Picked up my brother at the local ferd dealer, he had just returned a leased 05 f250ps. The lease guy asked if my brother wanted to pruchase the truck, for $36,000cnd!!! Brother laughed and said $36,000? How much do I getas a rebate, as the last 3 yrs of leasing it spent more time on a tow truck then actualy on the job!! Lease guy replyed that he had gotten one of the very few lemons! My brother told him he has 6 f450s 7.3 and 3 2500 QC 5.9s in his fleet and the dodges have never seen the inside of a service shop! He alsotold him,if dodge could get their truckscertified for ambulances he'd switch over at a drop of a hat!!

I drove in with my 05 3500 QC and had to apologize to the gaggle of salesmen, that had flocked over to my truck, for parking a "real" truck at their dealership and scaring off their customers! One of the sales guys was pretty proud of the fact that he had a customer tell him he was getting 14mpg (unloaded) with his 08 f350ps... oh boy!! I told him iget that pulling my 10k lb TT at 65pmh!!

I really believe DC is missing out on something big here, they ought to get their 4500 or 5500s certified for anbulances, as it stands only ferd has certification. The market is big enough to support other choices.

 

I'm amazed ferd is able to keep that certification with all the issues the 6.0's have. . .and the 6.4's arent looking up either with turbo issues.

 

Heres a ferd ambulance story. Im on a ferd e450 medic at the firehouse and when we park with all the lights on it kicks on to high idle or else the batteries die. Well let it high idle for 10-15 min and when you kick it out of high idle and try to go in drive the ses lite kicks on and it doesn't go anywhere. Nice when you have a patient in the back and we arent moving.

 

Drew I havn't seen a 6.4 come in with any turbo issues at all. 90% of the 6.4's I work on are blown radiators. I've seen a few EGR coolers blown, one where he got so much coolant in the engine it hydrolocked it and bent a rod so we ended up putting a new engine in it. I've seen two HP fuel pumps go bad. And one where somehow the #2 cylinder got scored up and had no compression. But not one single turbo issue. Maybe its just where I'm at. Anyways, yeah I really wish Dodge or Chevy could make ambulances, cuz we get a ton of em come through the shop and they drive me nuts. Worked on two of em today in fact. They suck mostly cuz just about all of them are vans and not trucks, and vans are the worst thing to ever have to work just because everything is crammed into such a small space. Damn Fords, they make me alot of money but sure are a pain in the ***.

 

All the stations out here run IH's with the DT466 in them. Dont really see anything smaller except the old ones they are about to retire.

 

We have one of the rare 6.0s that hasn't had any problems. We test drove an 08 Dodge 3500 but Wheelcoach pieced it together in a hurry to get it out that the Ford guy from MedTec really outshined so we get another Ford...

 

My departments ambulances are all F450 truck with the 6.0 and two of them have had a new set of injectors put in them, numerous map sensors and one has had a new turbo. Pretty sad when you depend on these to protect your tax paying citizens and get them to the hospital safely. The third one, is brand new, so just a matter of time before its in the shop. Oh, and they are so slow, my 03 cummins blows these away, and its three years behind the 06's. I agree, dodge needs to get into the ambulances, although you can get the Sterling bullet (basically a dodge) with the 6.7L in it. I think their are so many ferd ambulances and fleet trucks because of the price they sell them at. You can get them dirt cheap and there is a reason for it.