Fire Engines Photos

I can never understand why Hereford and Worcester always had the locker shutters behind the cab longer than the standard versions? The 'R's had this feature too.

Added by Andrew Middleton on 04 April 2011.

Andy - I think it is to do with the stowage of the hard suction hose. In the case of Hereford & Worcester appliances it is above the rear 2 lockers, hence their reduced height compared with the first locker. Other brigades incorporated the suction hose into the bodywork without affecting the height of the Lockers -i.e West Sussex appliances from 1977 R series had the Suction hose at waist height, which gave the same size middle locker, but slightly higher up, and the rear locker had a "blank" in the middle dividing the locker into 2 halves, where the suction hose ran through it, but giving the outward appearance of the lockers all being the same height, but in reality space avaliable for stowage would be the same on both Brigades appliances. All to do with manual handling and getting eqipment in the best location. In later West Sussex Rapiers the suction hose was stowed below the 135 ladder, and the short extension ladder was at waist height. Not sure what Hereford & Worcestes Rapiers had for suction hose stowage. I hope that makes sense and is correct! If not I expect someone will correct me.

Added by Jon Godden on 05 April 2011.

Thank you John. While you're here, what do you think of East and West Sussex merging?

Added by Andrew Middleton on 05 April 2011.

Andrew - I hope it does not happen - officially they are looking at working more closely, but nothing is off limits. Personally doing more to share resources, management, training, Control units etc, would save more money than full merging with all the wasted money on rebranding that that would bring. The Control set up is likely to change after the fiasco of the Regional Controls there is some logic in having a modernisded "Sussex" control - who can tell what will actually happen, but both brigades have reduced budgets and need to save money, but Sussex is a large varied county, and the brigades operate quite differently at present, and belong to 2 different County Councils.I'm sure it will not look the same in 5 years. Jon

Added by Jon Godden on 07 April 2011.

Does anyone know what the third pumper is? I think it may be a Carmichael custom cab on the Bedford TK chassis, but I am far from sure. It certainly looks like a unique effort at a rather low profile cab, quite noticeably lower than the Dennis next to it.

Added by Rob Johnson on 21 November 2013.

Rob the story is at picture 20440. It was an ex demonstrator.

Added by Peter Williams on 21 November 2013.

Thanks Peter. A very interesting story!

It seems that Carmichael did not have much success with any of their various efforts over many years to market complete fire appliances, rather than to just focus on building crew cabs on the manufacturers' standard factory truck cabs or front cowls.

I expect the reason was probably that these custom cabs were more expensive, but usually offered no real advantages over the crew cab built onto a standard cab.

This particular one looks like it is an effort at a low profile design, but the other pictures of it on this site show a ladder installation which does not seem to take advantage of the low roof.

Personally, I think it is a quite nice, clean and crisp design, but styling does not (and should not) sell fire engines! The D series I sold to Gloucestershire were probably the ugliest fire pumps around in 1967, but they did work quite well.

Added by Rob Johnson on 21 November 2013.

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