Interesting Rigs at FDIC International 2025, Part 3

The following personal observations are from an armchair’s perspective devoid of interaction with vendors on the exhibit floor at FDIC International 2025. Comments are not expressing approval, disapproval, or endorsement.

• Interesting Rigs at FDIC International 2025, Part 1
• Interesting Rigs at FDIC International 2025, Part 2

Photo 1. Rosenbauer dealer Brian Franz sent this photo by Rosenbauer’s marketing staff of a quint’s front bumper with a booster reel and steamer connection with a swiveling elbow. Franz: “Booster reels are making a comeback, but are difficult to place on quints due to limited space and weight.” Asked how common front suctions are on quints, he replied, “I would say 50/50. Some still use them in rural communities and it seems cities are getting away from them.” 

Photo 2. Pierce’s Dave McAlice provided this photo of the front bumper on a Velocity heavy duty platform with a 2,000-gallon-per-minute (gpm) pump. It also has a front steamer connection but is piped for hose to extend straight through the bumper fascia—often found when rigs might be drafting. Safety gurus will appreciate the Roto-Ray light mounted below the driver’s line of sight and the bumper’s cornering lights.

Photo 3. Tom Shand’s photo of a Sutphen 1,500-gpm, 500-gallon quint with a 75-foot midship aerial has an extended front bumper with an enclosed front discharge and preconnect. It also has hinged compartment doors.

Photo 4. Another McAlice provided photo of a Pierce/Frontline Communications vehicle for a county command post. McAlice says the 45-foot-long rig has two “bump-outs” on each side. The sign on the windshield says there are 22 television monitors.

Photos 5 and 6. Puck Fire was introduced in 2023. Puck’s website (https://puck.com/industrial-fire-equipment/) says, “We manufacture and sell liquid transfer equipment.” Tom Shand took these photos of Puck’s Chevy 3500 with dual 2,000-gpm monitors. The rear view shows the large-diameter hose (LDH) connections to supply them.

Photo 7. Shand’s rear three-quarter view of a Spencer 1,500-gpm, 1,800-gallon pumper-tanker had me baffled. Something didn’t look right. Spencer displays unique rigs at FDIC and this year was no different.  The polypropylene body has electric dump valves each side ahead of the rear wheels and at the rear. There’s a low-mounted rear LDH direct tank-fill reduced to 2½-inch. The upper rear compartment has slide-in storage for hard sleeves, ladders, and pike poles. There are four rear preconnects in a full-width hosebed with their hose connections located at the front of bed. Then I noticed the rear dump valve is not centered in the body! It is offset to one side allowing a lower tailboard compartment next to it. Note the full height grab rails incorporated into the polypropylene body on each side that wrap over on top of the hosebed side sheets.   

Photos 8, 9, and 10 are by Shand. Suction inlets and multiple discharges on a pump operator’s panel with multiple crosslays immediately above it is unsettling. Photo 8 is an Alexis 1,500-gpm, 1,000-gallon pumper with the driver side hose connections in a free-standing enclosure ahead of the body. Crosslays are almost full width of the body and there’s a slide-out step on the running board to facilitate their reloading. 

In photo 9, the pump’s controls are protected by a roll-up door in the compartment aft of the enclosure.  There are a large-drawered tool chest, vertical slide-out boards for adaptors, and the driver’s self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA). 

Photo 10 shows its well laid-out and simple operator’s panel for the 10 discharges and two gated suctions. There are no pressurized hose connections immediately adjacent to or directly above important body parts.

Rear Ends

Rear views of new pumpers, sans equipment, shows how fire departments might operate. They can even cause purchasers to ask how does the piping get to the rear discharge. Some might wonder what type of preconnected hose load will be used and, more importantly, how easy will it be to repack. Unless noted, the below photos were taken by Chris Mc Loone.

Photo 11. This Rosenbauer’s double high-side compartments are half deep in the upper section with an overhead ladder rack. The traditional looking rear end probably has a T-shaped booster tank. There’s a rear 2½-inch discharge each side but I can’t tell if their piping is sleeved through the tank, or the upper Ts were notched or shortened to accommodate the piping. There’s probably a difference in pricing. Slide-in ladder and hard suction storage can be part of the actual tank itself or part of the body fabrication. Ask your favorite vendor what are the advantages or disadvantages of doing so. 

Photo 12. Another Rosenbauer pumper with double high-side compartments has slide-in ladder storage at the right rear. To make room for the hosebed access ladder, the left rear 2½-inch discharge is offset towards the center. Piping is probably sleeved through the tank. Note the keep back sign.  

Photo 13. This Spencer pumper has double high-side compartments with slide-in storage each side between the compartments and the booster tank. I think it’s a poly body. There’s hose storage above each compartment. It looks like the single rear 2½-inch discharge piping is run on top of the main hosebed with poly flooring above it. If so, it is not displacing any tank water. The water displaced by sleeves and notches for piping may require the tank to be high or longer to keep the same capacity.  Ditto for through-the-tank ladder and hard sleeve storage.     

Photo 14. I’m not sure how or where Ferrara ran the piping for the left 2½-inch discharge and right LDH connection. Both could be just above the full-depth lower portion of the double high-side compartments. It looks like a bulk tank ahead of the hosebed with a treadplate applique facing the hosebed.

Photo 15. This Shand photo is a Smeal pumper with double high-side compartments with hinged doors and an overhead ladder rack. It’s a busy back end. It looks like slide-in hard sleeve storage each side above the compartments. Two single-stacked foam capable preconnects (that’s what the labels say) are on the left side. Their hose connections must be at the front of the hose bed. If they’re close to the flooring, they might be hard to reach and harder to use a spanner. It’s unknown what the right rear 2½-inch discharge piping runs through. Note the slide-out aluminum tray for hose storage above the discharge—probably for a preconnect.    

There’s slatted horizontal flooring in the second bed from the right—possibly to ventilate bundled hose storage. The dual swing-up hosebed covers have substantial hat-section reinforcements. Outboard of the main hosebed floor level on each side are swing-out open topped U-shaped holders that are used in wildland interface operations to loop/hang hose over from side-to-side. The rear step is hinged to swing up towards the body. Just visible each side recessed into the step is some sort of piston/cylinder to assist moving and holding the step in position.  

Photo 16. Another Shand photo shows an HME-Ahrens Fox 1,500-gpm, 800-gallon pumper that has fold-down single piece arms to loop/hang hose on the back end instead of the open U-shaped holders above.

Photo 17. The rear preconnect’s hose connection is at the front of the main hosebed on this Pierce pumper. Some fire department’s specify hose connections at the front of hosebeds to be located at a certain distance from the top of the bed so they can be easily reached. It also allows dead hose to be packed under the preconnect.

Photos 18 and 19. This Pierce pumper with double high-side compartments and roll-up doors has a well laid out full-width hosebed. Besides the large bed, obviously for supply line, there are eight other individual beds. The three lower ones have slide-out poly trays. The five upper beds could be used for specific sizes and capacities of dry hose. Every bit of usable space appears spoken for. There are two rear discharges. Note the lights recessed in the rear step, one on each side of the marker lights. There are aluminum scuff plates on all sides of the right rear slide-in storage compartment.

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BILL ADAMS is a member of the Fire Apparatus & Emergency Equipment Editorial Advisory Board, a former fire apparatus salesman, and a past chief of the East Rochester (NY) Fire Department. He has 50 years of experience in the volunteer fire service.

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