Where the rubber meets the road

Tires, wheels, the Holland Road Annex, and more

The following information was prompted by the May 9th Fleet Council meeting.

Tires The city garage only installs tires that meet or exceed factory specifications.  They never install retreads.  On emergency vehicles, they never plug, patch, or otherwise repair a tire; damaged tires are always replaced with new tires. Recently, an image was circulating that purported to show a retreaded tire on one of our ambulances. On closer inspection, it became evident that this was actually a picture of an unmodified Firestone Transforce HT All-Season Radial tire with underinflation damage.  It was not a retreaded tire.

Wheels For the past couple of years, the fact that vanity wheel covers can hide critical wheel mounting danger and damage has gotten a lot of attention.  Recently, an ambulance arrived at the city garage with one lug nut and stud completely missing, another lug nut and stud completely detached and rolling around inside the vanity cover, and a third stud cracked.  This kind of damage can be caused by failure to torque the lug nuts properly, but it can also be caused by collisions between the wheel and curbs or other obstacles.  As I've mentioned before, I was in an ambulance years ago when the ambulance suddenly tilted towards one corner, and the right rear pair of wheels rolled past us on the interstate as we scraped our way to a stop. This explains why the city garage has been phasing out the vanity wheel covers across all departments.  They've also been adding position indicators to the lug nuts to provide another visual warning in case something is amiss. Last Spring the news arrived that aftermarket alloy wheels and installation kits from Alcoa had become available for the Ford E-450 and Chevy G4500 (standard duty) chassis.  Among the many advantages of alloy wheels, they are designed to be attractive without vanity covers.  They are finished as brushed aluminum, unpainted.  They allow direct visualization of the critical lug nuts, so they're safer. The Alcoa wheels do not void any warranties.  In fact, they are offered as an option on some versions of the above-mentioned chassis.  Nevertheless, at least one "upfitter" company has decided not to install aftermarket wheels for fear of losing its status as a Ford Qualified Vehicle Modifier because the vehicles did not attain their emissions ratings using this combination.  There is no prohibition against having aftermarket wheels installed elsewhere, however, and other Ford QVMs (including local Ford dealers) do in fact install these wheels when asked. In our case, the city garage is willing to install the Alcoa wheels, and doing so will not affect the city's willingness to maintain the vehicles or to provide liability and loss insurance.

Holland Road Annex

Several of you are aware that some automotive services can be provided by the Public Works Waste Management facility at 3024 Holland Road.  This may be especially useful between the hours of 16:30 and 23:30.

When reconciled with city garage policies, the services that the Holland Road annex can legitimately provide are limited to:

• replacing burned-out headlights and lightbulbs
• replacing wiper blades
• topping off washer fluid

Otherwise the unit should go to the city garage.   Given that the city garage's policy is to replace -- never to repair -- damaged tires on emergency vehicles, there is no benefit to getting any tire work done at the Holland Road annex, nor should a unit stay in service if it needs any other fluid topped off (except fuel and DEF, which crews can do themselves at the city fuel facilities).

Loaning ambulances

Squads that have preferences regarding which ambulances to loan to other squads can set things up for success by taking advantage of the Deployment guidance field in OscarTRACK.  We will be advising field supervisors to look for indications like "Loaner 1", "Loaner 2", etc, when they have to make an unexpected borrow-loan arrangement to meet operational demands.