Specifically designed for heavy-duty contract use, GP Contracts' Fire Station (FS) range of all-steel, 'Horizontal' and 'Vertical' 'Wiskaway' Wallbeds, are fully counterbalanced and fitted with automatically opening and retracting legs, for safe, smooth and easy operation.

They can be supplied with or without tough housings, in a range of attractive, durable finishes, including MFC, veneers and plastic laminates.

Illustrated here are some of the 'Horizontal' 'Wiskaway' 6000 Wallbeds and matching 6600 lockers installed at the Cambridgeshire Fire and Rescue Service's Residential Training Centre at St Ives, in 1994.

This project was unusual, in that being a retained fire station, there are no sleeping/rest facilities provided for the fire fighters at St Ives, who all live close to the fire station. In this case however, the Cambridgeshire Fire and Rescue Service wanted to provide a residential training facility, in the roof space, on the upper floor of the fire station.

This was achieved, by arranging the 'Horizontal' 'Wiskaway' 6000 Wallbeds, with housings in a wipe-clean, 'Light Oak' MFC finish, complete with matching ventilated, 2-compartment 6600, bedding lockers, around the outsides of the main teaching room.

With space becoming an increasingly precious commodity, more and more Fire and Rescue Authorities are turning to wallbeds to help make the most efficient use of their available facilities. This is especially the case with large city-centre fire stations.

By folding the wallbeds out of the way when they are not required, the space can be used for other activities during the day.

Typical areas where wallbeds are used include watchrooms/watch offices, where a bed would be in the way during the day, fire fighters' dormitories, which are often used to double as lecture rooms and/or recreation rooms (e.g. with a folding ping pong table, etc) during the day and officers' rooms, which frequently need to double as offices, or interview rooms during the day.

Even where space is not critical, the use of wallbeds may still be desirable on health and safety grounds. Thus, for instance, carrying folding beds into and out of watchrooms every night/morning can considerably increase the risk of accidents and a wallbed may therefore be the safest option, even where there is no space problem.

GP Contracts are the country's leading supplier of wallbeds and related furniture for fire stations.

Our 'Wiskaway'^® 6000 Wallbed, at the Cambridgeshire Fire and Rescue Service's Residential Training Centre, at St Ives