From the Franklin Park Fire Department on Facebook:
Chief Stewart and Battalion Chief Burmeister traveled to St. John, Indiana, to inspect the new Engine Co. 2 at the Fire Service, Inc. dealership. This engine is a mirror image of our recently purchased Engine Co. 1. Both engines were designed by Fouts Fire. We hope to have Engine Co. 2 in service by the end of August to help better protect the citizens of Franklin Park!
Franklin Park FD photo
Franklin Park FD photo
Franklin Park FD photo
#1 by harry on August 12, 2025 - 5:54 PM
mike c yes while a larger cab may be roomier it also comes with larger delays and and a larger price tag look the eone that franklin park was going to get was the size of schiller pks eone which was going to be 1.2 million for a demo while this one was supposed to be ordered and delivary was 4 months later every dept has a differant outlook
i for one dont like fancy fp engine 1 has roll down windows which is better save money and problems because if u say u are a mechanic u should know power windows locks power seats all costs
but one feature i will argue against in any vehicles is airbags for crashes meaning the ones that come out of the steering wheel nd knee and side i have been hurt by them side curtain ones fine because that protects from flying glass
#2 by Mike C on August 12, 2025 - 8:55 AM
Hairy – The 94″ cab used by Franklin Park is actually 6″ narrower than the 100″ wide cabs used by Chicago. 6″ is a big difference. Furthermore, the E-One chassis is built much more rugged than the Spartan cabs. Don’t get me wrong, I like Spartan but E-One is a better built chassis.
#3 by harry on August 9, 2025 - 8:12 PM
mike i guess we will never know intill either the city buys them or another dept buys muliple of them then we would know but they guanatee 4 months or less for one
#4 by Tim on August 9, 2025 - 7:01 PM
Ah yes, the E-one and Pierce battle never dies. Everyone likes what they like. I was a member of a large department that had both Pierce and E-one. The only conclusion we could come up with was this: The Pierce rigs were junk at 6 months after delivery. The E-ones were junk at delivery. And the whole “single source builder” is bull$hit. There’s no such thing.
#5 by Mike on August 9, 2025 - 6:14 PM
Harry if the city did sign a contract with Fouts I doubt they would be able to build the mass quantity that the city orders. 5-8 rigs a year for a small builder that has other customers takes a lot. I’m sure even some of the big builders have problems sometimes. The cities problem isn’t money. It isn’t manufactures. It’s the city. They have a contract with money budgeted to purchase apparatus but are slow walking this, like everything else they do.
#6 by harry on August 9, 2025 - 5:33 PM
however 94 inches wide is just 2 inches shorter that say an eone so thats not a big deal while chicago is likely not going to buy them it would be a good choice for now even most of there rigs while maybe broke a lot are not that busy like engine 106 truck 13 get like 120 calls a month between the 2 rigs which is not much engine 91 and e 7 are very slow it could work with these companies
i know chicago wants all eone
napervillewants all pierce
aurora all eone
and so on
#7 by Mike C on August 9, 2025 - 5:13 PM
Hairy – Glad Franklin Park is having good success with their rigs. The Spartan chassis is good which largly plays a role in its reliability. The unfortunate part of Franklin Park’s Spartan/Fouts rigs is that they are 94″ wide cabs. They’re pretty narrow inside and if you’re a larger person, this cab gets a little uncomfortable.
Again, Fouts is okay. Nothing special at all. I’m glad Chicago doesn’t buy them.
#8 by harry on August 6, 2025 - 2:22 PM
ec darroll yes thats correct about limited options but as for a big city purchasing many i believe you are wrong on that because all fouts build is the back the tank comes from who ever builds that and the cab is a spartan butso far no big dept has so intill that happens we wont know either way they are solid rigs franklin was going to get an eone instead of the fouts for engine 2 but did not because the fouts did very well in its first 9 months then they were able to order another and saved the village more than a half of million the fouts was 600000 and the eone they were going to go with was going to be 1.2 million
#9 by E. C. Darroll on August 6, 2025 - 1:56 PM
Except a city like Chicago is one of the few places where a standard fleet of similar apparatus actually does make sense. You have thousands of firefighters rotating through hundreds of companies, including the engineers, and it’s irresponsible and impossible for anybody to become comfortably familiar with potentially several dozen completely different specifications. The suburban departments that only have one station and less than half a dozen pieces of apparatus total are different, and learning each of your trucks individually in that setting is not unachievable.
#10 by Chuck on August 6, 2025 - 1:37 PM
The idea that Chicago “needs” custom designed apparatus is a joke. They should be willing to take as cookie cutter an apparatus that is rapidly and commercially available and go with it. It worked up through the 1980 Ford / E-Ones and that should be the case today. It’s all this “gotta have it this way or no way” approach that’s left this fleet in such a f****d up state. Amongst many other reasons.
#11 by E. C. Darroll on August 6, 2025 - 5:24 AM
Harry, in addition to the single source manufacturer issue, the only reason Fouts is able to put out apparatus with such comparatively short wait times is that they effectively operate an assembly line for apparatus production. Their apparatus are not custom, they have a handful of base models with (very) limited options that you can pick from. Additionally, a contract with Chicago would take up almost their entire custom (as in non-commercial) chassis production capability.
#12 by harry on August 6, 2025 - 1:50 AM
mike c it has worked great for fp very well built i know naperville e3 is always broke and its a newer maybe 2017 eone but in all honesty if chicago wants to get the fleet back to shape soon fouts would be the way to go
and by the way before u say there fleet is in bad shape louis ville is just as bad or worst they have rigs way older that are still frontline
#13 by Mike C on August 5, 2025 - 10:39 PM
Hairy – Fouts is okay. Nothing special. Unless Chicago changes their spec for a single source builder for the engines, they’ll never buy from Fouts. In addition, E-One is far superior than Fouts.
#14 by harry on August 4, 2025 - 9:42 PM
hopefully they run it in place of truck 2 to save wear and tear this is there 4th new engine in 12 years looks good hope to see at some point
this is really what chicago should buy but i know they wont