New engine for the Illinois Fire Service Institute

Found on Facebook:

photographer unknown

Tags: IFSI, Illinois Fire Service Institute Engine 2, Pierce Enforcer fire engine

This entry was posted on October 11, 2019, 8:04 AM and is filed under Fire Truck photos, New Delivery. You can follow any responses to this entry through RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

23 Comments (and one trackback)

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#1 by CrabbyMilton on October 17, 2019 - 11:37 AM

A custom chassis rig is always better than one built on a commercial chassis. Many cities experimented with that thinking that it would save money. They usually didn’t hold up and were never designed for the purpose a custom cab and chassis is.
#2 by harry on October 16, 2019 - 6:58 PM

craig personally the pierces were not great and maybe the eone are not perfect but no brand is perfect but in 2000 sqd 7 at ohare got squadzilla and it was in the shop more than in the road as for the pierce trucks I am not sure but the city must know better than anyone on here
#3 by Michael m on October 16, 2019 - 4:23 PM

Nice looking engine! Love the color scheme!
#4 by Bill on October 14, 2019 - 8:33 PM

Maybe Chicago will get smart and buy hme trucks again and make the engine on a f750 chassis
#5 by Craig Mack on October 14, 2019 - 12:03 AM

Umm the e ones are absolutely garbage. What a joke. Brand new and they’re all in the shops. My favorite story was 103s literally wouldn’t go in to pump and they had to swap back in to their HME on the VERY FIRST DAY.

But back to trucks- the eone trucks suck with absolutely no room in the back, the spartans are land barges that have the most asinine designed jacks of all time. The seagraves are confy but literally are falling a part so bad they have basketball sized holes in them…so yes..the pierces are the favorites. And thats saying something cuz they have almost no room in the back too. But they ride the best and are by and large the most reliable. Rust or not, they are simple to use, get you where you gotta go, and the sticks always go up. Anyone have the pic of new e one Tower 14 with the basket all the way down in front of the windshield? Total failure, again, RIGHT AFTER DELIVERY. What a joke
#6 by Tim on October 13, 2019 - 9:52 AM

Mike C you must be smoking the same stuff Craig Mack is. E-one makes a much higher quality rig than Pierce? Pierce definitely isn’t what it used to be but, E-One is NOT the Cadillac of the apparatus industry. Stick to your Rosenbauer/Spartan.
#7 by Mike C on October 12, 2019 - 6:53 PM

I want what Craig Mack is smoking. The Chicago Pierce aerials have been total garbage from the beginning. They had heavy corrosion issues when they were 6-8 years old. The majority of the CFD firefighters prefer the Pierce over anything??? I don’t buy it for a second. Those new E-One’s are beautiful! E-One makes a much higher quality rig than Pierce!
#8 by Tim on October 12, 2019 - 5:34 PM

Keith thanks for mentioning “Mac” as there was no mention of his death on this website. And you’re right they should dedicate that new rig to him. Not only was he an important mentor to many of us, he was a Pierce guy.
#9 by Chuck on October 12, 2019 - 5:28 PM

Why does the orange look so washed out? It looks almost pink.
#10 by Craig Mack on October 12, 2019 - 11:55 AM

Chicago gets E-Ones because the guy that runs fleet is childhood friends with the guy that sells e-ones. Thats not some made up story, its the actual truth to the matter. The sad part is the members have absolutely no say in what they get, as most prefer the pierce trucks over anything. Those trucks were designed by Chief Connolly who was very much a firemans fireman.
#11 by Keith Grzadziel on October 12, 2019 - 11:32 AM

This is awesome that the Institute finally received a new engine, as they have historically acquired hand me down fire apparatus from departments across the state.

The color combination is very unique but of course is the Illini’s colors, which is fitting to support the teams. Louisiana’s firefighting campus utilizes LSU’s team colors.

On a final note, with the recent passing of one of our greatest fire service mentors, John “Mac” McCastland Jr., I think that the Institute should dedicate this new engine and name it in his honor for his legacy to the betterment of fire service.

D-P-T
#12 by FFPM571 on October 12, 2019 - 8:32 AM

I believe this is their first NEW New rig they have gotten since the 1996 Spartan Darley
#13 by Bill Post on October 11, 2019 - 5:02 PM

Crabby it’s interesting that West Allis is going to Seagrave as they have been known to be very expensive, pricing themselves out of the market in many cases. It appears that West Allis is willing to spend the money.

Chicago will be getting rid of their Spartan engines as more E/Ones get delivered.

Until recently, Dallas Texas was an exclusive SpartanERV customer. They started buying from Pierce over the last year. I understand they had a chief hired from Round Rock, Texas who had a preference for Pierce. He left Dallas less than a year ago to work as the Director of the Texas A/M Engineering Extension Service. Dallas is also changing the paint scheme of their apparatus from white over red to red with gold trim.
#14 by CrabbyMilton on October 11, 2019 - 3:03 PM

Yeah MFD is still very much a PIERCE dept. I think they have more on order so I doubt that will change anytime soon. Most of the newer ones are the ARROW XT with a few VELOCITYs that are not that well liked. Not sure about the rust issue but it may be academic since they seem to turn the fleet over quite often with I think the oldest reserve rigs being less than 20 years old. West Allis was a long time PIERCE customer until they got jerked around by PIERCE over the rust issue. They are now a SEAGRAVE customer with 3 on the roster beginning in 2017.
#15 by Bill Post on October 11, 2019 - 2:45 PM

Crabby Milton if I am correct you are from Milwaukee and I am assuming they are still a Pierce town. I know that at least 2 years ago about all of Milwaukee’s apparatus was Pierce and Madison is a Pierce town as well. Chicago still has a pretty large fleet of Pierce trucks and tower ladders however they are going to be replaced by E/Ones within the next several years.

I understand that Chicago has been having rust problems with the Pierce trucks yet many of Chicago’s suburbs are using Pierce. I am from Chicago however I live near Skokie and Evanston. Both towns are nearly 100% Pierce. Lincolnwood replaced their Pierce engine with a Spartan/US Tank and they have a beautiful Pierce tower ladder. The majority of MABAS Division 3 rigs are Pierce.

A little over a year ago when Chicago was seeking bids for a large contract, Pierce didn’t submit a bid, in fact the only bidder was E/One.

I am happy that E/One is building new apparatus for Chicago and know that their ladders and tower ladders are pretty popular. I can’t help but wonder about the bad blood between Pierce and Chicago. Even though Chicago has Pierce ladders, if you don’t count the former Engines 9 and 10 at O’Hare, they never had a custom Pierce engine. In the late 60s and 70s Chicago had Pierce engines on Ford chassis but never any Pierce chassis.

So Crabby how is Milwaukee doing with their Pierce units? With so many places nearby that seem to be buying Pierce it just seems strange that Chicago never owned and apparently won’t buy a Pierce pumper.
#16 by Hunter on October 11, 2019 - 1:26 PM

Nice color combination. Anybody else having problems with seeing post posted the last couple days
#17 by CrabbyMilton on October 11, 2019 - 12:43 PM

I would imagine that you turn it on or off. Nowadays I guess flushing the toilet requires a workplace training class.
#18 by harry on October 11, 2019 - 12:39 PM

crabby Milton but if u think about iit how does an officer learn to use the q right if there is not one there but otherwise great looking rig
#19 by CrabbyMilton on October 11, 2019 - 11:30 AM

That’s funny Bill. Perhaps they’ll have to burn the tires if they ever touch Chicago soil. 🙂
Harry, I would guess that a Q would have been an un needed extra cost since it’s mostly a training rig anyway.
Up here, MATC bought a brand new SABER in 2016 with no Q and probably for the same reason.
#20 by harry on October 11, 2019 - 11:23 AM

very sharp engine the only thing it is missing is the federal q
#21 by Bill Post on October 11, 2019 - 11:13 AM

Interesting color combination however it’s a Pierce so you better keep it out of Chicago as Chicago seems to be allergic to Pierce and vice versa.1
#22 by Localguy on October 11, 2019 - 8:50 AM

Orange and blue. University color’s.
#23 by Crabbymilton on October 11, 2019 - 8:10 AM

Very nice looking and interesting color combo.