When fires ravage through neighborhoods, engineers come up with solutions
Wild fires have scorched the San Diego area. A fire recently burned through Jeff Palhegyi’s neighborhood, burning seven houses down on his street. Palhegyi, a chief engineer working with the All Terrain Vehicle Division of Phoenix International Systems, watched the blaze from his home and thought, “Man, we’ve got to be able to do something.”
Palhegyi, who was lucky enough to live up on a mountain away from the fire, spent one night watching a brush crew attempt to hike in to a hard to reach area. The engineer had previously worked on Phoenix’s Prowler Light Tactical All Terrain Vehicle (LTATV, pictured below), the only vehicle in the class that was purpose built, designed and produced for military applications including assault, crew-served weapon mobility, perimeter patrol and logistic support.
“I was watching the brush crew and I thought that one of our vehicles could’ve simply driven right through that brush,” Palhegyi recalls. “We watched these guys hike in carrying a small amount of water. Each guy could only carry, at most, three gallons of water, because of the weight on top of all of the equipment and gear. We watched them set up this fire line that was three or four miles long and it took three hours for it to happen. I’m sitting there thinking that if they had one of our vehicles, they could’ve done this in a quarter of the amount of time.”
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Phoenix went to work and quickly introduced two new versions of its Prowler Rugged Terrain Vehicle (RTV) for use by the nation’s fire-fighting and emergency response agency operators. The new Emergency Response Vehicles (ERVs) are designed and purpose-built for emergency wild fire response and medical response.
Both vehicles offer the reliability, stability, speed, endurance and power as the Prowler LTATV, but the Prowler Emergency Wild Fire Response ERV, designed for the wild fire emergency first responders provides a self-contained fire fighting unit and the ability to act as a remote pumping station.
The Prowler ERV required the ability to perform as a stable platform in any terrain or climate and provide:
- Fully automatic all-wheel drive.
- Better than 1:1 load to vehicle weight ratio.
- A wide range of auxiliary power resources.
- A low center of gravity, tight turning radius and ground clearance.
- Front and rear extended range double wishbone suspension.
- A rugged and durable chromalloy steel tubular construction.
- Platform engineering for minimal maintenance.
- Automotive style controls.
- Wheel or track mount interchangeability.
Concept Development
“We started putting together the idea of building a vehicle that could carry 50 gallons of water, which would take twenty guys to carry, as well as all the gear for these guys to cut into the brush line,” Palhegyi recalls. “We decided that we’d make it a bit generic, because there are a lot of tight areas where people will want to be able to access where you would need a small ERV to go. We pooled our minds together, and built a vehicle based on the military platform (LTATV), but because of its size, it had some limitations.”
Given the size of the initial ERV design, the vehicle is only able to carry a certain amount of water, and the weight of the full tank had to be taken into consideration so it didn’t throw off the vehicle’s center of gravity. “We bolted the tank into the bed of the original LTATV and there wasn’t a lot of room left. The vehicle was too small for what we wanted to do,” says Palhegyi.
Couple the smaller size with the demand from other ERV platforms (like carrying up to four people), and the team decided to stretch the wheel base to allow either a water tank to be dropped in a low position, but it also allows the user to not add a water tank and add two more seats. “It’s a platform that can be customized to suit different fire department demands,” Palhegyi adds. “The platform can also be outfitted to carry a stretcher and a medic if need be (top left).”
The basic platform allowed the team to do a lot. After they figured out structurally and mechanically that they had to make a bigger vehicle, they realized that they would have to strengthen the vehicle and extend components such as the brake line, drive shaft and the exhaust system.
The basis for the LTATV was already ruggedized, but the engineering staff had to add upgraded heavy-duty skid plates.
The undercarriage protection, heavy-duty shock absorbers, heavy-duty wheels and run-flat tires carried over from the early Prowler design.
Common Sense
Phoenix consulted with local fire equipment suppliers as well as fire agencies. Most of the additions included “common sense stuff,” but trying to get as much out of the vehicle as possible.
The ERV has a two-cylinder gasoline constant velocity transmission (CVT), but the efficiency of the vehicle relies on its ability to perform in the field. The more efficient this type of vehicle is relies on its range, and a balance between how far it would go on a tank of gas and how much weight it could carry.
After the initial testing, most technical changes had to do with the pump or water systems. For example, a high-tech water system that uses a foam mix to get more out of the water supply was added. “You can haul up to 50 gallons of water with the vehicle,” Palhegyi states. “If you use this foam, it will give you about 200 gallons of effectiveness.”
The foam system mounts next to the tank and as you create pressure from the pump to shoot the water out, the water mixes with foam, lowering the water content and sprays out a foam material that instead of soaking into the ground or running off, sticks and gives the firefighters more time.
When you spray something down with this foam, not only are you going to be able to spray down a larger area, but the foam has staying power against the flames.
“We have made sure to make room so that we can add the foam systems; because the foam systems are something that makes the vehicle much more efficient in terms of what it can carry and do,” Palhegyi says. “Being as it’s only able to have a certain payload in water, adding this foam system that gives you 200 percent of what your water would have been is incredible.”
There are different types of systems that you can use to outfit the ERV. There are different types of hardware and every fire department, every law enforcement agency has some different specification of how they’d like to spec out their vehicles. In some ways, every order has to be customized as a result of the various demands.
When he thinks back to the fire line of men running into the brush, Palhegyi adds, “We had this vehicle that we already made that you could pile gear on. You could carry the water and gear equivalent to 25 to 30 guys, with four or five of those guys hitching a ride on it to get into the fire faster. The new design is about speed, and the ability to do more.”
Standard Specifications
- 660cc 4-stroke single, liquid cooled, electric start with auxiliary auto.
- Fully automatic transmission.
- Sealed tubular structure with chrome-moly roll cage and cargo racks.
- Standard automotive driver controls.
- Sealed rack and pinion steering.
- Console-mounted dual range shifter.
- Digital multifunction display with LCD speedometer /odometer.
- Dual trip meters and clock.
- Electronic fuel gage/drive train position indicators.
- Front Suspension: Independent double wishbone, adjustable preload reservoir shock absorbers, eight-inch travel.
- Rear Suspension: Independent double wishbone, adjustable preload reservoir shock absorbers, eight-inch travel.
- Front Braking: Dual hydraulic disc.
- Rear Braking: Shaft-mounted hydraulic disc with four piston-opposed calipers.
- Full engine braking on all four drive wheels.
- Towing Capacity: 1212 lbs.
- Winch: 3000 lbs with wireless remote control.
- Fuel Capacity: 7.9 gal.
- Ground Clearance: 12.5“ (13.5” approach and departure).
- Wheel Base: 75.25”.
- Track Width: 46” front, 43” rear (center to center).
- Overall Width: 54”.
- Overall Length: 113” (122.25” extended).
- Height: 69.5”.
- Weight: 1,100 lbs (dry).