A 1967 “travelling rig” with 5 successive owners and a long life, in two continents...
Around 1967 the Chews Landing,NJ FD ordered a Floodlight Truck on a Ford C600 chassis to the Canadian THIBAULT and US coach-builder MORYSVILLE (the latter is out of business for many years now). Not entirely clear who was the main contractor end the sub-contractor...). It was operated for a number of years by that FD as their Emergency Truck (#826), depicted in here.
Around 1967 the Chews Landing,NJ FD ordered a Floodlight Truck on a Ford C600 chassis to the Canadian THIBAULT and US coach-builder MORYSVILLE (the latter is out of business for many years now). Not entirely clear who was the main contractor end the sub-contractor...). It was operated for a number of years by that FD as their Emergency Truck (#826), depicted in here.
The rig was subsequently sold to the West Collingswood Heights,NJ FD and operated there for an undisclosed, period before 1983 as a Rescue Squad. The apparatus was sold again, this time to the Hose Co#5-Neptune of the Burlington,NJ FD, where it saw active duty, as their 9058 Lighting and Utility unit, up to 2006 (see attached picture in Burlington, at the fire station’s door).
This 1967 e 9 Ton gross weight rig carries a fixed 12.5 kW ONAN generator, directly feeding eight 500W spotlights that can be partially positioned (rotation, elevation, angle). It offers a considerable room for equipment storage (12 compartments), while it can also seat up to 11 FFs (8 inside its semi-enclosed squad body).
In 2006 the truck was sold and shipped to Europe and became privately-owned in Portugal where it was re-equipped and preserved as a fully equipped Squad, like if it would have been a Portuguese apparatus (of the APR category) in the decade of the 1960’s. An array of vintage equipment was successfully procured and installed for that purpose by the owning family. As a token of respect with regard to the US FFs in general the Burlington livery was kept, while a new call sign was assigned as a specific tribute to the FFs fallen in the line of duty on the 9/11: APR343. See attached pictures for that period, partially showing the equipment carried.
In the month were the truck became 50 years old (April 2017) it was transferred on a permanent and perpetual lease to one of the best fire museums in Portugal: the one operated by the VFD of Dafundo (residential suburb of Lisbon, the Portuguese capital city), where it became (by then) their 15th motorized vintage piece.
The rig (showing about 25 000 miles only in the odometer) has ever since participated in many parades and public shows (see picture, where additional lettering for Dafundo was added). A short movie of one of those parades can be found in YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4FaB9igkyM... ).
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Photo credits: Burlignton: FD own; Chews landing: FD own; W Collingswood H: Johnny Floyd II, Royal Blue,Ltd; private ownership: B Costa, in SPAAMFAA Facebook; Dafundo: author unknown, in SPAAMFAA Facebook.
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