Ooooops!

[firepiper1]

South Euclid, Ohio's 1991 Pierce 75' quint. According to the blog,

"This South Euclid ladder truck was heading down Wrenford Road April 4 when it came to an unexpected, abrupt and uncontrolled stop. The U-bolts that hold the differential to the leaf springs snapped, causing the differential to roll out the back. Several tow trucks came to the scene. Those tow truck operators considered several options while trying to figure out how to hook up the truck and load the broken parts. It took about four hours to clear the road."

[FWDbuff]

Fascinating. And I am not breaking Piece's balls, either. You have to wonder what caused this. And it would not surprise me to find out it was stress on the (single) rear from all the weight of a stick, water, pump, etc............

[donethat]

Opps

Some assembly required!

[HuntPA]

You should also post this under the thread for a used platform. I bet it would be a lot cheaper than what they are looking at!!!

"Used fire truck. Runs great!!!! Well maintained. Current pump and ladder test. Some wear evident. Priced to move!!"

[nameless]

that's interesting.

[pasobuff]

Just showed my brother the picture - his response - WTF!.....

Bet the driver had to change his pants!

[FIREMECH1]

Aerial #321

Aerial 321 is the fire department ladder truck first put in service January 14, 1991. This truck has a 75-ft ladder and a 1500 gallon per minute pumper manufactured by Pierce. Ladder 321 was sent out for refurbishment in October 2006 and is expected to provide years more service to the City.

Figured I'd show this from the Dept's site.

I am curious now, on who did the refurb, and what all they did. This shouldn't have happened in a less than 5yr refurb.

FM1

EDIT: Here's a link to the story. Click to see the image 10 times bigger. http://blog.cleveland.com/sunmesseng...uth_eucli.html

[FIREMECH1]

Just showed my brother the picture - his response - WTF!.....

Bet the driver had to change his pants!

I had the same response when I saw the pic.

And I don't think the driver is the only one.

FM1

[Cutlass84]

So they didn't hit anything to cause this? All four u-bolts just snapped as the truck was rolling down the road?? We must be missing something.

Last week one of our engines ran over a downed tree at speed.. the u-bolts survived, one of the leaf springs did not (among many components..)

[ChiefKN]

Fascinating. And I am not breaking Piece's balls, either. You have to wonder what caused this. And it would not surprise me to find out it was stress on the (single) rear from all the weight of a stick, water, pump, etc............

It is a single axle... unless I'm missing something.

We have a 100' quint on a single axle. When we refurbed, we took out the steel 300 gal tank to reduce the weight, as we had rear axle problems in the past.

[EngineCO38]

Oh that does not look good, someone is gonna get they're pee pee slapped over this one! I must say I've never seen a rear axel and differential come out from underneath a rig so cleanly like this. And the only reported cause was failed U-bolts...I dunno about that, seems odd to me.

[CGITCH]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqsI3fl1Z8w

[volff1170]

The same thing happened to a Pierce quint in Elyria, Ohio in 2007. I think the article said it was a reserve ladder and was 14 or 15 years old at the time. I would think Pierce would have looked into the problem back then just to avoid any lawsuits.

[ke6gwf]

This thread finally got me to jump through the sign-up hoops!

I think what happened is that the welds that hold the saddle/spring mount to the axle failed.
If you look at the big picture courtesy of FIREMECH1 http://media.cleveland.com/sunmessen...8b7587d975.jpg, you can see a rusty brown strip on the far side of the housing. That is where the saddle is supposed to be welded on. The fact that it is missing tells me that the welds failed in any case, and since I know this to be almost common, and have seen it happen personally, I am guessing that it was the root cause of the accident.

The saddle would normally combine a place for the spring or other suspension arm (should be air-ride, but some of them still use a spring leaf with the air bag at one end) to sit, and then have wings on both sides that the u-bolts would go through and bolt under. In this case, the u-bolt should be going over the spring, and bolting to the saddle. The only connection then between the axle and the suspension is via those welds between the saddle and the housing.

I don't remember the model now, but I have heard there was one model of common heavy truck axle that had design issues so the housing flexed more than it should have, leading to the saddle welds cracking. I had that model axle under a truck of similar size and weight (and hard usage), and I caught it with just cracks, before the axle fell out!

Also, a common contributor was the saddles being replaced or moved when upgrading the suspension, and the wrong welding filler being used, causing metallurgical problems with the metal.

In any case, there should either be something welded on that side, or there should be signs of u-bolts wrapping around the axle. Since I see no signs of u-bolts around the axle, I diagnose it as the welds failing!

(a non-mechanic might look at it and see the u-bolts no longer connected to the axle, and since the u-bolts are probably the only thing they can identify by name, they would blame them. You know how it goes with Admin!)

(Source: 15 years of seeing big things break and then trying to fix them

Ben~

[93Cobra]

I would not doubt that the winter salt and brine played a big part in eating away the components. The road crews here in Ohio use some nasty stuff on the roadways to keep them clear.