What? This is the feeling I get about this show. It's like it is what it is, and has been for the last 3 years, and nobody cares much to change it. I've put up with the high cost of just being a pedestrian and have found it's the show I spend the least amount of time at, and I'm a truck owner. I decided this year I'm not coming back. Too late for me, but maybe someone can turn it around before others are lost. I know of 4 others that decided not to attend because they felt it wasn't worth it.

My opinions...and you know how much they're worth. ;)

[Garbz]

I started Vending in 2001 at this show, Specalizing in 61 to 66 ford truck parts.

2001 was a good year as i could not even get the parts unloaded before i had people wanting to purchase items.

2002's show was not a break even deal as i failed to get enough to cover the spots

2003 With the removal of on site camping was so bad i had to really think about returning. This was really not a hard decision as the move to August pushed the 2004 show into other comittments.

I chose not to renew in 2004 and waste 3 days of life at a show that clearly in 2003 was dying and out of control.

The Worst possible thing was to move this show into a later date. I understand the need for a GM nationals but put it in the August slot.

I will never enter a truck ito the fun field or show as i totally agree with previous posters...

25 bux gets me into the F100 Supernationals and includes a goodie bag and all the entry passes for the whole family. 40 at the ALL Truck Nationals is a total waste......

Well enough venting...

I have no plans to return

Thanks for the new comment forum...

Garbz

[65FordStepside]

Well,
I have been coming to Carlisle for 20 years as a consumer. I agree with the above posts. Instead of re writing the same, I would like to offer a suggestion. This show does not compare to Spring, fall, summer, and the other events. With that said, CP should make it appealing for vendors,, truck owners and alike to come and grow this back where it was or could have been. I know of 1 vendor out of 6 that bothers with the truck event and thats what their specilaty is! CP, please use this forum to help this event. Last time I looked, there is plenty of room for everyone. Problem is everyone does not care to support this event. There is nothing here to offer from 75 model year and older. I also think the sport compact trucks are better served with the compact cars or at a seperate event like that. There are 20 plus trucks in our Central pa truck club and there was 1 person who went this year and scouted on Friday for the rest of us. He said stay home there is nothing here.

Thanks for the forum

[hellcat520]

this years show was the worst i ever saw!! first i noticed their were hardly any vendors under the grandstands... the show field was about bare compared to the 2003 show....it was proballly due to the date change..move it back to june... I atteneded the show in 1998 and camped overnight and got to show my truck for 35.00 now you pay that much to just enter your show field...the cutout of camping defently lost your croud....i will not waste another weekend at truck show if its not in june agian... i will attend the import or corvette show instead.......THANKS FOR YOU COMENT PAGE!!!!

[loweredlimitz97dime]

After reading down through the posts on this forum, most people seem to have had a bad experience at the 04 All Trucks, i on the other hand had a good time, i am not sure if the people that did have a bad time are the only ones posting, or what is going on, but hopefully these problems can be worked out, and everyone can enjoy themselves in the future.

[chevyguy88]

I also had a good time at the 04 truck show. We come with family and friends for all 3 days so the price to enter the fun field is cost effective for me. I think they assume you are coming for at least 2 days, since it is a 3 day event.
The staff do make every effort to fix a problem, especially Mike but he left but I found his replacements to be the same.
The problem I do have is the cruising of the fields with trucks by those that are to lazy to walk. It does not take a lot to figure out who they are, so I wish the staff would warn and park them, If they choose not to listen.....that is the part I cannot understand, if you do not want to abide by the rules that everyone else does then throwing you out is an option.
As for the vendors, all I have heard is the majority of the "kids" do not spend money in the flea mkt. Many do not return with parts for this reason. The years with the out of control camping area and the cruzin and burn outs we had for several years turned off the original crowd and older people. Getting them back is a real problem.

[mudslinger51]

i also had a good time. we enter the fun field and what i like about it is that they let us park anywhere, the last couple years we were stuck on the damn hill. it was much better this year and we plan to keep attending, this coming year we will bring more of the club. thanks, keep improving it.

[DOORDRAGGER]

I also had a good time at this years show!
only complaint I have is the (PARKING FOR SPECTATORS WAS RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE OF THE SHOW FIELD AT THE BOTTOM OF THE HILL TOWARD THE VENDOR ROW) AND alot of us had to park by judging and u couldn't see us on the other side of the hill. spectators should have been parked back there were the camping used to be and in trailer parking are not the middle of the show field!!!

[nuttinbutjim]

The 04 show was my 8th time showing, got hooked bad from the start! We camped on-site that first time only,lol. My first visit we got to parade thru town after the Neon contest, what an great night that was! Really miss that!!!!!!!! But understood why it was stopped. Thought it was great when they started allowing non-show trucks to park on-site in a designated area, however letting all these non-showing trucks to park wherever really rained on my parade so to speak. We stayed in a campground near by with some friends who've come to visit the show in the past and really enjoyed it! This year was different. Had to listen to them complaining about all the non-show trucks on the field. They felt jipped, they came to see trucks that they don't usually see everyday. The worst part was having so many people back at the campground coming over expressing the same thing. Had two couples camped next to us from Canada who said they come down every year to see the show, these people are farmers who had to pay folks to tend the farm while they took this little vacation. They packed up Saturday afternoon and headed home vowing never to return. The space for our Club was way to small, got packed in like sardines, constant moving about to squeese more late arrivals in after spending hours cleaning and setting up was a pain as well. The Drive thru judging wouldn't have been so bad except that we had to have words with folks to get our parking spots back.

[93loyota]

I've been coming to Carlisle for 5 or 6 years, import and truck ( miss the import show being at the fairgrounds). The truck show definately could have been more organized, parking being the main problem. People that enter their rides, and spectators pay a lot of money to get in, and WANT TO SEE SHOW VEHICLES, not stock vehicles parked wherever they want to on the show field. It makes it very difficult to find a good spot to park for true show trucks who shell out the now $45 to get entered.NOBODY IN A DECKED OUT TRUCK WANTS TO PARK NEXT TO A RUSTED OUT STOCK FULLSIZE. THAT MAKES A CRUMMY BACKDROP FOR A MAGAZINE PIC. VEHICLES SHOULD BE PARKED IN CLASSES SO THAT THE COMPETITION KNOWS WHAT THEY ARE UP AGAINST. That way the classes could be judged easily because everyone that has a similar vehicle could park next to each other, instead of one toyota mini, ( for example ), being by gate 1, and another toyota mini in the same class being parked next to gate 3 a half mile away.
Drive through judging for a truck show of that magnitude is rediculous. Most people spend hours driving to Carlisle, then on Sat. had to spend 2-3 hours sitting, with their sometimes fresh out of the garage body dropped mini at an idle in the grass, in line for judging. People who come to Carlisle want to relax under their tent next to their ride, drink some cold ones, and talk with their fellow mini-truckers from different states, or go check out the vendor areas, and grandstand activities, not sit in their truck in traffic all day ! We come from all over the east coast, every year, and keep your shows going, without us there would be no Carlisle, so give us what we want, make it convenient, and organized, and tell the Middlesex Township Cops to get a life on show weekends!

[ted]

so everybody's trucks that aren't to your standards should stay home? more like if you dislike the show that much you should stay home.



I've been coming to Carlisle for 5 or 6 years, import and truck ( miss the import show being at the fairgrounds). The truck show definately could have been more organized, parking being the main problem. People that enter their rides, and spectators pay a lot of money to get in, and WANT TO SEE SHOW VEHICLES, not stock vehicles parked wherever they want to on the show field. It makes it very difficult to find a good spot to park for true show trucks who shell out the now $45 to get entered.NOBODY IN A DECKED OUT TRUCK WANTS TO PARK NEXT TO A RUSTED OUT STOCK FULLSIZE. THAT MAKES A CRUMMY BACKDROP FOR A MAGAZINE PIC. VEHICLES SHOULD BE PARKED IN CLASSES SO THAT THE COMPETITION KNOWS WHAT THEY ARE UP AGAINST. That way the classes could be judged easily because everyone that has a similar vehicle could park next to each other, instead of one toyota mini, ( for example ), being by gate 1, and another toyota mini in the same class being parked next to gate 3 a half mile away.
Drive through judging for a truck show of that magnitude is rediculous. Most people spend hours driving to Carlisle, then on Sat. had to spend 2-3 hours sitting, with their sometimes fresh out of the garage body dropped mini at an idle in the grass, in line for judging. People who come to Carlisle want to relax under their tent next to their ride, drink some cold ones, and talk with their fellow mini-truckers from different states, or go check out the vendor areas, and grandstand activities, not sit in their truck in traffic all day ! We come from all over the east coast, every year, and keep your shows going, without us there would be no Carlisle, so give us what we want, make it convenient, and organized, and tell the Middlesex Township Cops to get a life on show weekends!

[redline4400]

:cool: i've been attending this show for about 4 years now, since my freshman year at carlisle high school. now i live in NC and i even drove up this past summer to attend and compete with my s10. i came in third and i had a damn good time. the show was good in my opinion, but most of the posts on this forum have been dead on. we need more contestants in the beauty contest next year, they should park each truck in a designated place (away from non-competition) because stock just cant cut it in a show. and that drive up judging is not cool.. that weekend my truck averaged about 5 mpg because of all of the idle driving i had to do and just letting my truck run for hours in the judging line. we need better vendors too, i thought there would be a lot more aftermarket parts available but i'd rather look thru a stylin concepts magazine and find what i want.. but i did get a good deal on a goodmark cowl induction hood for under $300.. i'll be back next year

[bshertzer]

My $ .02

I’ve been going to several of the shows at Carlisle for several years now, in 03 I entered in the funfield, and in ’04 I entered in the judged. The main reason for spending the extra $10 was to avoid “the hill” As a spectator, I usually don’t even go over the top to see whats down on the other side, unless I see something from down below that peaks my intrest. MY reasoning for this, is the fact that I have 2 young sons 2 and 4 that love going to places like this with me. Anyone with kids knows or can imagine what pushing strollers or wagons up and down “the hill” would be like… or even the people with the beerwagons for that matter. Being this was my first time I was in a judged competition, I have nothing to compare it to. I was really confused with the way things were set up on the show field. There was nothing to designate what class you were in.

My truck is nothing too spectacular, but it is clean and tasteful. I can agree with the poster somewhere above that said about the rusted out fullsize not belonging on the showfield. I too wouldn’t want to have an airbagged mini truck next to me, or some mid 70’s monster truck that feels the need to start his truck every 20 minutes and blast the bigblock thru open headers. I think that if I take the time to figure out what class I am in, I should park in that respective class.

At the same time though, I can see how if I had a ford monster, and my buddy had a slammed s12, and my other buddy had a jeep wrangler rock crawler, we all might want to park together.

Drive up judging – I liked that idea. I got lucky though, I went over about an hour before judging started, and was in about 9th to go thru in my line. I heard some people sitting there for literally hours in line. If it was broken down by class, the judges would know that ok, this is a stock class truck, or this is a radical truck or whatever, and not necessarily need to discuss every last detail with each owner

Class parking – as I said above, I think this should be implemented. Plus if I don’t want to look at dodges, I can just avoid that row (I’m an equal opportunity offender). It would also alleviate people feeling the need to be there at the crack of dawn so they can get their spot back that they had the day before. I left a canopy in my spot overnight, but did it with some concern that it might be gone when I come back in the morning (it was still there thankfully)

*steps off soapbox*

[willbeis]

I haven't heard anyone talk about the rock crawl that was there last year. You have to admit, it was interesting.

[ICUDOGG]

Sure I will through my $.02 in.
I too thought this years all truck was way down, But I think it is an illusion. So many guys were in line to get judged that the feild looked empty!

The quality of rides were down. It may be that junker idea that guys were already talking about but even show tuck quality seemed down.

And for me $20 to and from on that ****ty Turnpike is not worth it!

We are coming out to Modified Madness as a club(since we have a little of everything). It's closer, and looks to be a fun show.

Hope that the all truck turns back into it's old self again this year!

Later
C
www.fokispg.com

[dieselfreak2]

wE HAVE BEEN TO SEVERAL ATN'S, AND I HAVE TO SAY 2004 WAS THE MOST DISAPPOINTING. THE DRIVE THROUGH JUDGING HAS TO GO.
THE SHOW FIELD PARKING NEEDS TO BE GROUPED BETTER. ASSIGN SPOTS IF YOU HAVE TO. I HAVE A LIFTED TRUCK, BUT I ENDED UP BEING SURROUNDED BY LOWERED MINIS??
ALSO, MAKE AN AWARD FOR DIESELS. YOU DON'T SEE MANY CUSTOMIZED AND WHEN YOU DO, THEY REALLY DON'T GET RECONGIZED.

JUST MY INPUT. WILL BE THERE AGAIN THIS YEAR.
THANKS