Rescue your HO scale town with Boley's Seagrave fire truck
By Mike Smith

Boley's new line of emergency response vehicles now includes a licensed model from Seagrave. Since Boley's first HO scale vehicles hit the market in my area a couple years ago, I knew they were here to stay. These detailed models can help you populate your empty HO highways at a reasonable cost. Their line of fire and rescue equipment fills a gap for both the collector and modeler alike.

Seagrave has been building fire apparatus for close to a century and has always been on the cutting edge of design. In the early 1950s Seagrave introduced one of the first all-enclosed cabs. The reason was to keep fire fighters out of the elements while en route to a call. The Boley model utilizes a modern version of this innovation. A truck of this size would commonly pump at a capacity of 1000 to 1500 GPM and have a 500 to 750 gallon tank. The top-mounted control panel behind the cab is another innovation introduced in the past 5 to 10 years. Most modern fire apparatus follow a similar design with Seagrave having the telltale chrome radiator grille.

The fact that this model has a "custom" cab is the main reason
I bought the truck. A custom cab refers to the fact that the cab was built by the apparatus manufacturer (Seagrave in this case) as opposed to a commercially available cab, as on the International rigs also produced by Boley. Inexpensive models of this custom style were unavailable in HO scale until now. This model's modular design will lend itself quite readily to kit bashing other models based on this truck.

The paint on the model has a smooth finish and the separation lines are crisp and clean. The molding of the detail parts like the siren, light bar, rear beacons and tele-lights above the pump panel are top-notch. The printing on the pump panel does the job but I like a little more relief so I added some "lenses" with some dots of clear epoxy. Adding figures to the interior would be easy as there is plenty of room inside. The body has nice compartment detail. On the other hand, the hard suction hoses on the side seem a little undersized. The load in the hose bed is neat the way it is color-coded the way some departments are doing it now, but those stacks are far too neat. My aching back can tell you it's impossible to get hose to lay that flat in real life!

All in all though, this truck is an excellent piece of model equipment that any HO fire fighter would be proud to respond in.

Please visit Boley for more info.

About the Author
Mike Smith, 30, of Rochester, New York, is a frequent contributor to RAILROAD.NET. A life-long model railroader, he is an experienced hobbyist. While his main interest lies in railroading, Mike also constructs models of vehicles, airplanes, and military equipment.