[quote author=sdaves link=board=8;threadid=20911;start=0#msg197449 date=1066268928]
22 mpg is NOT a possibility no matter what they are driving. Some departments/services I have worked with in the past did long transfers. Some trucks have a governer that limited speed to 62 mph. Even with these trucks (7.3L PS) the best was around 8-11mpg.

My department now has about 20 FL-60 Type I medium duty ambulances. They have the CAT 3126 and they average about 4-7mpg. This is strictlly fire/emergency innercity. Better than our platforms which average less than 3mpg. The cost per mile for the FL-60's average out to just a little better than $3.50/mile.

Dodgeman01
As far as being plugged in. Are you sure you are talking about a block heater. 99.9% of emergency vehicles that are plugged in are battery chargers or shoreline power. I have been on bone noxes for over 13 years and the only block heater plug ins that I have seen are the factory type that are OEM (under front end). I spec our fire apparatus now and know that a Kussmaul autoeject setup isnt cheap. Just wondering.


[/quote]

Not sure if we are talking apples and oranges or oranges and apples.

 

Kind of interesting what you hear about these kinds of things. Over on DieselStop, the Pherd boys are saying that these vehicles are equipped with Cummins 5.9L ISB's and that Fedex and several cities have already scrapped them after a year because the engines have crapped out.

 

[quote author=sdaves link=board=8;threadid=20911;start=0#msg197449 date=1066268928]

Dodgeman01
As far as being plugged in. Are you sure you are talking about a block heater. 99.9% of emergency vehicles that are plugged in are battery chargers or shoreline power. I have been on bone noxes for over 13 years and the only block heater plug ins that I have seen are the factory type that are OEM (under front end). I spec our fire apparatus now and know that a Kussmaul autoeject setup isnt cheap. Just wondering.


[/quote]
Yes I'm sure I read the booke whe they were ordering it and that was an option that they got with the two new cummins powered trucks. those are the ones that have it but during the winter they plug in the squads because I told them to lol
DM01

 

[quote author=Tartarus link=board=8;threadid=20911;start=15#msg197466 date=1066270783]
Kind of interesting what you hear about these kinds of things. Over on DieselStop, the Pherd boys are saying that these vehicles are equipped with Cummins 5.9L ISB's and that Fedex and several cities have already scrapped them after a year because the engines have crapped out.
[/quote]

Believe me, the Sprinter line is not equipped with the Cummins. Only a MB.

I agree with Haulin, we are not comparing apples to apples as far as mpg goes. The Sprinter is on a 1 ton chassis for an ambulance. You are talking about Class 6 and 7 trucks when you refer to the FL60. Obviously the Sprinter will not be bought for these types of applications.

 

I know our firetrucks and ambulances are stored indoors when they are not on a call and that is heated so they are technically never cold. As far as being plugged in, the block heaters are NOT, just the batteries to keep them charged and the air compressor on the firetrucks for the air brakes. We can not leave out firetrucks outside in the winter anyway for obvious reasons such as the water freezing inside of the pumps. Thats why on cold winter days you have to keep the pumps moving but sometimes it just happens and they freeze up so you have to take them back to the station to thaw out. As far as the 22 mpg, that would be amazing. Once you fire that thing its throttle all the time so I see noway that can happen.

 

[quote author=BIGCUMMINZ link=board=8;threadid=20911;start=15#msg198143 date=1066428505]
Seeing this truck poor stats and seeing that it has a egr problem really makes me hope that they wont put a MB diesel in our trucks in the future.......WOW that engine looks like a real POS
[/quote]

I am not pushing the MB engine, never had one, probably never will, but they are a good engine. MB has been building them longer than Cummins and they pretty much run Europe.

I'm real interested Alpineram what is your take on this MB engine?

 

Don't know about the engine they are putting in the Sprinter, but I have a MB diesel thats 36 yrs old and runs great. These engines can rack up 10k to 15k hours before a rebuild if taken care of. MB knows how to make a proper diesel engine.

I read an article recently concerning MB and electronics. A spokesman talked about how they are revisiting their method of taking components to market in new cars because of their recent quality problems. Sounds like they maybe having the same issue.

 

[quote author=sdaves link=board=8;threadid=20911;start=0#msg197449 date=1066268928]


Dodgeman01
As far as being plugged in. Are you sure you are talking about a block heater. 99.9% of emergency vehicles that are plugged in are battery chargers or shoreline power. I have been on bone noxes for over 13 years and the only block heater plug ins that I have seen are the factory type that are OEM (under front end). I spec our fire apparatus now and know that a Kussmaul autoeject setup isnt cheap. Just wondering.


[/quote]


We have some that the heater is wired into the shoreline and some that are not.
It just depends on how it was speced when ordered.
We don't plug all of our in just a few that have a big draw on the batteries due to light chargers ect.
But we keep our engine rooms at about 70 degrees in the winter.

I've been doing this for a living for 18 years now.

: Eddie : 8)

 

Easy for large departments, but there are thousands of units in uninsulated butler buildings in small towns and volunteer departements where budgeting the heat bill is a problem. This is especially in the southern areas where temps only get below freezing now and then, a good cold snap creats a big problem. In one of our buildings the heat on full at temps in the teens, the floor is below freezing or close to it. The engine is still quite cold when starting.

 

curious why these depts. arn't using a hotbox or Espar engine coolant heater??

 

When I used to drive a diesel car (MB300D) it got 30-40 mpg. I'm fairly certain that with lower speed governors on an ambulance they can get 20 pretty easy. Have seen a couple of new Sweetheart Bakery Sprinter trucks on the road and talking with the drivers is now a pleasure.

 

It comes down to area of use and how it is speced out. Our Freightliner FL-60's have the CAT 3216/Allison 1000. The rear end ratio is high (I would have to look at spec book to tell exact (high 5 though). They are turning around 2500+ at 75mph. A neighboring FD has the same truck/motor combo but lower gearing and their trucks can top out at 85mph. 99.9% of our travel is urban. Our trucks have AWESOME takeoff. Their trucks suffer on takeoff and have higher topend. They have more open road travel though.

We no longer governer our trucks. A few of our 1991/92 Sutphen custom engines with the Detroit 6V-92 were governered at 58mph. That was fine except the .1% of the time you had a run down I-85 and nearly got ran over.

 

Well off topic but... Big arguements about pros and cons off plugging in block heaters on fire trucks that sit for any real length of time like with many volly depts. Claim is that warm engine will lose all lube oil from cyl walls and crank because of the constant warmth and service life will be greatly diminished.

As for speed, my department has a 110kph (70mph) limit on all trucks and squads. Thats a lot of weight and its not all tied down (water sloshing in tank). The time you save may not be worth it. We have a saying here for the people coming to the hall as well as going to the fire. "Its more important that you get here than that you get here right now" Think about it.

MB diesels up to about 435 HP are avaiable in the fl50 - 70 series as well as from other mfrs.

Starting to see a lot more of them in class 8 trucks.

Now I have NOTHING to do with ambulance ops, other than assisting at MVA's, but I really think that Sprinter is way underpowered for the application. And there is safety in power.

 

“Birmingham is advertising on the news that due to the cuts in funding here Regional Ambulances are replacing the fleet of Ford vans with the new Freightliner van which is a heavier and larger vehicle. They are powered by the Mercedes engine and claim that they get 22 MPG to save funding. It will be interesting to watch, I have driven a lot of ambulances and fire vehicles and if they get 22 with the method of running them, Mercedes has something going for them. The normal operating is getting paged, jump in the cold truck in the winter, fire it up, put it in gear, and put the throttle on the floor. I have to wonder if the new 6.0 is part of the reason for the change.”

This was the original post. This was a news story on Birmingham TV, no more no less. I had also spoken to my son who is a Civil Service Paramedic at Fort Leanordwood. He related the same information. They are getting 22 miles per gallon and there are several of them on post. I was just relating what was news and did not even mention that my son agreed.

So far as the use they get here in our small town and county, that is how they are used, right or wrong. Twenty-five years ago I was involved in starting this volunteer department. We had fund drives just to purchase gas for the small truck which was a 1941 GMC with a 175 gallon tank and a small pump. Life is a system of priorities, large departments have expensive equipment, small departments do the best they can. This department now has three trucks and an ambulance. The newest is a FL60, crew cab, with a 1500 pump and all the frills, purchased new in 1999. The ambulance was purchased used and you get what you can get. A while back we had the ambulance sitting outside which is not acceptable for the ISO rating. I personally laid the concrete for the one bay extension on the garage. I also personally dug the 4-foot deep ditch to hook the water from the water main. It would be nice to have insulated garages, automatic disconnecting plugins, and many other features, but we do have an ISO 6 rating, ACLS rating and a little more funding than years ago.

At 62 years old I have dropped out of the system completely. Looking back over the last years, we lost a lot of buildings, saved a bunch. Cut a few teenagers out of wrecks. Just one 17-year-old teen with a broken back that I cut out of a flipped Camero makes all the work worth it. This is only one of thousands of concerned volunteer departments across the country that does the best they can with what they can get. It is real easy to sit back in the well funded municipal department and tell how it should be done, but without that funding, you do what you can with what you can get, amidst the complaints and; negative comments from idle bystanders. The last investigation we had showed that at a major fire we had water flowing in 4 ½ minutes from the first call at 11:00 at night and no full time personnel. Those in the large departments, you have it made, the best equipment, well paid; we do it for nothing and get complaints anyhow. We have men who fight a fire, or tornado damage, all night and then go to work in the morning with no sleep. All that and until recently, using their own funds to purchase radios and pagers for Central Dispatch. I used my Alinco HT for years with the necessary wires cut to get on the fire bands, and yep, that’s illegal too.

Ok guys, off my soapbox….