Mobile Air Stations.

[zoom40]

Our volley dept. has reason to beieve we are getting the FEMA FPG this year.
We applied for a Moblie filling station, SCBA, and PPE..
What kind of BAC filling stations do you guys use?.. Do I want a gas compressor? Do I want an Electric Compressor?.. Do I put the compressor on the enclosed trailor we will be buying? or do I just fill the 4 Bank Cascade system that will be on the trailor.. I found out that 4 bottle cascade will fill approx 34 Breathing Air Cylinders (45 min). That should be enough bottles we would probably never run out of BAC at an incedent. But?.. I want to make sure. If any of you have purchase this type of system, I'd love to hear feedback..what would you do again? and what would you do diffent. We want to do it the right way.. and I learnd along time ago that a man who wont ask a few questions, makes lots of mistakes..
Also. where and what were some of the prices you got on your SCBA's and such.? Thanks for the info.

[parafire81]

First of all, how many times a year do you respond to a call that requires personell to "pack up" and actually use multiple bottles of air?

If the answer is not many...then don't waste your money. Get 4 M Sized bottles that can be refilled by your local welding supply vendor and make a cascade system out of those. We recently spent $36,000 on one and it hardly gets used. I hear now that if you don't run the compressors regularly, they begin to fail. I think we could've found something better to spend $36,000 on.

But, just one man's opinion.

[zoom40]

Thanks.. Thats a very good point. We will use our pretty regular for training. Probably a whole lot more than actually at incendents. We have to spend 23K on a mobile air system.. thats the way I wrote it up in the grant.. I'm finding out to include the trailor cost several thousand more than that..

[mglax13]

http://www.scotthealthsafety.com/liberty1.htm


This is what we use. We got it from a grant too. You can never run out of air, and its really easy to use. You can train all you want using the air and you never have to worry about refilling cascade bottles.

[N2DFire]

You can see a good variety of systems at http://www.breathingair.com

A few weeks ago I was on a mission to create a Light/Air trailer out of our compressor / storage system and some spare parts laying around the station - all I needed was a trailer. After talking with one of our guys who services the compressor, we decided that our particular model of compressor wasn't suited to the rigors of travel. We then figured that we could take our existing 4 Bottle (4500 psi) system and add a couple of bottles on the cheap, hook up a high pressure quick disconnect and just have a portable 6 bottle cascade system that we can refill ourselves.

I like this idea a lot better as it cuts down on a lot of potential maintenance issues w/ the compressor and it would allow us to build a smaller/lighter trailer unit that we could then pull with more vehicles.

Having some experience with the AFG myself, if you are able to construct or purchase the trailer that you want for less than you applied for, you can ask in writing to use the funds for other equipment in lieu of returning the extra funds.

Also - consider adding scene lighting capabilities to the trailer. This will be worth gold if/when you use this thing at night.

[cozmosis]

We purchased the Liberty II with our FIRE Act grant.

http://www.maumellefire.com/photos/mobileairunit.htm

http://www.scotthealthsafety.com/liberty2.htm

So far, so good. Before the trailer's arrival, we had no portable air whatsoever. Also, our compressor was becoming more and more difficult to operate. So, not only can we fill bottles on scene or at the training grounds... we use the trailer for filling one or two bottles in the station instead of using the old fixed compressor.

[zoom40]

Thanks for the input.. thats the kind of info i'm looking for.
What was the price on the Liberty 1 and 2?.
Right now I"m leaning toward putting a fixed compressor at the station and mount a 4 bottle cascade system in the trailor, along with the 2 position fill station.
We are so rural, most of our calls are on dirt roads. I dont think hauling a compressor would be a smart idea for us. I think that may be asking for trouble. I dont think we would ever use up 34 bottles of air at an incident, but if it got close someone could take the trailor back to station and refill the Cascade System.

cozmosis>> what sales rep did you use in Arkansas.. I'm about 65 miles north of you , toward Greers Ferry Lake.

[cozmosis]

Originally posted by zoom40
cozmosis>> what sales rep did you use in Arkansas.. I'm about 65 miles north of you , toward Greers Ferry Lake.

We used Pro-Fire Equipment out of Olive Branch, Miss. In addition to the air trailer, we also replaced all of our SCBAs and purchased individual masks for each firefighter with grant money. From a grunt's perspective, Pro-Fire seemed to be on top of everything.

[doughesson]

Our air truck uses a cascade system pressed up with a PTO compressor.
The frequency of use shouldn't dissuade a department from having a mobile unit to refill SCBA bottles.Air does go bad in the bottle and you'll need to repressurize them occasionally no matter how often you use them comepletely.
Every fire I've ever been to in the two years I've been on,I've used the entire bottle doing vent work and the like.
We have mutual aid calls all the time and we are one of the few in six counties that has the cpapbility.
I'm just a two year rookie and don't claim to understand all that I've been taught about the air system,but I will ask this:why is it that you can refill a scuba tank anywhere in the world because the threads are standard but not so between MSA,Scott and any other brand?