A pretty amazing thing showed up on Bring a Trailer yesterday: a Dutch company that sells vintage G-Wagens from German fire departments. They’re all incredibly low mileage, reasonably priced, and — if I know anything about Germans — extraordinarily well maintained.
Take the 280 GE above example. It’s covered only 21,000 kms since 1983. That’s only a hair over 13,000 miles! The price? 19,900 Euros. You’d pay a mere $26,259 at today’s rates.
This one is equipped with a gasoline-powered, 6-cylinder, fuel-injected, M110 engine, mated to a manual transmission, of course. The ad doesn’t state whether the emergency lights and siren are functional but that awesome fluorescent red paint seems to be working just fine.
It’s over 25 years old, so importing it to the U.S. should be hassle free. And this isn’t the only one on the site.
Link trail: Bring a Trailer post > Original ad
Update: Here’s a video of a similar one in action.
One thing to remember about “low-mileage” fire trucks, is that the mileage can be deceiving.
Here in the US it’s a common practice to leave the engine of an emergency vehicle running after arrival at an incident. In fact, it wouldn’t be uncommon for a vehicle to travel only 5-6 miles to get to a location, and wind up staying there for hours, all with the engine running.
something to consider, and something that may be reflected in the price.
Ah, I hadn’t thought of that. I wonder if they keep the trucks running I like that in Germany as well, and if so, if it has an hour meter on the engine.