On another thread I just saw a picture of a neat old '56 Ford station wagon ambulance that had twin RotoRays fender mounted along with tunnel lights, twin 17s and a roof-mounted Q. While that made for spectacular lighting, I wonder how they powered that thing.
I used to see an occasional station wagon ambulance here and there with twin Mars FL8s fender mounted. PCS member Tim Fantin in Indiana recently sold a nice old '65 Cadillac ambulance that came from near Chicago that had twin 888s with clear lenses and colored bulbs fender mounted. The car had the traditional Superior bullet lights on top with, if I remember correctly, a 175 right behind the front set of bullets.
I've also seen pictures of a '48-ish Buick ambulance that had big red tunnel lights with a C6B siren mounted on the front center of the roof and a pair of red PropelloRays fender mounted.
One vehicle that I mentioned on another thread that I was particularly fond of because I helped "design" the warning package was a 1960 Ford sedan-delivery that belonged to Thomas Funeral Home here in Midland. This Ford replaced their '56 Ford sedan-deliver that had been equipped with a lighted (the "F" part of the grille was removed and a truck stop light inserted) Q mounted front center. It was flanked by four red Unity sealed-beam lights and had a 17 behind the Q. They had planned on using the same setup on the new Ford but that didn't happen. One day I just happened up on the place when we were out of school. There set the new Ford, and the oldest Thomas son, Billy, was outside working on the new wagon. He had just gotten the Q mounted and wired. So I asked him how he was going to set up the new rig and he said that they were going to go back the same way the old truck had been, but someone had stolen two of the Unity lights when he had gone inside for a few minutes. So I surveyed the new truck and said to Billy, "Too bad you dont' have a second beacon available" He asked me why so I told him that it would look nice with twin 17s on the front corners of the roof and they could mount the two remaining Unity lights on the front cowl. He got a big grin on his face, ran insie for a minute and came back out toting another red 17. We set both beacons as I had suggested, and that's the way it was equipped. For a short time from 1959 until Fall of 1962 they had gone out of business. When they reopened their first ambulance was a '63 Ford wagon with the twin red 17s on top; but this time the siren was a Federal 78 with the SolaRay light that had replaced the PropelloRays. They eventually added twin red sealed beams in place of the high beams. That car was replaced with a '66 Pontiac wagon. The twin beacons and 78 siren were retained, but the Pontiac was equipped with red Unity lights cowl-mounted. This would be their last station wagon ambulance. From 1967 to 1972 they ran Superior Pontiac Consort ambulances with various light configurations and Federal Interceptors; and except for their '70 Consort that had twin red double-faced spotlights, none of their remaining ambulances would have anything cowl or fender-mounted. But by far their most spectacularly-lit ambulance was a 1970 Pontiac Consort that came with red Superior bullets on the front corners of the roof and a CJ84 beacon/speaker combo just to the rear of front center, powered by an Interceptor. Just after they got this car they added a pair of Sireno GyroRay lights to the roof, just to the inside of the bullet lights, and this car had the twin double-faced spots. Some very neat old ambulances!
