scarren:
Hi Glenn, here is the Pathfinder at Elvington, best shot I could get, it was stuck in the corner:
Know all about that one.It’s ex Manchester airport built very early 1970’s just before I started with the firm.The other Manchester one was last known to be at East Midlands Airport.There’s also some of the American ones still around.One was brought back here and one is on youtube still over there in private hands.I’ve posted the youtube video of the Polish one.There might still be plenty of others around in places where they were exported to like Middle East etc.It’s not far behind that other beast.3,000 gallons of water,360 gallons of foam compound,60-70 mph max speed,0-50 mph around 30 seconds,13,600 gallons per minute foam at the monitor and 300 feet range.But if they’d have fitted it with the 16V92 twin turbo instead of the 16V71 naturally aspirated .
it was a design nightmare not from the manufacturers end… The concept was for a pump crew to jump across on to it and ride it as a single unit, then they realised that it had no firefighting capability doh! So a wasted crew cab which was far too high! Cambridgeshire had at least one which was much smaller (a two seat cab) and more powerful, it had a big block Chevy in it whereas the Goole unit only had a 3 litre Ford V6 and a very weak gearbox which kept failing in a big was, it couldn’t deal with the torque.
I understand that there was some unorthodox transmission facilitating the 6 wheel drive, maybe hydraulic but I can really remember too clearly. What I do know was, it didn’t fulfill the needs properly.
Glenn R:
… then they realised that it had no firefighting capability doh!..
as a clueless member of the public my perception of firefighting probably leans to-wards dads early experiences (if I’ve read it correctly) in that there’s a blaze somewhere, engine arrives, crew fire jets of water at it from the ground or from atop the extending ladder. Job done. OK naively simplistic so back to Glenns quote above. Would it be possible now that we’ve seen loads of cracking photo’s to hear what their firefighting capability involves? The Stonefield as a first example, where did it fail in it’s duties?..jim
The basics to put them simply are how fast can it get to the fire and when it gets there how much and how fast can it pump water/foam etc onto it and in the first instance it’ll need to rely on it’s own supply so it needs to have a good tankage capacity.The figures that everyone looks for usually reflect those criterea.Acceleration,maximum speed,water/foam etc tank capacity,pump delivery capacity Gallons/Litres per minute and pump pressure.Some of the most impressive that I’ve seen for combining most/all of those criterea are the big airport crash tenders and refinery foam tenders often part of the refineries own internal fire services.
“Carryfast” you contain so much “wind and ■■■■” you could blow yourself to a fire and the ■■■■ on it and put it out quicker than any of these fancy Fire engines!!! Bewick.
Bewick:
“Carryfast” you contain so much “wind and ■■■■” you could blow yourself to a fire and the ■■■■ on it and put it out quicker than any of these fancy Fire engines!!! Bewick.
Maybe but what is certain is that very few decent fire engines ever used Gardner engines even that zb great big heavy lump of zb 240.
Another fine selection Glenn including a blast from the past, the Stonefield. Built in Ayrshire and somewhere along the line Jim McKelvie (McKelvies, Ailsa-Volvo) had something to do with it, design, finance or other. Forget which. Why weren’t they a success? You’d think that being a step up from the land rover type they would have been, especially as in the example you give above. Was that just a one off?..jimstravaiger
SENIOR MEMBER
Jim, the military got interested in the Stonefield and run trials on them. I was in an Artillery unit in the Seventies and awaiting the ‘new’ Gun to arrive through the post, so to speak. This Gun was the 105mm Light Field Gun (It later done the deed in the Falklands, Iraq and Afghanistan) This gun needed something bigger than the Land Rover which previously had been the prime mover for the lighter 105 Pack Howitzer (Of Italian design and used by the Argies, familiar to many of our Gunners and many of which ended up in our hands after the surrender in Stanley).
The 1Tonne Land Rover was the vehicle we used to tow the Light Gun but this was basically a General Purpose vehicle and had no specific Gun Tractor fittings or design so a larger and more powerful vehicle was being sort. The Stonefield seemed a strong contender but for reasons not wholly passed onto the minions (as is mostly the case) it didn’t materialise after tests. I left the Army in 1980 and we still didn’t have a replacement for the ‘1tonny’. In the Falklands it was moved by Chopper so no need for a towing vehicle, today it may use a Leyland Daf as the MOD went for them as the main lighter range transport.
Getting back to Fire Fighting vehicles many varied and strange types have been bought and used and many were found to be lacking, Tyne and Wear had a few American GMC’s as rapid response types but they were not up to the job and they got shot of them, Northumberland still use Isuzu 4x4’s as light foam/water tenders mainly for fires on the moors but again they have mixed success. I think just about everything has been tried at some point even having fire motorcycles! Cheers Franky.
Glen R you state the Stonefield trasmission as fitted to v6 3000 ford wasnt up to scratch well how come it managed to stand up to Chrysler 5lr engine, same auto box same chassis and having worked with Stonefield I never heard of any complaints, you also state it was to high well it was designed to cope with seriously deep sh-t hence it had to be higher than your normal fire engine, the fact it was lacking in fire fighting equipment was down to the body builder.
Having driven Stonefields both on and off road I can only say they were well up to the job they were entered each year in the Police Rally competing against all the various 4wd makers and won their class each time.
Franky the reason they went to the wall was the Scottish Development Agency would’nt put any more money in even allthough as you said it had passed its 0521 and the Mod were starting to market it to other Army’s around the world they had put 5million into it and they had got a good managment and sales team but SDA said no more so the plug was pulled and thats when Gomba stepped in and it slowly went down the tube. Eddie.
Hiya… we see some what we think funny looking prototype sketches of Volvo,s/ Scania/mercs and MAN trucks. This cab looks
space age and is here. Maybe in the very near future this type of cab will be used on everyday trucks.Scarey thinking its only 42
years we was building the Scammell highwayman.
John
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