Ever wonder why fire trucks and EMS vehicles have chains that drop off the rear axle?  Probably not but it’s been bugging me for a couple of years now and I finally had a chance to ask a firefighter why during lunch today.

Apparently in 1915 an inventor in New York came up with a novel way to automate the whole “putting-on-and-taking-off-tire-chains” process with a simple mechanical invention that used a small wheel rubbing up against the inside tire-wall to spin a disk with chain strands attached to it. The inventor never got around to producing any but in 1978 a Swedish inventor takes a similar idea and turns it into: [Onspot: Automatic Tire Chains]. Go figure.

I suppose a 10 second Google query would’ve answered my question 2 or 3 years ago but then if I had done that, I might not have been inclined to donate my spare change towards the [Georgia FireFighters Burn Foundation] this afternoon.