There are days when I make up 1/3 of the fire dept.  We went a different route than many with our tender (technically in the Fire Service jargon a tanker has wings).  We bought a used chassis with new equipment. Good Hope

custom builds them for departments like ours that can't justify new and shiny specialized stuff.

Ours is 1800 gallons with a PTO driven pump to 2 - 1 3/4 pre-connects, a drop tank, quick dump, and some storage compartments.  And yes, it has an automatic transmission.  When the adrenaline is flowing you don't need any more complications.

Our plan of operation is get 1351 (the attack truck) out the door ASAP.  It has 175 gallons on board.  By the time it runs dry 1352 should be there with 1800 gallons and 1353 should be behind shortly with 700 gallons and a big pump.  Set up the drop tank, start drafting and go get more water and if need be call for mutual aid.

What would we do differently? More lights.  Side dump.  Make a few changes in the other trucks.  For instance run a line on the attack truck so the tanker can pump into it's tank easier. Put a butterfly valve on the pump inlet of the pumper so we could switch to the drop tank easier.  Several fairly little things, but until we get our latest truck paid off we are putting every dollar we can into that.

(edit: typo corrected)

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1351 fr.JPG (94KB - 71 downloads)

1352 fr.jpg (87KB - 70 downloads)

1353 fl.jpg (81KB - 70 downloads)