Ford C Series Chassis Fire Apparatus

[hondok]

Arden FD, which I will guess is in California, ran this 1968 Ford C pumper. The pic ain't very good, but I thought the subject matter was neat. Check out the hose reels. I have no idea who built the interesting piece.
Mattson Collection

more next week....

Not sure who may have built this unit, but it appears to be a high-pressure fog pumper.  For you younger folks, the use of high-pressure fog for fire attack was a tactic that was big in the late 1950's into the mid 1960's and was developed and promoted by Lloyd Layman who was the "father of indirect attack".  This tactic worked well when you only had ordinary Class A combustibles burning, but the BTU production of burning plastics and other synthetic materials eventually negated the ability to fight a structural fire with booster lines because the volume of water fog needed to overcome the BTU production could not be achieved with the small diameter booster hose.

 

There were a number of apparatus manufacturers who offered high-pressure pumps during that time (either as the primary pump or as an auxiliary to the centrifugal pump) with John Bean/FMC being one of the more prominent apparatus builders.  If you look at the booster reels, it appears that they all have John Bean fog guns for nozzles.

 

Thought this would be a good way to revive this thread!