What is the oldest ambulance that you have worked in?
- Thread starter Paul Steinberg
- Start date
1980 Ford Wheeled Coach Type II, this was our back-up unit for the Morrison Community Ambulance Association in Morrison, IL. I only got to drive this rig a couple times, but she ran like a scalded cat! She was bought brand new by the association from Foster Coach Sales, Inc. in Sterling, IL. She featured red & clear lenses on a twinsonic lightbar with siren in the middle like they all did back then, round flashers (with square headlights, I wish they would have upgraded the flashers with new square covers to match the new look), two red Federal fireballs on the hood, and wig-wag headlights which were a first for me, and looked incredible when she was all lit up. She replaced two combos that both local funeral homes ran until they exited the ambulance business, so she was the first emergency vehicle our town had that featured WAIL YELP and HI LO electronic siren (our local police only had WAIL and YELP, no HI LO. Our fire department ONLY had Q's on all their vehicles, even their rescue squad).
The unit I actually worked in most of the time was a 1986 Ford Econoline chassis, with a re-conditioned Horton modular body. It was ok, but I didn't really like it that much. No wig-wags, the lightbar was a Rosco P Coltrane looking one with no siren speaker even though the middle section didn't light up, and it had a dumb looking blinking headlight clear lensed light in front of the lightbar's speaker section. Oh, and exterior blinking lights in the grille which also housed the siren. This unit was also slow as all heck, you literally had to keep it pedal to the metal on the highway to keep it at 70 mph and it still slowed down to less than 55 mph going up hills even when you had it floored with the lights off, no siren, and no A/C running. It was also hard to keep on the road, I don't know if it had major suspension problems or what, but that bitch was not easy to drive. I was only 19 when I started, so I didn't really know how to drive it properly until I had been with them for awhile. So I ran over a lot of curbs when making right hand turns code 3! Much to the annoyance of my crew-members.
The unit I actually worked in most of the time was a 1986 Ford Econoline chassis, with a re-conditioned Horton modular body. It was ok, but I didn't really like it that much. No wig-wags, the lightbar was a Rosco P Coltrane looking one with no siren speaker even though the middle section didn't light up, and it had a dumb looking blinking headlight clear lensed light in front of the lightbar's speaker section. Oh, and exterior blinking lights in the grille which also housed the siren. This unit was also slow as all heck, you literally had to keep it pedal to the metal on the highway to keep it at 70 mph and it still slowed down to less than 55 mph going up hills even when you had it floored with the lights off, no siren, and no A/C running. It was also hard to keep on the road, I don't know if it had major suspension problems or what, but that bitch was not easy to drive. I was only 19 when I started, so I didn't really know how to drive it properly until I had been with them for awhile. So I ran over a lot of curbs when making right hand turns code 3! Much to the annoyance of my crew-members.
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