Quality Fire Apparatus Inc

[engine co capt]

I come from a medium sized volunteer Fire CO. 2 engine 1 heavy rescue 1 light rescue 1 tanker 1 brush unit and 2 bls units. We run over 700 calls a year. But enough about that. We are curently specing a new pumper. The front runner at this point appears to be quality because they have dealer close by. I what to here from people who have or have delt with this company in the past. I WOULD LIKE REAL ISSUES THAT YOU HAD WITH THE UNIT. If you had a problem give a small discription of what. Also how were they to deal with as a company. Thank You.

[SCOOBY14B]

You need to find someone with Atlanta FD. Thats all they have. I know some AFD guys, they like them pretty much.

[STATION2]

SCOOBY14B is right. Call Atlanta, Dallas and Austin to see how they like them. Now keep in mind though, they are large volume buyers compared to you. They will get service and warranty issues handled because they are large and long time buyers. Check with a similar size dept. to your own and see how they were treated. My volunteer department has 2 1996 Spartan/Quality 1500GPM/750GWT rescue pumpers. The things I would change: 1) Don't buy a Spartan chassis. Chronic electrical issues, under powered A/C units and fit and finish issues never respolved. 2) Pay attention when Quality says that you are getting a new design. We got their "new" ladder racks and they have been disasters since day one. Never fixed right and were forgotten by the factory. Eventually fixed by local company because that company in a blue building in Alabama wasn't doing anything. 4) Electrical nightmare at times. The circuitry for their rear warning and signal lights changes every 2 - 3 years. No big deal initially, but when you have a problem and need new boards 4 years later and your rig is out of warranty your screwed. We had that problem 2 months ago and Quality told us to ... Well actually we never got a straight answer on what to do from them. The local E-One dealer fixed them and got it right.

Overall they have been good rigs and have held up well considering the abuse they get. Just spec everything to the letter and triple check everything.

[ScottCook]

Station2, you sound like you're singing the same song we are (or were) until a few days ago. We have 2 Spartan/Quaility, a '97 engine and a '99 or '00 quint. The engine was and has been fine, no problems. The quint on the other hand...

To make a long story short, 2 years later, things are finally getting fixed and we are supposed to be getting reimbursed for warranty work that we ended up having to pay for to get done, like the busted steering wheel (tilt) the truck was delivered with. We never could get the dealer or the factory to fix.

The dealer (same guy as you Station2) hired a new guy to rep our area. The new rep is a friend of mine and an all around great guy. He knew about our problems before he was hired by the dealer and one of the first phone calls he made was to us to get them fixed as warranty.

Even at that, I can't help but wonder if the dealer is trying to make it right because he's heard we're in the market for a new engine.

[STATION2]

S. Cook, I agree with you 100%. When they found out we were looking for a Ladder Tower, there were all sorts of promises of repairs and the like. When we bought an E-One 95' those all disappeared. Tell you friend to call me about ours. We have been arguing with the factory over repair costs we payed out of our pockets and that they should have payed for. And there are still some "issues", small as they may be, we would like to see handled. Be safe brother.