This is former Truck 12 (32) that the article was written about.
Mount Penn Fire Company buys truck on Internet auction siteBy David Mekeel - Reading EagleTimothy F. Waldman is no stranger to the pressures of eBay.
But sitting in front of a computer screen in June, he had an experience unlike any he had before - watching helplessly hour after hour as unseen foes made bids on the object of his desire.
He had bought and sold cars and trucks using the Web auction site many times, but this was different. This was a fire truck.
"I was watching it the whole time, clicking refresh, refresh, refresh," said Waldman, chief of the Mount Penn Fire Company.
A few days earlier he had contacted the man selling the truck and struck a deal to buy it without using eBay.
Waldman even mailed the Kentucky resident a $2,000 check as a down payment to ensure he would cancel the auction on eBay.
"This thing (the auction) had three days to go," Waldman explained. "We didn't want to play around with eBay."
But the seller didn't know how to take the auction off the Internet. So Waldman was forced to sit and wait and hope that no one made a serious bid.
"That could have been a mess," he said. "Then we would have had to deal with the eBay people, and we didn't want to do that."
To Waldman's relief, the online shoppers didn't get close to the $12,000 minimum needed to buy the truck.
If you're wondering why the Mount Penn Fire Company would turn to the Internet to buy a fire truck, the answer is actually quite simple: Money.
At the beginning of the year, the company solicited bids for a new ladder truck. Based on the specifications, company officials got a bid of $808,000.
"That kind of made us sit back and say 'Whoa,' " firefighter and Mount Penn Borough Council President Thomas Staron said.
They had the fire company's accountant run the numbers and the news wasn't good: The company would have to take out a loan that would have it paying back about $45,000 a year for the next two decades.
"We couldn't put that burden on two groups," Staron said. "First, we couldn't put it on the borough, who just gave us a 1 mill fire tax. Second, we couldn't justify putting that burden on the future firemen of the department."
So if they wanted to replace the old ladder truck - which has an out-of-date ladder and open cab - the fire company needed to look elsewhere.
"I said: 'Hey guys, this isn't going to work. We need to come up with a new idea,' " Waldman said.
The company began scouring the country, searching high and low for a used truck that would meet their needs. That's when David L. Schwoyer struck gold as he was browsing his favorite Web site.
"Dave is known as Mr. eBay around the station," Staron said. "He buys everything on there."
Sure enough, Mr. eBay had found a 1992 Seagrave ladder truck that seemed to meet the company's needs. A few phone calls to the truck's manufacturer and the Cincinnati Fire Department, where it had previously served, confirmed that it was the right choice.
Waldman called the owner and agreed to pay $12,000, sweated out the auction and then headed to Kentucky with a group of his fellow firefighters.
The 5612-foot truck wasn't exactly in pristine condition; it had to be taken to Ohio for a new motor before being driven to the Seagrave factory in Wisconsin for a full renovation. But, in the end, the purchase was quite a deal.
When the truck is delivered in January, the company will be getting a like-new machine for the low price of less than $250,000.
As for the strange circumstances under which the company found the truck, Waldman said they aren't really that strange.
"You could search for fire trucks on eBay right now and probably get 20 hits," he said. "At $800,000 for a new truck, a lot of companies are starting to look."
•Contact reporter David Mekeel at 610-371-5014 or dmekeel@readingeagle.com.
www.readingeagle.com/article.aspx?id=103502