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I Bought A Firetruck

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Re: I Bought A Firetruck

#41

Post by newbie12 »

gph wrote: post #32

That's pretty cool, as a toy. Too bad he doesn't seem to have any use for it in that capacity. Don't know if I can agree with him driving it on routine trips around town. Not only because of the extra gas consumption and CO2, but it also takes up a lot more room on the road, and it's a lot slower on acceleration wasting everyone's time behind him. When someone has a purpose for having a huge truck on the road you tol…

I'd be pissed to be his neighbor. The firetruck spews dirty exhaust, is unsafe if there are kids running around, and definitely is an eyesore. Even though there's no HOA he is probably running afoul of city or county zoning rules...you shouldn't be able to park large work trucks in residential neighborhoods.

Re: I Bought A Firetruck

#42

Post by hariananth »

jlgaddis wrote: post #29
hariananth wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd guess that he means relative to other vehicles on the road. He follows that with "it looks like a modern fire truck." Apart from things like GPS and maybe improved radio communication, I'm curious as to what design and feature improvements have come along, considering those in nearly all other modes of transportation over the same period, and the importance they serve. E.g. do firetrucks really need to be that hu…

> do firetrucks really need to be that huge? How many thousands of gallons of water can a Prius hold? =)

Don't fire hydrants solve that problem?

Re: I Bought A Firetruck

#43

Post by rdl »

unimpressive wrote: post #34
rdl wrote: post #18

I still want an office in a light industrial area with a concrete wall/bollards/ditch, and a roller gate, behind which I could park a 5 ton truck and/or unimog or fire truck or something (so as to make it impossible to drive through the gate). I had no idea fire trucks were even cheaper than old 2.5 or 5 ton military trucks.

Okay I'll bite. Why?

Onsite power, generators, parking for cars, a big tower for RF, satellite, security, etc. A perfect office normally and set up perfectly for disaster response when the earthquake eventually hits. Being able to get $0.95/ft2 NNN on Pioneer, and taking an entire building, so each employee has 500+ square feet...

Imagine being the only place with real comms, security, and competent people (i.e. non-government), just like my friend who stayed in his ISP in NOLA after Katrina, or my office in Baghdad, or any other situation like that.

Re: I Bought A Firetruck

#44

Post by rdl »

cglace wrote: post #40
unimpressive wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay I'll bite. Why?

I don't know about him. But having had my home broken into many times its easy to become obsessed with preventing entry into your home.

I'm not really that concerned about people breaking and entering (I have guns...) while I'm in home or office, but secured parking would be awesome.

Re: I Bought A Firetruck

#45

Post by rcfox »

carlob wrote: post #30
rcfox wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It'll be slightly offset by the fact that it has a diesel engine. Not enough to make it equivalent to car, but it's something...

I've always wondered: why aren't there more diesel cars in the US?

From what I gathered from a quick look at Wikipedia, probably the biggest factor is that diesel engines are best used for high-torque, low-speed applications.

Re: I Bought A Firetruck

#46

Post by gavanwoolery »

I grew up in the mountains outside of Napa. One of our neighbors was very wealthy, and also paranoid about fires (brush fires are very dangerous in that region). He owned a fire truck aside from many other vehicles. One day an arsonist set fire to the mountainside, and he had a heart attack because of it. A new person bought up his property, and I would visit their house sometimes, and see that firetruck, not knowing the backstory. I just thought that wealthy people owned firetrucks because it was cool. :)

Re: I Bought A Firetruck

#47

Post by tdicola »

shurcooL wrote: post #31

Isn't $3600 kinda ridiculously inexpensive given that a Civic costs over $15k? What's the insurance and mileage on that thing like?

Supply and demand. There isn't a huge market for 30 year old used fire trucks, so the prices are low. As the author found out, a fire truck isn't the most practical vehicle in the world--certainly not as practical as a Honda Civic.

Re: I Bought A Firetruck

#48

Post by Swizec »

jeffdavis wrote: post #35
carlob wrote: post #21

Is there some sort of crazy game of one-upmanship in the USA as to who can drive the most impractical gas guzzler? First it was stretch limos, then Hummers, then Hummer stretch limos. I wonder if we're gonna see stretch limo fire trucks… Edit (since I'm being downvoted): The story is cool, I just find the fact that he's driving it daily to work completely retarded. What the hell I consider driving a car to work to be…

If someone wrote about their experiences travelling the world, would you make a similar criticism? After all, they are flying, which causes a lot of extra carbon emissions. Or is the fire truck particularly bad for some reason?

As a European I don't understand the american fascination with impractically fhuge cars for every day commuting.

Okay I get it, you want a big car for that roadtrip or vacation. Understandable, I do too. But for everyday stuff? My hatchback does perfectly fine around town ... hell, it does perfectly well on most vacations and long drives too.

Re: I Bought A Firetruck

#49

Post by fzzzy »

jeffdavis wrote: post #35
carlob wrote: post #21

Is there some sort of crazy game of one-upmanship in the USA as to who can drive the most impractical gas guzzler? First it was stretch limos, then Hummers, then Hummer stretch limos. I wonder if we're gonna see stretch limo fire trucks… Edit (since I'm being downvoted): The story is cool, I just find the fact that he's driving it daily to work completely retarded. What the hell I consider driving a car to work to be…

If someone wrote about their experiences travelling the world, would you make a similar criticism? After all, they are flying, which causes a lot of extra carbon emissions. Or is the fire truck particularly bad for some reason?

This is one thing that bugs me about complaints about the carbon emissions of cars. Planes cause far more carbon emissions, and they do it way up in the atmosphere where it seems plausible that it actually does more damage. It's a giant elephant in the room.

Re: I Bought A Firetruck

#50

Post by Spooky23 »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #13

I've always thought that an old firetruck would make a much better RV conversion platform than an old bus. The reasoning is that a firetruck (especially a pumper truck) has a suspension that is designed to carry much more weight than a bus so you would not be as constrained in what you could build on top of it. Jay Leno did an excellent column about how amazing fire trucks are in terms of durability. The OP said that…

I live next door to a busy firehouse, and I've heard plenty of gripes about the perils of their newer truck vs the mid-80's pumper with 350k miles that replaced it. Based on the frequency that I see the department's backup engine next door, I tend to agree.

Basically, the new trucks are unibody and much more fragile -- it turns out that new firetruck demand is driven by smaller/volunteer departments that don't put a ton of wear on the equipment. Minor accidents and mechanical breakdowns on the newer gear are major repair incidents that require weeks of downtime.

The old trucks were basically custom cabs sitting on a truck frame. Not very comfortable, but tough enough to survive 30 years of service with 2,000+ calls a year in a northeast city.

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