Posted by Lew VB on Monday, June 09, 2003 at 10:06AM :
In Reply to: Re: What is a Bean Pump worth? posted by Willy-N on Monday, June 09, 2003 at 2:59AM :
High pressure fog really hit its peak in the Navy during WW2. The theory was that the mist was so fine that it would quickly turn to steam and displace all of the O2 in the room and by not using a volume of water to drown the fire you would save alot of water damage {the last thing you would want to go is fill a ship with water}. That worked good with the Navy's steel ships because the rooms were steel and that would limit the escape of the steam. As for post war they did work well for structures at the right time and place. If you knew when and how to use them you could make some great saves, iv you used them at the wrong time you would surely end up with nothing but a basement. Later Beans were equiped with both types of pumps. The Bean trucks were designed to carry their own water supply {435 gal} which was a first to carry that much water {for an attack pumper}. They were smaller that most fire trucks and that helped to get through traffic and get to the fire fast before it could grow out of control. Their sales pitch included the saying that you could have water on the fire within 60 seconds after arriving on the scene. With the low volume water needs getting a fire hydrent right away is not a priority {435 gal /2 guns @ 30gpm ea=7.25 minutes of water} . As for the output of the truck. Don't let the small sprayer fool you, at 650psi output is does have quite a kick, the few times I've had my truck turned up that high I've had grown men look at me and ask "how long would they {the firemen of the time} have to do this?????" A lot of the old Bean trucks {including mine} ended up being used as tree sprayers after retirement because they could reach the tops of trees when spraying for gypsy moths.
Lew VB
'46 Dodge/Bean
'41 Dodge 1/2 ton WC
'71 M35A2