My nightmare scenario here would be being parked somewhere near where a fire breaks out, and then having to tell people that no, I can't actually help them.
I Bought A Firetruck
51–60 of 284 posts
Re: I Bought A Firetruck
#52I 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…
Nice story. Must have been amazing to grow up there.
Re: I Bought A Firetruck
#53That'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.
What makes the truck more unsafe around children than e.g. a Ford Explorer or similar?
Re: I Bought A Firetruck
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.
This.
In Sweden 90% of the cars are diesel because they need the high-torque and low-speed in the snow, plus Sweden is big and there's only 9 million of them so most journeys are pretty long.
Re: I Bought A Firetruck
#55Is 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…
Dude, it is a single firetruck, not a fleet of firetrucks being driven around to pick up groceries. If he were starting a trend, then yes perhaps this would be a-bad-thing. Instead, it's one guy fulfilling a lifelong dream. The gas mileage is going to be terrible and the emissions bad, but it's one firetruck.
Re: I Bought A Firetruck
#56Isn't $3600 kinda ridiculously inexpensive given that a Civic costs over $15k? What's the insurance and mileage on that thing like?
If you were buying a car, and were offered those two choices, which would you pick? I'd definitely go for the Civic despite the 4x higher price, because it's far more practical.
Re: I Bought A Firetruck
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.
There's no complicated fascination. It is simple. People like big cars because they are spacious, feel safer, provide a higher vantage point, and a host of other reasons.
Your hatchback is perfectly fine around town, but it can't tow a boat, and most people don't like to have multiple cars.
So, what winds up happening is people buy the most car they think they will need. It's totally overkill driving to work, and plenty of people never actually tow that boat, but this is why it happens.
Europeans would do the exact same thing, I figure, if they lived in an economic climate with similar gas prices and car taxes and such. With the possible exception of people living in old cities whose roads are just too small.
Re: I Bought A Firetruck
#58WHAT AN AMAZING STORY ABOUT HACKING! Seriously, HN needs to see if there is a service out there that spams these type of sites with these horribly uninteresting reddit/digg/boingboing/hurrderp stories.
I wish I had downvote ability right about now... so I could negative karma you even more. There is this constant argument about these kinds of stories on hacker news. It's not about being 'hacking' related, it's about being interesting and informative. I'd say the story qualifies for both.
Re: I Bought A Firetruck
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
> 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?
Only when present and working, which is not guaranteed.
This is a fundamental problem with emergency services. When a major emergency happens, it happens all at once, and you need a lot of manpower and equipment to handle it. All the rest of the time, when more routine emergencies happen, all that manpower and equipment looks like total overkill, and it is, except for being prepared for something huge.
So, yeah, you don't need a truck that can carry thousands of gallons of water to respond to a house fire when there's a hydrant down the street. But you want that truck to be available in case the shit really hits the fan hard, and since you have it, you might as well use it.
Re: I Bought A Firetruck
#60Earlier 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?
1) They developed a negative reputation as being stinky, noisy, and complete dogs when it comes to performance.
2) Something to do with the sulfur in US diesel. Up until somewhere around 2005, US diesel had more sulfur than, for example, Europe. I think the issue was that diesel passenger cars would have trouble passing emissions requirements due to the fuel. (Trucks generally have more relaxed requirements)
Edit: Ah, here we go:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-low-sulfur_diesel#United_...
Start at the paragraph beginning with "The allowable sulfur content..."