Cover Story

By Staff
Published on February 1, 1997
article image

Robert W. Buntin, Jr., 91 South Main Street, Sherborn,
Massachusetts 01770, spent three hundred hours restoring the
Fitzhenry Guptill portable fire fighting pump on this month’s
cover. Originally purchased by the Sherborn Fire Department, the
pump dates to about the late 1920s. It was made at 135 First
Street, East Cambridge, Massachusetts.

The single cylinder gas engine is water cooled, about 10 HP,
driving a 3 cylinder triplex pump, pumping 25 g.p.m.@250p.s.i. The
pump weighs 310 pounds.

‘A common problem with this pump was water seeping inside
the pump pistons and freezing, thus ballooning the piston causing
the pump to seize,’ writes Robert. ‘To make new pump
pistons a pattern and core box had to be made, then new pistons
cast and machined.’

Robert W. Buntin, jr., of 91 South Main Street, Sherborn,
Massachusetts 01770 restored this Fitzhenry Guptill portable
firefighting pump. Additional details inside.

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