Mack Tower Ladders Closed Cabs?

Christoph_51 · Jun 29, 2016

When searching the term "FDNY Tower Ladder" on the web one will mostly find pictures of the half-open cabs from the 1986 delivery or even earlier ones.
Some of the photos only date back to the mid nineties which implies that these rigs were still in service at that time.

How long where these half open rigs around? Did they still meet FDNY safety-standards in the 90's?

And then there are some rare photos of closed Mack Tower Ladders.
For example the rigs of ladder companies 121 and 44.

I figured out that these must have been from a 1991 delivery.
How many of them where purchased?
Or are those old ones that only got retrofitted in 1991?

68jk09 · Jun 29, 2016

Not sure about the answers to your questions but i do think the last open TLs were 1988s...they were still around in the early '90s.

116ff60 · Jun 29, 2016

The mack tower ladders with fully enclosed cabs were all 95 foot. All were in first line service until they were replaced with 2001-2002 seagrave 95 foot towers. all 75 foot mack towers had the open style cad until they were replaced by the fwd/seagrave 75 foot towers in 1994 starting then all tower ladders were delivered with fully enclosed cabs.

69 METS · Jun 30, 2016

116ff60 said:
The mack tower ladders with fully enclosed cabs were all 95 foot. All were in first line service until they were replaced with 2001-2002 seagrave 95 foot towers. all 75 foot mack towers had the open style cad until they were replaced by the fwd/seagrave 75 foot towers in 1994 starting then all tower ladders were delivered with fully enclosed cabs.

One exception that I'm aware of was TL 33. When they moved to their new Quarters, they found that they were unable to make the turn coming out of quarters with the 95' tower ladder. They were subsequently assigned TL 41's former Mack 75' TL as their front line rig.

68jk09 · Jun 30, 2016

It was a closed TL by that time but some trivia...around '94 or '95 i am working for a day tour on OT in 302 (Vipers Nest) & 155 was supposed to receive a new TL (not sure of the size or length)....the Shops had previously brought a similar but unloaded model to the FH & backed it in as a test for fit....on the day i was there 155 went to pick up the new TL.... they put their equipment on & returned to the FH but as they tried to back in the fuel tank was jamming/dragging on the incline on the FH apron ....they had to return it & get the old TL back until the Shops got or made a lower profile fuel tank...so much for pre planning......PS.. 155 missed a good a$$ kicking 1st Due job we had that hot afternoon.

jks19714 · Jun 30, 2016

68jk09 said:
It was a closed TL by that time but some trivia...around '94 or '95 i am working for a day tour on OT in 302 (Vipers Nest) & 155 was supposed to receive a new TL (not sure of the size or length)....the Shops had previously brought a similar but unloaded model to the FH & backed it in as a test for fit....on the day i was there 155 went to pick up the new TL.... they put their equipment on & returned to the FH but as they tried to back in the fuel tank was jamming/dragging on the incline on the FH apron ....they had to return it & get the old TL back until the Shops got or made a lower profile fuel tank...so much for pre planning......PS.. 155 missed a good a$$ kicking 1st Due job we had that hot afternoon.

One of our neighboring fire companies bought a new Mack CF 100-ft ladder (tiller). They found that the tillerman's cab was an inch or so too high and wouldn't clear the garage door.

Embarrassing, as guys from the surrounding companies were there to see the new truck! They had to dismount the garage door for it to fit and then wait for a contractor to rebuild the doorway for them.

Disp51 · Jul 3, 2016

TL 44, taken from the 3rd floor of 92's quarters, (17th Batt. office), a few days after delivery.

116ff60 · Jul 3, 2016

TL-44 received that rig in 1969 along with TL 105,119 and 127 and were the last c model mack towers delivered.

guitarman314 · Jul 4, 2016

116ff60 said:
TL-44 received that rig in 1969 along with TL 105,119 and 127 and were the last c model mack towers delivered.

Actually TL14 received one of those 1969 C model TL's and their former rig, a 1966 TL was reassigned to L127 as the first tower ladder in Queens.

116ff60 · Jul 4, 2016

Ok never knew that. I had thought that TL-14 received the 1966 and TL-1 had the first one that was delivered in 1965.

guitarman314 · Jul 5, 2016

116ff60 said:
Ok never knew that. I had thought that TL-14 received the 1966 and TL-1 had the first one that was delivered in 1965.

. Yes, but TL14 only had the 1966 rig until they received one of the four 1969 models. The '66 rig then went to TL127 and their next rig was a 1972 Mack CF.

68jk09 · Jul 5, 2016

The '65 in LAD*1 & the '66 in LAD*14 were the only 2 TL's Citywide until '69....of course (whether needed or not) many wanted to see them in action so they got a lot of Special Calls.