Triple Layer Load Preconnect

[WCENG23]

We have used the triple fold on preconnects for many years. Some of the guys still want to stuff the hose through the bale. On our engine we put a medium sized rubber band over the nozzle and the first loop. If you dont break it after you pull it, it will break when charged.

[BlitzfireSolo]

My question is, what happens if you do not grab the first loop with the nozzle, is the load still able to be deployed in a somewhat efficent manner?

No. If you fail to grab loop with the nozzle, you will end up with a tangled mess. Train your firefighters 100% or be prepared for failure.

After a couple more years of using the triple layer, we have come across several more instances where we are unable to deploy the line properly, due to obstacles close to the side of the road. This significantly defeats the appeal of the triple layer load. [I should mention that this is also why I have come to hate crosslays, and believe that a true engine company only has pre-connects off the front or rear].

If you are considering the triple layer, I would strongly recommend a hybrid-type load like RFDACM mentions, or I mentioned in my previous post. I would amend my previous statements to describe the ideal bed load as a minuteman hybrid with the triple layer, not the other way around. However, until/unless proven otherwise, I will continue to support the donut roll load as the ideal pre-connect configuration.


WC - interesting idea on the rubber band. If that's what it takes, go for it. It is certainly better than stuffing it through the bale.


ACM - In re-reading this thread, I am curious as to why your guys had problems with the minute man in the double-wide beds? Are they very tight? How much of a shoulder carry vs. how much of a drag load did they try? Did they put the shoulder carry on top of the drag load, or did they put them side-by-side? My current department doesn't use the minuteman, but my experiences with it in the past have been very positive when done properly, both in single and double-wide beds.

[sciotolt374]

The triple lay is what we use on all three of our engine's cross lays. Works great. A few other are depts don't use it because they think it takes an extra 15 mins. I say it's crap. If you do it once or twice you'll see it's the way to go. We use it on all our 1.75" lines as well as our 2-1/2" pre-connects.

[ff118pfd]

we now use the triply lay load and the people who take the time to learn it and see the results of it, love it.

[dmleblanc]

We've never used the triple lay, although I wouldn't be unwilling to try it. I don't think anyone around here uses it. We had some career FF's from Slidell helping us out for a few days following Hurricane Gustav, and they use the triple lay. Most of my guys had never seen it before. They were interested in it, but so far no one has been begging me to try it

We use a modified flat lay, which I'll try to describe. Our crosslay beds are double-wide, with connections in the center of the truck, up top. We connect to the discharge, then flat lay, leaving extended loops on the very first layer (loops on both sides of the truck). We continue to flat lay, then when we reach the last length, we extend loops off both sides again ("dog ears", we call them), finishing up with the nozzle laid on top of the hose in the center of the truck.

To pull this lay, you have three options:

-Pull the nozzle off the top and advance the entire 150-200' like any regular flat lay;
-Pull the top loops onto your shoulder. This gives you a 50' working end to take to the fire. As you walk away from the engine, hook an arm into the bottom loops and pull the remaining load to the ground (admittedly this does give you a little spaghetti pile at the engine, which the driver or another firefighter can assist in straightening out); or,
-Just pull the bottom loops and dump the whole lay on the ground, grab the nozzle, and advance to the fire (the way we did it for years until we added the top loops)

Advantages:

-Easy to load and hard to mess up. Dealing with volunteers with varying levels of experience/training/interest, keeping it simple is important.
-Hard to pull it wrong. Any way you pull it it will still work.
-When deployed properly, gives you 50' of working line at the door to make entry, instead of just the nozzle and having to drag the whole line with you.
-When you drop the remaining load on the ground, you can advance perpendicular or parallel to the engine equally as easily, in case you have a problem with a fence, vehicles, etc. in the way.
-Can be deployed equally as well from either side of the truck.

Disadvantages:

-Dropping 100-150' of hose at the engine means you may need some assistance advancing and unkinking it.

Simplicity is the key here. This lay is simple enough to remember, even for a rookie, but still fairly versatile and effective for most situations.

We also keep a simple accordian load 100' preconnect in the front bumper well for car fires, trash fires, etc.

[RFDACM02]

An update from our FD. Our new engine will have all its 1.75" lines in the donut load as Blitzfire describes. No crosslays or speedlays. For simplicity it's hard to beat rolling hose, and for deploying we couldn't find a better lay. In 25 ft all of the hose regardless of preconnect length is on the ground and one firefighter can advance it. No spaghetti, ever. Our front bumper will carry two donuts of 200 ft each. which if required can be connected for a single 400' line for condos and the like. If you only need a 50[' trash line, you need only disconnect one exposed coupling and couple it to the discharge. Any length from 50-400 ft. is possible very quickly. And we can store all the 1.75" in the station racks in the doubled roll so changing out house a 5 minute op.

As for our hybrid load, it still works very well. All the hose is off the truck in less than 20 ft. and due to the middle section being triple layers it doesn't tangle or need to be flaked out much like a flat load. The big downside is loading it correctly, it's not easy to figure all the little dynamic if different hosebeds, which does effect it.

[ffmedcbk1]

this has been a very good forum topic.
however has anyone used it in a suburb/urban enviorment where you need to take the hose up four flights of stairs? I find this the ultimate defiency of the triple layer.

I use the triple (250' 2x wide) at my volly dept and use the flat (300' 2x wide with ears at the 50' and 150' marks) at my career. both work well at their respected departments(BTW we generally connect to the side discharges at my FT job).

Still the stretches in cluttered streets and parking lots are definately big issues also. the 2 1/2" preconnects also don't work well in my opinion due to the fact they are being stretched into commerical structures and they tend to be difficult lay outs in my volly's jurisdiction. we almost got the change back to flay b/c a problem at one of our fires a year ago.

[RFDACM02]

this has been a very good forum topic.
however has anyone used it in a suburb/urban enviorment where you need to take the hose up four flights of stairs? I find this the ultimate defiency of the triple layer.

What little sense I have, tells me that you'd best drop the triple layer at the first floor or outside and advance the single length up the stairs. If you were to stop short of the full length of the triple layer with any left on the stairs it could become its own decent hose clamp on the stairs when charged. The beauty of the triple layer is the fact that you can stop and charge the line and it's all flaked for you, not so in an enclosed space.

[pciddy]

My dept uses triple layer load in our 2 crosslays while the city we run with uses the minute man. I have pulled from both engines and it seems to me the minute man gives the best manuverability but you must know what your doing, while the triple layer is much easier to unload just is harder to navigate turns b/c your dragging hose from behind rather then dropping it as you would with a minute man which is my personal preference.

[ffmedcbk1]

What little sense I have, tells me that you'd best drop the triple layer at the first floor or outside and advance the single length up the stairs. If you were to stop short of the full length of the triple layer with any left on the stairs it could become its own decent hose clamp on the stairs when charged. The beauty of the triple layer is the fact that you can stop and charge the line and it's all flaked for you, not so in an enclosed space.

my perferred techniques is to have the length I'll need for the floor on my shoulder as I will navigate the multiple floors up the stairwell, and the back up man is stretching and flaking what is need in the stairs. we actually performed this very efficiently using the mod-flat load. on stairs one of the worst things to to is trying to drag hose up multiple stories. Please remember this is not a sfd but apartments and low to mid rise buildings that I think that works best. Triple loads in the country are good, not urban though IMHO.

[RFDACM02]

my perferred techniques is to have the length I'll need for the floor on my shoulder as I will navigate the multiple floors up the stairwell, and the back up man is stretching and flaking what is need in the stairs. we actually performed this very efficiently using the mod-flat load. on stairs one of the worst things to to is trying to drag hose up multiple stories. Please remember this is not a sfd but apartments and low to mid rise buildings that I think that works best. Triple loads in the country are good, not urban though IMHO.

Makes sense to me, I was referring to your use of the triple layer on the four story. This is why we use the modified load, which allows you to carry the last 50' in a horseshoe to the fire floor/door/area. Similarly when our newest engine hits the stretch with the donut loads the nozzleman will be dragging four progressive "loops" of hose that he can drop
as they're stretched and bring the remaining length(s) to the objective area.

[ffmedcbk1]

sorry about that rfd I thought you were advocating the 3x for stairs

[BKDRAFT]

Triple layer load is horrible in my opinion. You have to have a lot of room to deploy this hose load quickly and efficiently. If you don't it is just a pain.

In fact I believe that any hose load where you drag all of your hose on the ground is just slow and unnecessary.

The quickest most efficient hose load would be to flat load a bundle of 50' of hose (Use starps with clips to hold the bundle together that can be easily removed when you reach your objective). This is your working line you need at your front door. Load the rest of the hose in a flat load two or three tier system depending on your hose bed with loops that you can pull and drop as your making your way to your objective. When you get to your objective remove the bundle and toss the hose to flake it out and call for water. With this type of load your carrying all of your working line on your shoulder minimizing the amount of hose your dragging on the ground. This load makes 2nd floor fire attack very easy as well. For all of those using the triple layer I recommend you trying this and believe that many would not go back to the triple layer.

[SilverCity4]

We've officially switched to the triple-layer at work, but a few companies still load the minuteman. I personnaly love it, but we generally have a decent amount of room to work with. I don't have many buildings higher than two stories in my district, so I can't speak to the issue of deploying up several flights of stairs.

The biggest problem I've encountered is the actual loading. The math is real easy with 150 feet, but we load 200 feet, and sometimes I think some of the guys make it WAY harder than it is.

Also, since you have to lay out a third of the total length at once, you have to think ahead a bit when preparing to load it. Our guys tend to want to lay it out for reloading perpendicular to the truck, which is generally right into a building or obstruction. You don't have to do this, but for some reason that's how it seems to go.

One last thing...when laying the hose out for reloading, I think three men is about right...one at each end to pull slack, and a guy in the middle to work out the twists. You get 5 or 6 guys trying to lay out the hose for reloading and you're doing a lot of work over and over.

[hwoods]

Bryan Who??......... Hi Bro, long time no see.

[Fokker416]

The biggest question of any preconnect is what are you going to use it on? What I mean by that is your preconnects are/should be set up for your departments typical fire and what works best for those. We use triples with great success. The triple is at it's best for one or two story buildings with an average size yard or parking lot where you are going to enter with a charged line. If your department advances dry lines up stairs on a regular basis, I can see where this isn't the best load for you. If we're flaking up stairs we have to unload the line then grab or shoulder some flakes then take that up, this isn't a common evolution for us. A lot of our multistory apartments have exterior stairs so we hoist which is easy with a triple. Many times we will choose to advance our 2 1/2 that is in a flat load up then connect a hose pack. It's all situation dependent, how far up, how long is the building's setback from the street/parking lot, etc.

[coliverhrfd]

we switched to this load sometime back and have found if there is a personell shortage it is superior we actually timed it in a working fire scenario and from arrival time to water flowing was 45 sec ipersonally love it and have never had a problem with it while it was flaking off

[imprezive]

Maybe I've missed something in the thread, but one of the best parts of the triple layer is pulling it in a tight space. Two firefighters, one takes the nozzle, one takes the loop. Walk in opposite directions down the length of the truck and it will flake out beautifully. This makes it a great pack for MVA use on narrow roads or highways. If you're pulling your triple layer with one guy walking straight out, you're missing 50% of the advantage the triple layer provides.

You didn't miss anything, and I'm suprised you're the only person to state this. It needed to be reiterated.

[ChiefKN]

An oldie but a goodie.

[FFPCogs08]

I don't care for the triple layer load. We use a load that as far as I know is unique to us. Goes like this.
Female of the 1st length is connected to the chicksan (discharge) in the mattydale hose bed and flaked out alongside the engine, leaving the male end
attach nozzel to the 2nd lenth and place on running board. take hose and begin to pack it in the bed in a horsehoe leaving the nozzle on the RB. Connect next length to the 2nd and continue horseshoe pack. You will have to make two layers of horshoe one on top of the other. When you get to the end you will have a female end on the 3rd length(150') or 4th length (200') which is then connected to the male end of the first length. Pack 1st length flat on top of horseshoe and bring nozzle over and lay it atop the load or as we do place tip in a double female on the RB (we use only smoothbore nozzles for interior ops). Each bed is deployed off only one side of the rig based on which end has the loops

To deploy grab nozzle with one hand while putting your other arm through the loops of the horshoe. Pull both. As you walk away from the engine the 1st length will play out, when it reaches the end it will begin to pull the loops of the horseshoe off one by one until you reach the end which is your other hand with the nozzle. This load is designed to be deployed by one FF and works very well once you get accustomed to it. No spaghetti, kinks or other mess, but it does require some thought as you usually have to "plan" your deployment route to ensure you have enough hose with you at the door to make entry.

This method is part of an evolution we call "quick attack" based on a 4 man crew.
position 1 is nozzle
2 is irons who goes straight to door to begin FE, then backs up nozzleman
3 is officer who does walk around then works with entry team.
4 is MPO
If a 5th is available they are to throw a 24' portable ladder to the second flr front at a PD or taxpayer. They then vent as necessary or begin deployment and postioning of 2nd line from the rear of the rig (also packed in a horshoe configuration).

I know this is hard to envision but it does work phenomanally for our district. Here's a couple of pics. Their a few years old but the load is still the same.