Fire Trucks...High Performance Engines?

[Anonymous-0]

The other day I watched a large fire truck hurry off to a fire. While it's a little hard to tell by just watching a big truck take off, that thing seemed to have a pretty impresive quarter mile. Are they set up differently than a good performing work truck.

Thanks,
Glenn F.

 

[Anonymous-0]

...impressive, not impresive!

 

[RodinNS]

There is usually a 'fire' spec for any given engine that will probably give another 20-40 hp over the standard spec and possibly a bit more torque... but most of it is simply the fact that you have a lot of engine in some of those trucks. 300-350 is common today in single axles and 400+ is common in the tandems. That power is nice when you're trying to drag a load of water up a long hill... but they also make for a widowmaker for a guy that is not familiar with handling a live load....
Most of them also have a 4 or 5 speed Allison now as well so a rookie can just punch the pedal and go. A lot of vocational trucks are coming with the same setup's now tho. Performance is similar in them.
The days of old trucks with DT466-180's and 427's howling down the road are pretty well over.

Rod

 

[Bob Bancroft]

My 10 wheel dump truck has an L10 Cummins engine. When I bought it had been a fleet truck- body unknown to me. HP rating was 270. I wanted a truck capable of a good honest 300 HP. My local Cummins man assured me this was. When I asked why they would de-rate an engine so he said they could put any nut behind the wheel and they couldn't hurt it. Apparently so, one of the things we did to it was put new bearings in it. The originals were falling apart, but the crank looked beautiful. Another thing we did was take the fuel pump and have it checked and re-calibrated. His fuel system buddy set it to "maximum emergency vehicle" HP of 350. Apparently at least at one time- "emergency vehicles" enjoyed some relief from regulation somewhat like the military.
I would also expect a fire truck would be geared for acceleration, not high cruise speed.

 

[Mattlt]

Plus many are capable of pumping 2000 gallons per minute. That takes power.

 

[showcrop]

Our town got a new full sized engine a few years ago. I don't recall the engine size but it was a lot less than the dump truck that I had at the time. It had plenty of power for the weight but probably the biggest thing was the auto trans. With the independent front suspension it handled like a car.

 

[James White]

Fire trucks have to meet certain minimum requirements for take off and speed. This is dertermined by their end user location. City trucks will have different requirements than rural pumpers and tankers. On top of all that they must have the horsepower to power the on board fire pump.(500 gpm up to 3000 gpm, 1,2 and 3 stage.) The engines are not high performance per se, but they are generally lager than would be encountered in a standard truck. Also, rear end gearing is taken into account.
These standards can be found in NFPA and ISO publications. Stop by your local fire dept and talk to the fire fighters on duty, they will be glad to talk about their eqpt.

 

[k6zrx]

Not only are they fast off the line, they are easy to drive. Open the door, turn the battery switch, press "start" (no need to hold it until the engine catches), wait for air (if not on house supply), press the "D" button and off you go! Air, shore power plugs, and exhaust vent automatically disconnect. Power everything in these new rigs. The back wheels even steer on some we have here. Amazing brakes, too. I fix the radios in "em, so I get to drive them sometimes.

 

[LeoinMI]

Structural Fire trucks are quick,..but airport Crash Trucks are really fast. The airport I worked at had all Oshkosh Crash Trucks, Our biggest was over 45,000lb"s fully loaded and reached 60mph in about 13 seconds. It carried 3,000 gallons of water and 400 gal. of foam. @ 3% mixture. You could empty that 3,000 gal. in 90 seconds with both turrents going full bore.

 

[buickanddeere]

If you look in a Detroit Diesel service manual. The fire truck engines were equipped with injectors one or two sizes larger than any other otherwise identical application.

 

[Lefty]

Dunno much but buddy owned a 68 Ford C series,small town pumper he was going to convert to a rollback for farm hauling....until he drove it 100+mi to drop off the pumper body to a buyer.
Was quick outta the hole and plenty of power,but maxed at just over 60 at redline.He got just over 4 mpg round trip. Big block gas Ford V8..not positive but 548ci comes to mind.Too expensive to swap down engine and up differential.But he sold bare cab chassis,fire body and misc lites etc for 3 times his cost

 

[Phil9N3667]

The IH truck dealership I work at takes care of some of the local fire equipment and "the times" as they say, have changed". My hometown still has one old Chevy 427 gas burner, but the rest are Cummins diesels. The Suffolk (VA.) F.D. and surrounding areas have some trucks with the new Caterpillar C13 engine rated at 430 HP! And you"re right about the new Allison automatics at 5 and 6 speeds. Its come on, I ain"t waiting for you!! Some of the older rigs with the 8V71 and 8V92 Detroits are being phased out in favor of the lower emission engines and better brakes etc.

 

[Rollie NE PA]

Our fire dept. spec'd out a tanker in 2004. We went with a Peterbilt 379, 500 hp Cummins, 72,000 gvw, 3,850 gallons of water. All of us that were on the truck committee wanted a 10 speed transmission, but the rest of the dept. members wanted an automatic so they could drive it.
We brought in a rep from Allison Transmission. The first words out of his mouth as to why we should go with a automatic was " The truck will go like hell because there will be no turbo lag and anybody can drive it". We bought the 10 speed. The Allison was $16,000 more than the 10 speed.

There are way to many fire truck accidents. They have the horse power to get them goining but you still have to stop them.

www.jacksonfire.com

 

[RoyIA]

I haven't heard recently but in the 70's the torque rating was not a curve. It was a straight line. It had the same torque from about 900 rpm to 2100. That way you could bring the pump up to speed and have enough torque to do the job at any speed.

 

[RodinNS]

I agree that you need power for a 2000 GPM pump but there's still precious few that pump 2000 GPM. A lot of deliveries I see on the truck sites usually have 1250 pumps. There's actually none around here. In town the old infrastructure can't readily supply that kind of flow and out here in the sticks... we couldn't hope to haul that kind of flow in a shuttle. 1250's are the big pumps around here. There's a lot of 1000's around yet too. The main reason for so much power is just the giddy-up factor.
Our trucks are an 88 S-Line with a 180 HP (approx) DT466 and 6 speed Eaton fitted with a 1990 Almonte built body and 1000 GMP Barton/American Godiva.
The second truck is an 89 GMC, 427 power with 5/2 setup. Body by Metalfab with a Hale 'M' 750 pump. There's also quite a few still running around with PTO pumps here... Our truck are pretty pokie on the road too. They have some speed in them but it takes some time to get there...

Rod

 

[Doug in Illinois]

The replies I have seen so far are a far cry from the old days of surplus equipment we used back at my first volunteer department in Nebraska.

The army 6x6 would top the hill coming north from town at 18 MPH, take a mile to get to 48 MPH top end with 2500 gallons of water. It would go anywhere, just don't get in a hurry.

Pump? Basically just a water hauler, except for a 2.5 inch gasoline powered pump that would supply enough water to run two two hoses off the front of the truck for brush and grass fires close in.

DOUG

 

[Bret4207]

I started out on a 64 American LaFrance, seems it had a 12 cylinder engine? Don't recall anymore. Back up was a 54 IHC with a Young body IIRC. That old split shift 2 speed was a bear. Great pumpers though.