Details FIRE-BOX

2Tracks · May 2, 2021

A few weeks ago I had taken my boom idler car out of the box to takes some pictures of it. In the box was a brass "tool box" from Precision Scale Co. that I had put in there when I had built the car, as a detail piece to add later on. Now seemed like a good time!
So I thought I'd detail the piece here.
I did a 'puter search, didn't get much. Does anybody know about fire fighting tool storage?
A long rectangular wooden box to keep fire fighting tools in. Is it called a fire box? Did they even have such a thing back then? I don't even know that! I would think they would have.
This car is going to have one....

Colored a relatively bright red, a white "FIRE" painted on the lid? Going for a 1950ish time period!
Here is a couple of positions of the box on the boom car.
Mounted on the inside here, positioned between the sling hooks to avoid interference when opening the lid.

Or, on the end of the car! Better accessibility than on the inside of the car, but it's blocking the walk way.
Any other position for it?

Well, I'll have to contemplate positioning while I'm coming up with an appropriate red color.

dave1905 · May 4, 2021

Why would you have fire fighting tools on a boom idler car?

The boom idler cars I worked with had tools related to wrecking (pry bars, lining bars, cutting torches, shovels, hundreds of wooden blocks and wedges, hammers, sledges, ballast forks and shovels, brake rigging, air hoses, hose connections, chains, etc). There will also be a a truck or two on the boom car to use under a car whose trucks were damaged in the derailment.

2Tracks · May 5, 2021

Humm! I don't know that there would be a fire box on the boom idler car. I don't know that there wouldn't be one either, hence my post here. My original thought was, in the heat of the summer, the box would be placed on this car because there was room for it and it was accessible. If it doesn't make sense to have one there, ok, that's fine. Thanks for the reply Dave. As I will go ahead & decorate this as a fire box for use else were, you gave me an idea to make up an idler car with out the house structure on it, with the tools & materials you had mentioned.

2Tracks · May 5, 2021

As finding a picture of an appropriate red colored box is not going to happen, I'm just going to wing it. I have seen fire fighting storage areas before and they were a brighter type of red. I have several red paints but none of them look even close to what I want out of the bottle.

This is a strip of styrene that I sprayed Rustoleum 2X Flat Gray Primer down to the arrow on the left.

The colors listed on the card board, starting at the upper left, correspond to each stripe of paint from the top down on the styrene.
The last listing on the card board---4 parts Bloodred X 1 part .102 Red, is the last two stripes on the styrene (right arrows). The top arrow, painted on the primer, and the bottom arrow painted on the bare white styrene. The red on the bare white styrene is the color I'm after...I'll go with that.

Rico · May 5, 2021

From what I remember anything fire related was a bright red.
We had a box of hose fittings and repair bits that went wherever it would fit whenever it was needed and would sometimes just be sitting by the worksite.