Steelonsteel, my 52 is owned by me personally due to some family history of a similar truck, and due to the craziness of liabilities it gets more use than any parade truck in mine and neighboring fire departments trucks.
Don't fret about changing its use, but before you do make some pictorial and written documentation of what you've got, just in case someone does come a looking later, not to mention for your own posterity. Document casting numbers etc. You could even try to track down the Howe records so you could find original owners and maybe even pictures.
I'd love to have shop big enough to hoist off the fire body to make it a fifth wheel sometimes, but then I remember it's a pig on gas and slow so I wouldn't go too far anyway....
