LANSING -- The old building on East Robinson Lake Road in Roscommon looks out of date, but inside are some of the latest innovations in preventing and fighting forest fires.

The Forest Fire Experiment Station (FFES) was built in 1929 as a firefighting think tank. The technology has radically changed in nearly 80 years, but the purpose remains the same, said Kirk Bradley, who leads the research team.

Inside is the Roscommon Equipment Center, which is the unit that researches and produces modified fire vehicles and equipment.

"We develop new equipment to prevent forest fires," Bradley said. "We've been doing it for quite a while."

For example, the center takes in stripped-down tractors and off-road vehicles with only a driver's seat, and then modifies them to meet firefighting needs, said Scott Heather, the state wildfire supervisor.

"They are constantly looking at how to make things better," Heather said.

One such innovation is a bulldozer with a specially designed plow on the back, he said. The bulldozer can navigate through forests and create 6-foot dirt walls, called firebreaks, to slow down or guide the blaze.

"This model is widely known," Heather said. The FFES has been providing these vehicles to other states for more than 30 years.

The equipment center also receives requests from other regions, he continued. For example, 15 years ago, loggers in Maine needed a way to quickly combat small fires. The FFES created a tank-and-pump system that could move quickly and dispense water. Many loggers still use it today.

The station's newest invention is a small, off-road vehicle that holds a water tank big enough to put out a small fire, Heather said.

The biggest challenge was having a large tank that wouldn't impede its off-road capability or block the driver's visibility, he said.

Now is the most dangerous time for forest fires, said Carol Nilsson, fire information officer at Huron-Manistee National Forest, headquartered in Cadillac. The fire season is usually April and May, she said.

"As the temperature rises, the fire danger goes up," Nilsson said.

The FFES hasn't had much chance to use its equipment yet in Michigan this season, she said. "It's been fairly quiet this year, a lot of small fires."

Heather said that doesn't mean the FFES is sitting still. It is currently working on a flamethrower that would hold 50 to 60 gallons of flammable gel.

The gel would burn longer than traditional fuel and cling to the surrounding area, he said.

A flamethrower might sound counterproductive, but it will allow firefighters to burn prescribed areas for fertilization reasons and it will also help stop fires using a burnout technique, Heather said. That way firefighters can burn the area around a fire to destroy its fuel.