Excerpts from the journal topics.com:
At their Tuesday, Oct. 24 village board meeting, Niles trustees approved the replacement of a 1998 aerial fire truck. Because of supply chain issues, the new truck is not expected to be delivered until calendar year 2028, which is why it is being ordered now.
The purchase price for the Pierce Enforcer tractor-drawn aerial is $2,061,745.
“The standard build time for a fire aerial apparatus has been increased to 50 months, placing the village in a financially unfavorable situation,” a village memo said. Approving the purchase would lock in the price against possible future increases and would save the village nearly $249,000 by prepaying for the vehicle.
The village has funds to pay for the purchase of the new truck, but that cost is now in the fiscal year 2024 budget. Since the old truck was purchased, a decision was made to have apparatus respond as ALS (advanced life support) units. The 1998 truck has all the equipment, except for stretchers, that an ALS ambulance carries, though equipment is packed into the crew compartment which is not ideal.
Last year, the village purchased an ALS ambulance from Foster Coach Sales at a cost not to exceed $455,000. The ambulance will replace Station 3’s 2015 frontline ambulance, which as of last year, had logged more than 100,000 miles and was dispatched to about 24,000 calls. The ambulance is expected in the first quarter of 2024.
The village also ordered a Pierce Enforcer pumper last year for Station 2, at a cost of about $900,000, with delivery expected in September or October 2024, and will replace a 1992 reserve engine that was not designed to current ALS standards.
thanks Harry
#1 by Scott on November 15, 2023 - 2:04 PM
to MABAS 21 Replacement of reserve apparatus is common for budget purposes. Yes, the current spare truck will go away once the new tiller arrives. The current Tower 2 will become the reserve. Its not misleading, just how replacement vehicle budgeting works.
#2 by Mike C on November 11, 2023 - 9:20 AM
Austin – Have you been in tune with the parts suppliers??? The supply chain issues have smoothed out a bit but some things are still very difficult to get! Much of the delay is a snowball effect. It takes time to get the Cummins engines and Allison transmissions. It’s not like it used to be where you could get a Cummins engine within a month. Whelen lights have been hard to find too! The supply chain issues are real. Even if these apparatus builders had sufficient staff (which they don’t), Cummins, Whelen, Akron, etc are all way understaffed and can’t meet the demand within a timely manor.
Pretty much all the major apparatus builders have a minimum 3 year wait on new rigs. I think E-One and Spartan are in a better place than Pierce. Seagrave is around 5 – 5.5 years since they just got an order from FDNY for about 140 rigs.
The demand for new fire apparatus remains very high and so do all the supporting components. In fact, Pierce and Seagrave continue to fall further behind with their backlog.
I suspect once the pre 2027 emission engines are all gone, apparatus sales will drastically decrease.
#3 by Danny on November 10, 2023 - 9:09 AM
It seems it less of the problems are Cause by labor shortage, but more so by the influx of all, the American rescue plan, money that A lot of cities in towns got….. Once that money started going out then there was a gigantic influx in new orders
#4 by Danny on November 10, 2023 - 9:08 AM
Most of your manufacturers are quoting a minimum of 3 years now with a sum exceptions. If you buy a stock unit from Pierce, you can get it a little bit faster. But you’re still looking at almost 2 years. Couple of fire departments local to me just went through that…. From April of 2020 two, until now, delivery times went from 36 to 38 months all the way up to 50. Louisville kentucky place in order, and they were told that time of order last year that it would be approximately nine hundred To nine hundred and fifty days for delivery on a tiller.
#5 by Austin on November 9, 2023 - 9:56 AM
Chuck, its because people still believe all of this supply chain bs. Most of it is not a thing anymore, but as long as people keep buying that excuse, companies will keep saying it. I suspect its more of a labor shortage, which that comes down to people not learning the trades anymore. You need welders, painters, electricians, and so on. These skills take a while to master, so its not like you can just hire any Joe off the street. I do wonder if they considered other manufactures with shorter wait times? I know most manufactures have a long wait time currently, but surly you can find some that aren’t 4 years down the road.
#6 by ffpm571 on November 8, 2023 - 8:55 PM
the 1998 is the old Trotwood Ohio Used truck they bought over 10 years ago. They bought it sight unseen off a website by the old manager for way more than it was worth and still put almost $80K in work to get it in service. It was supposed to go when the new truck came in in 2014 but since they sunk a boatload of money in it they kept it since they would never get that money back It had over 100K miles on it when they got it…
#7 by Drew Smith on November 8, 2023 - 7:29 PM
For those interested, North Carolina has a large number of tractor drawn aerials – more than two dozen. See a list here:
https://legeros.com/blog/north-carolina-tillers/
#8 by Chuck on November 8, 2023 - 1:54 PM
How these municipalities keep getting literally suckered into these huge, multiple million dollar apparatus with even more ridiculous delivery times is beyond me. Somebody is getting passed something somewhere under the table somewhere along the line. There is no way a prudent individual looks at this and says, “Yeah, 5 years is an acceptable wait time.”
#9 by Rob on November 8, 2023 - 10:06 AM
What is interesting about this is that Niles is going back to a tiller. The last tiller they had was early 1990’s Pierce Lance 105ft tiller. I would think they would keep the 2014 as the reserve.
#10 by MABAS 21 on November 8, 2023 - 10:02 AM
They reference the “old” 1998 truck. Isn’t this their reserve? And what happened to their tower ladder? Is Niles not running it? I am not knocking Niles by any means for budgeting and ordering new apparatus, however this article is misleading.
#11 by William on November 8, 2023 - 9:56 AM
Interesting, would this also replace their 2014 Pierce tower ladder or just the 1998 Pierce aerial? Glad to hear that Niles is getting some new apparatus.
#12 by Chicagoland fire photos on November 8, 2023 - 9:28 AM
Looks like by 2028 the state will have 5 Tillers! Hopefully, this encourages some other FDs to get them (I know its a long shot but hopefully Chicago).
The 5 Tillers
2 Evanston
2 Cicero
1 Niles