Why your next engine takes three years, and what departments are doing about it

In November 2024, Cheyenne Fire Rescue ordered three engines. The delivery date was January 2029. This spring, a dealer offered the city a stock unit already on the line, and the city council approved buying it out of reserves for $1,428,842, about $44,000 less than the custom engine it replaced. The truck was due at Station 5 in October.

"By pivoting our current plan, canceling one of our 2029 engine slots and securing this unit in October, we can put a new frontline engine in service 28 months ahead of schedule," Fire Chief Andrew Dykshorn told the council's finance committee. The city had to accept that the unit "does not fully conform to the specifications" it had written. Staff called it "operationally equivalent."

Many departments are weighing the same trade: a slightly different truck in exchange for a much earlier one.

How long the wait is

Published contracts show the spread. The Pierce agreement in the December 2025 council packet in Delano, Minnesota, put delivery at "approximately 47-50 months" from signing, which is why its fire chief asked the council to act on an engine budgeted for 2028. In July 2026, staff in Victoria, Texas, asked the council to approve a Pierce Saber pumper quoted for delivery "within 19-21 months." According to the City of Fullerton, California, Pierce's delivery time for identical engines went from two years in 2019 to four years for trucks ordered in 2023. That figure appears in a letter Rep. Derek Tran sent the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in April 2026, which also cites a survey of 70 California chiefs who said delivery went from under a year before the pandemic to more than four years in 2025.

Three years is a fair middle estimate for a custom pumper ordered today. The range runs from under two years to more than four, depending on manufacturer, dealer, chassis and how much of the spec is custom.

Prices moved with the waits. In Providence, Rhode Island, Pierce pumpers cost $449,159 each in 2021. When the city bought five more in 2024, the price was $734,320, according to city court filings reported by Stateline. Victoria's 2026 Saber listed at $1,180,760 before discounts. Delano's pumper came to $1,328,750.

Who builds the trucks now

Most custom apparatus in the United States now comes from three companies. Starting in 2006, the private equity firm American Industrial Partners bought what had been 12 separate companies and built them into REV Group, according to the Tran letter. In 2020 REV added Spartan Emergency Response, the group that included Spartan, Smeal, Ladder Tower and UST. REV holds about a third of the market, Oshkosh's Pierce about 25 percent and Rosenbauer about 8 percent, according to the letter's figures. In February 2026, Terex completed its merger with REV Group, and REV stopped trading as a separate company.

Two-thirds of a market in three companies' hands doesn't prove anyone broke the law, and the manufacturers say they didn't. When they moved to dismiss two of the antitrust suits in August, the defendants said in a joint filing that "the pandemic prompted skyrocketing demand and disrupted supply chains causing price increases and longer wait times." They added: "None of that has anything to do with an antitrust violation."

The case against them is now in several venues:

• In May 2025, the International Association of Fire Fighters (IAFF) and the American Economic Liberties Project asked the Department of Justice and the FTC to investigate. "Consolidation among fire apparatus manufacturers, largely controlled by private equity profiteers, is driving up costs and delays of critical vehicles," IAFF General President Edward Kelly said.
• Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Jim Banks opened a Senate investigation in April 2025. A Senate subcommittee held a hearing on what it called America's fire apparatus crisis that September.
• More than 60 cities, counties and departments have sued REV, Oshkosh, Rosenbauer and their trade group. In April 2026, the claims were rolled into three antitrust class actions in federal court in Wisconsin.
• Los Angeles County filed its own federal suit in February 2026 against American Industrial Partners, REV, Oshkosh and others, asking the court to unwind past mergers and challenging rules that tie Pierce owners to Pierce parts.
• Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton opened an investigation the same month and sent civil investigative demands to all three manufacturers.
• In July 2026, Rep. Becca Balint, Rep. Ben Cline, Warren and Banks introduced a joint resolution directing the FTC to study the industry and report within a year. It hasn't passed.

The manufacturers say they're adding capacity. REV broke ground in August 2025 on a $20 million expansion at Spartan's plant in Brandon, South Dakota, meant to raise production by 40 percent. "This investment will double our manufacturing footprint and help us meet the rising demand from fire departments across the nation by allowing us to build more fire apparatus and deliver it faster," said Mike Virnig, president of Spartan Emergency Response.

Pierce's vice president of sales, Dan Meyer, has said the company expanded its manufacturing and hired more workers. We covered part of that work in our look at Pierce's frame-up chassis assembly.

The clause to read first

The contracts behind these prices have something in common. Tampa's 2026 Pierce agreements and Delano's both include a "Persistent Inflationary Environment" clause. If a federal producer price index for manufacturing components rises at a compounded rate of 5 percent a year or more between the order month and a point 14 months before the truck is ready, the dealer can raise the price. The customer then has 45 days to cancel. "If Customer accepts or fails to respond within such 45 day period, Customer will be obligated to complete the Product purchase at the updated Total price."

Departments have been hit this way. According to the Tran letter, one Indiana department was told after a three-year wait that its two engines would cost $209,950 more. Get the escalation clause in front of your purchasing office and city attorney before the council vote, and set a calendar reminder for the 45-day window so nobody misses it.

Four ways around the wait

Stock trucks are units a manufacturer starts building before it has a buyer. Pierce says its stock units deliver in "six (6) months or less because the units are already in process or complete when sold," and it publishes the list every month. Tampa Fire Rescue bought one in June 2026, a stock Enforcer pumper for $1,039,876.55 through the Florida Sheriffs Association cooperative contract. Pierce lists it as delivered Sept. 11. You get the spec someone else chose, so decide ahead of time which features matter to you (pump size, tank, cab seating, compartment layout) and which ones you'll give up.

Demos come with the same give-and-take. The Village of Orwell bought a demonstrator ladder truck for about $1.5 million, roughly $500,000 under the new price, and skipped what News 5 Cleveland called "what's become a three year wait." "Currently if you were to buy this truck, it's $2 million dollars. It's already gone up," Fire Chief Shane Gregory said. In nearby Geneva, Chief Dale Arkenburg, who went the same way, gave the other side: "There are some things we would do differently on both of these trucks if we would have made them from the ground up instead of taking a demo."

Prepayment discounts can be large. The Saber bid in Victoria's staff memo listed a $61,884 full-prepay discount and a $6,610 pricing-level discount, and staff wrote that ordering before Aug. 1, 2026, would avoid a $15,290 price increase. Delano's proposed contract offered to deduct $166,032 if the city paid 100 percent by Dec. 29, 2025. A city that takes that kind of offer leaves the money with the builder and dealer for as long as four years.

Refurbishing buys time. In April 2025, the Charles City, Iowa, fire department proposed to its council a refurbishment of a 1998 Pierce Dash for $298,556 and a 2003 Pierce Saber for $224,043. St. Charles Township had already approved its 30 percent share. The department expected 10 to 15 more years from the older engine and estimated each truck would be out of service for seven to 10 months. About $95,000 of the money would come from savings for the station roof, which would have to wait. Delano's staff compared the options over 25 years. Refurbishing for about $400,000 and buying a new engine in 2036 at an estimated $1.8 million came to a net $1.4 million. Ordering new now, at an estimated $1.325 million, came to a net $865,000.

What to change in the plan

Start the replacement clock earlier. If a custom engine takes three or four years to arrive, ordering in the year it's due puts a 20-year truck on the road until it's 24. Delano's chief made that argument for an engine budgeted for 2028.

Make the spec as standard as your operations allow. Every custom item cuts down how many stock and demo units you could take. Use a cooperative contract if your state allows it. Tampa bought through the Florida Sheriffs Association contract, Victoria through BuyBoard.

Then keep a standing list, approved ahead of time by the chief and finance, of what a stock or demo truck has to have, so the city can say yes quickly when a dealer calls with one.