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Volunteer Fire Department Turning HMMWV into brush truck

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bfdvollie

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Hey everyone; just wanted to say hi. If anyone could be greener with these vehicles than us they'd be from Ireland :)

We got a 2 door unit through the DOD program and we are using it to replace a 30 year old brush truck that can't keep doing it's mission. This is helping our city save the over 60k for a new vehicle by repurposing this vehicle.

That being said we know we've got a lot of work to do with removing components we don't need and adding things like a water tank, pump, plumbing, sires, lights, etc.

I've downloaded the manuals and will enjoy the light reading. :) Our big thing are parts and head scratchers. So I apologize in advance if I ask questions you've heard a million times. We do use the search function before I ask :)
 
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bfdvollie

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I did read their article and it gave some good information. We debated the 200 versus 300 gallon tank. Our current truck has a 175 gallon tank and has plenty of capacity. Our big thing with the 300 gallon tank was the weight of the water (2500 lbs) and the size of tanks and how it would fit in the bed. We've decided to go with a 200 gallon tank but we are looking at a 250 gallon tank.

One other thing was the 12V system they installed. We're looking at a 24V to 12V converter. Our pump will be recoil start so we didn't need a 12V starting system and the only thing that 12V on our vehicle will be the emergency equipment and the 12V solenoid valves that we plan to use to actuate the system. The issue is tying into the electrical system. When we pulled the seat up to review the batteries it looks like this vehicle is a postive ground. Is that correct?

Ours is the canvas top and "jeep" doors and that's fine, however olive drab and fire engine red do not go. I've been tasked to find a dye or paint that we can dye the canvas either red or black. I've also been tasked to clean up the cab and the green has to go. We're looking at a light grey.

Since ours is the two door model it has the inserts over the second row door openings. When we pulled the insert out we see the gobs of space that could be used for storage. We plan on modifing the insert to allow access to that space for smaler tools and other items.

Our big thing are parts and one of our other members found a site that carries parts. We'd like to replace items that are broken or better to replace than repair. We joke about the horn and feel we should replace it with one out of a plymouth road runner :)
 
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aczlan

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Upstate, NY, USA
bfdvollie said:
One other thing was the 12V system they installed. We're looking at a 24V to 12V converter. Our pump will be recoil start so we didn't need a 12V starting system and the only thing that 12V on our vehicle will be the emergency equipment and the 12V solenoid valves that we plan to use to actuate the system. The issue is tying into the electrical system. When we pulled the seat up to review the batteries it looks like this vehicle is a postive ground. Is that correct?
Click to expand...
IIRC, it should be 24V negative ground with 2 12V batteries wired in series (Positive on Batt1 goes to the engine/fusepanel, Negative on Batt1 goes to Positive on Batt2 and Negative on Batt2 goes to the frame/ground).


Aaron Z
 
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bfdvollie

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Belleville,MI
Ok I found out I was incorrect. I'm used to regular automotive wiring and not 24V military wiring. What looked like a ground lug to me is called a power stud and what I thought was a maxi fuse was a shunt. It's all shown on page 176 of part one of the service manual.
 
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187

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Youngstown, OH
Good luck with your aquisition! These are great vehicles for the price. Glad you guys could put one to use and save it from the crusher.

We used the 24V emergency equipment in some of our rigs to avoid the power issues. Thinking about the converter for the last one.
 
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bfdvollie

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Belleville,MI
We are looking at a 50 Amp DC/DC converter, because we already have a 12V lightbar and siren in house that we can use. We also want to add some 12V scene lights for those nighttime brush fires.
 
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aczlan

Member
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Location
Upstate, NY, USA
bfdvollie said:
We are looking at a 50 Amp DC/DC converter, because we already have a 12V lightbar and siren in house that we can use. We also want to add some 12V scene lights for those nighttime brush fires.
Click to expand...
If you will be running multiple scene lights (ie: if you turn them on in pairs), you could run 2 in series (ie: positive on light 1 connecting to negative on light 2 just like your batteries) and be able to run them directly off of the 24v system.
That could reduce the load on your converter somewhat.
Edit: Could also drop 24v bulbs into the scene lights...

Aaron Z
 
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Montanaro5

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Arroyo Grande/CA
A friend of mine is the Battalion Chief of the local fire department and he expressed an interest in a vehicle such as the one you're putting together. Can you contact me directly so we can discuss this in more detail? Please email me at Montanaro5@att.net

Thanks!
 
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bfdvollie

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Belleville,MI
We are well into the project. The pump has shown up, tank being built and all the green canvas and vinyl has been painted black. We sat down with a local vehicle outfitter and calculated we only needed a 30 amp dc/dc converter. We also changed our two door back to a quasi four door with some fabrication. Paint and prep are our next steps and we are still debating coatings.

We did have the headlamp switch fail so we need to order one of those.
 
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sgtmike3

Member
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Location
Ohio
One option you might want to look into is the multi-voltage emergency lights. Several companies make LED lights that work from 10-30 VDC. There are even sirens that operate 10-20 VDC. This could allow you to use a smaller DC-DC converter. One negative is that most of these lights are surface mount units, not light bars. But we've decided against a light bar to reduce the possibility of damage off road.

Mike
 
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bfdvollie

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Belleville,MI
Sorry haven't been on to much but we've been busy. The green is almost gone, replaced with standard automotive finish that was sprayed on by local body shop. The black is mostly Durabak 18, but we had several parts black powder coated and we rattle caned the dash. We are trying to figure out how to deal with the green steering wheel.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/13745394@N07/8194273629/in/photostream
http://www.flickr.com/photos/13745394@N07/8194273565/in/photostream/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/13745394@N07/8194273497/in/photostream/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/13745394@N07/8195365418/in/photostream/


 
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bfdvollie

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Belleville,MI
Well we finished POR-15'ing the frame yesterday. Found out it's much cleaner to use a foam brush versus a bristle brush to put this stuff on. A sponge might have been even better. A review of the underbody did note we had a slight front diff leak, the front carier bearing is a little rough with rust and copious amounts of what I call white chewing gum over some of the electrical connections. Based on that review we are planning to durabak the underside of the body including the wheel wells to improve the NVH. We're also going to update the "tool kit" out back. We also vinyl painted the NVH pads that go along the driver and passenger seat floor and on both sides of the transmission tunnel. We also found out one of the direction tires was installed backwards. We plan on asking the local guard base where they go for tire/wheel work.
 
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bfdvollie

New member
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Location
Belleville,MI
Well we are heading into the home stretch for the rebuilding work. We're waiting on a new three lever switch, a front seat belt upgrade kit and we need to find a left hand mirror. Other than that it's good to go. We had the front seats re-covered by a local marine trim and fabric shop, All the green canvas is now black, but we are thinking of changing the rear cab canvas to a sheet of clear vinyl versus the small window. The tank should be ready this week and we can start plumbing it, iinstalling the dc/dc and the emergency equipment.

Here are some more pics:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/13745394@N07/8276898397/in/photostream/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/13745394@N07/8276899139/in/photostream/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/13745394@N07/8277991344/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/13745394@N07/8277992374/in/photostream/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/13745394@N07/8276955347/in/photostream/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/13745394@N07/8278033048/in/photostream/
 
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