The following thesis project has been done in direct collaboration with Autokaross i Floby AB Rescue Vehicle Department, in Sweden. The report contains the design development of a protective cover against weather conditions for the extendable ladder in a fire vehicle.
The aim of the report has been to develop a functional and low cost solution cover for the FEL on a fire truck, which is allocated on the roof, with the express intention of providing adequate access and protection against weather conditions in Nordic countries, so as to prevent premature deterioration of the FEL unit. The company has set the technical and conceptual boundaries, with the help of the two previous concepts currently used, the BMC and the ACP.
The initial requirements laid out by the company were expressed through a number of specific demands which can be categorized in two main points:
Cost: Designing a solution keeping in mind cost limits, assembly cost and time, and space optimization. This was done by taking into account the two existing solutions, particularly the BMC, which represents the lowest, cost wise and function wise. Therefore it was used as the basis on which to apply improvements, rather than trying to lower the high cost on the overqualified function of the ACP.
Function: Providing the adequate protection and access to the FEL. In this case, the problem was solved by establishing the correct degree of protection relevant to the Nordic weather conditions and FEL needs, and regarding the access, this was assured by fully automating the opening/closing process with the existing extraction operating system of the FEL.
The result of this report is a concept solution which meets the company’s demands, obtained by creative detailing, together with an analysis regarding possible considerations that could improve the creative detailing result in this report in the form of future work.
The report documents the process that has taken place in exploration, concept generation, concept evaluation, concept selection, and detailed CAD development. Each section shows the requirements and adjustments taken to fulfil the company’s needs.