ltjay157

my dept got morning pride gear about 4 months ago and we had an easy solution to the name on the butt flap. we had them put velcro on the flap and had a a tag made with velro on one side and our name on the other. this way if we needed to change coats due to damage or if there was a sensitive incident going on, we could remove our names.

my dept had our patch put on our new morning pride gear by the dealer. they used regular thread and our patches have stood up well even in flashover simulators. mornig pride told us the patches would not affect our gear in any negative ways.

to be NFPA compliant, the helmet will need to also have googles. you can still have bourkes or a faceshield but will need to add goggles to be compliant. i have a leather with bourkes & i keep a pair of goggles in my pocket for when i need them ie extrications. so enjoy your helmet the way it is & keep goggles in your pocket for when you need them.

i used to have a 660 metro when i first joined my dept. it was a POS. faceshield kept breaking and it was a pain to get it to fit just right. when i became a lieutenant, i bought a 1010. it fit ok but the plastic from the ratchet would dig into my head. i bought my current leather about 5 1/2 yrs ago and i love it. it's like you're wearing a fitted baseball hat. the capt used to give me crap about wearing it bc it was heavy blah blah blah. i told him one day to wear it and he realized it wasn't that much heavier then a 1010. he's been hooked ever since. the weight is not much more than a 1010. look inside a 1010 on the label and it says it weighs 56 oz. now look in a N5A and it says it weighs 60 oz. plus a leather helmet is tradition. long live the leathers!!!!!

In my dept in Connecticut, we tried doing the color coded helmets and it just became too much of a pain because a junior member recieved a yellow helmet, then a blue one once they turned 18 (blue indicates your an exterior ff) then when you passed firefighter 1 you recieved a black helmet and chiefs have white. we found it cost too much money to keep buying different helmets so now every member recieves a black helmet and we color coded the helmet shields instead. a junior firefighter has a yellow shield, non-interior/probationary firefighters have orange, interior firefighters have black shields, and officers have white shields. we found this to be more cost effective by spending $30 on a shield instead of $200 on new helmets. we also have a rule that junior and non-interior firefighters do not respond to any mutual aid call. our feeling on this is that if someone is requesting our help, they need interior firefighters and the dept recieving our aid knows how many firefighters they have coming.