FLU419 SEE HMMH HME Owners group

[General Hood]

The more I think about it, the more likely it seems that "General Hood" really should be "General Foods". And he now needs a parts SEE to provide enough food.

Actually, I was thinking of a different plan of action

 

[The FLU farm]

Actually, I was thinking of a different plan of action
View attachment 651622

Hey, good plan. I have a couple of flatfender Jeeps we could use.

 

[911joeblow]

Pics of the new LED lights. These are H4 housings with hi/low LED bulbs. Half the power and twice the light!

 

[BigBison]

Thought more about how to use a regular winch with the HMMH last night (that's how I stay sleep deprived) and came to the conclusion that a second snatch block, tied to the pintle hook with a short chain, should do the trick. That way the forces on the crane stay in line with it, and any lateral force will be applied to the pintle hook where it doesn't matter nearly as much.

Interesting. But there's still quite a difference in line speed, i.e. the traveling block on my AutoCrane's hoist cuts its lift speed in half, but it's still faster than a truck winch (when it intermittently works). Pulling up a few dozen arches in a minute each, vs. several minutes each, adds up! With my back, I'm not the guy standing 12' up on a scissor lift pulling on a rope hand-over-hand, but as the property owner in this day and age, I don't want to see anyone else doing that, pulled over the edge by a sudden gust of wind pulling back at the wrong second! Which is also a good reason for not dallying when raising a Quonset arch.

None of which matters twice a year on the windmill tower, but I do have a good property for having a windmill. Swinging an arch up with the HMMH knuckle-boom crane, even without wind, would be tricky enough without folding the arch by inadvertently lifting/dragging it. Applying KISS, yeah someone needs to get up on that scissor lift and haul up those arches with a rope, but I'm trying for beer pay, not hazard pay, by utilizing like, machinery and such instead of having an old-fashioned barn raising. Although if anyone has a hay trailer with a pintle hitch I can pull behind a FLU it could be a real hootenanny...

All these nice, warm, wind-free days are making for a disappointing hunting season around here, but it's killing me I didn't execute a little sooner on the Quonset, couldn't ask for better building weather for this project... foundation's curing, driveway's just in, well's coming next week as I finally got my permit yesterday morning...

Every time we take a break from working up at my place, we look across the small box canyon (and county road) from my homesite, to the aspen grove (with the binoculars, my malamute doesn't need 'em, just a calming "stay with me" now and then 'cuz she really, really wants to go hunting) on the neighboring 7,000 acre ranch on the other side, and see/hear a big, beautiful bull elk with a harem of at least 20 cows moving through the now-leafless trees. All day to set up a 1/4-mile, cold-bore shot, eh? Most every day. At anyone don't belong up here lookin' to poach that fella! Harvest a cow, not a trophy! I've had my property for a year now, the handful of others who belong up here go further away to hunt, and leave this little herd alone. Nice!

Champion motor grader, dump trucks, Cat D6, HMMH running around, with this serenely calm elk heard just *oh* so close! They see us working up here, "duly noted" and such. Nope, I wouldn't take a shot from my back-deck-to-be. I'd rather have a most-daily elk herd. Hope I don't drive 'em off building in the middle of nowhere. Look at what's become of Copper Ridge in Steamboat -- once upon a time, there was an elk herd there, that I drove by every day between work & home NW of town. Now, 100+ businesses in a big industrial park, there (basically where one goes to buy pot nowadays).

I don't live on my spread yet, I'm about five miles away in the valley bottom. Cacaphony on a warm night like tonight! The highway's mostly silent, I really do need to go out and record the elk bugling, and the coyotes singing, and the owls hooting, and such. I'm going to sleep out in the GMC tonight, all windows open, all systems shut down, look at the stars, and listen to a symphony that only plays once a year. There's just no snow, so the elk have the upper hand this year, so much harder to track!

 

[BigBison]

That Pierce winch is interesting, as in "Wow, they still make those?!?"

PTO shaft-drive winches aren't uncommon around here. May I edit your comment? "Wow, they still make those in America?!?" I'll get a PTO after I've completed my Fuller 6-sp tranny conversion (synch, but no OD) w/ Gear Vendors over/under (stock tranny's failing, and increasingly expensive to rebuild/replace). Yeah, the PTO cutouts are the same across trannys, but the fitment's the problem. Meanwhile, I'll happily underpower a winch from my PS. Besides, I hate my E/H crane and want full H from LiftMoore (also in TX, fwiw). A diverter valve can handle running either the crane or the winch, at their full power ratings, top it off with a hydraulic screw-drive air compressor or welder/charger/starter, for a badass little farm truck.

I've got everything but the crane hoist (dead motor after one job, maybe?), LED work lights at each corner of the service body, and the six off-road lights on the worry bar, working. The air compressor works, but only when hot-wired, kaput switch I think. Knapheide's wiring and LED taillights required *either* an analog replacement blinker relay with ground wire (Dodge grounds back to the relay, Knapheide grounds to the truck frame), or a digital relay, both of which are cheap from NAPA but neither of which allow re-installation of the fusebox cover.

...but for efficiency I think the MileMarker would be better. That one is apparently perfected for running off a measly P/S pump.

The reason other brands look suspiciously quite similar, is they're Chinese. No thank you! So many identical winches out there, when you get down past all the accoutrements they're supplied with, and the differences in motors, etc. One thing they all brag about, is how well they check their suppliers' products for defects. Well, silly old-fashioned me whose first job was pre-CNC lathe/Bridgeport operator capable of doing his own (simple) setups not just sharpening tools, is sometimes "get 'er right" is more important than "get 'er done." Like for instance, when manufacturing a winch.

And it's hard to go wrong with a Warn.

Almost! The Pierce is actually "Plan B" because Warn's PS-hydraulic winch (like everyone else's) has a planetary gear. Meaning there's a brake in the middle of the drum. So lowering my windmill, would inherently generate heat, unlike a worm gear. On a practical note, it's the difference between running wire rope vs. synthetic -- synthetic can't stand the heat on those inner wraps, and there are various strategies (splicing thicker/thinner rope, sheathing the first wrap layer) to combat this.

I'm thinking I shoulda specc'd an Aluminum bumper from Jack's, then again that service body / crane has the dually it's on raked the wrong way, so I want some weight up front just not too much. Anyway, a hydraulic winch weighs significantly less than an electric, same goes for synthetic vs. wire rope, so worm gear's a win/win vs. Warn's hydraulic offering. Easy enough to level a truck with airbags or whatevs, but balanced handling on the highway would be nice.

Still, I understand your concern about relying on a brake, but for repeatedly moving something 80-plus feet, I'd look into a capstan winch.
If you do end up with the Pierce, it should be fairly simple to modify a standard winch mount for the Dodge.

Crane hoists are worm-gear, so maybe that Pierce can go "vertical" because the admonishment against that, has everything to do with too tight a bend running a wire rope over a roller.Idon'tthinkthatappliestosynthetic,andtheregoesthespacebaragain!Sigh.

 

[BigBison]

View attachment 651779

View attachment 651778

Pics of the new LED lights. These are H4 housings with hi/low LED bulbs. Half the power and twice the light!

Definitely bugging me yesterday, following a dumptruck from my place with one filament & one LED taillight, why am I having problems? OK, they're solved, so I'll tell ya! Knapheide grounds taillights to chassis, and doesn't offer a harness to plug their service body into either of my Dodge CTDs. I got 'er done anyway, but I had to do two things to the '95 4x4 dually. One -- only one cabover light had a good/existing bulb. My '02 doesn't have cabover lights, so it gets a 10A fuse, the '95 has a 15A. Four bulbs from NAPA gave enough amperage through the circuits in question to make the blinkers work with the parking lights on.

Still no blinkers w/o parking lights. Flashers, yeah, that's a different relay -- in the '95! The '02 uses one relay for blinkers *and* flashers, totally different fusebox, but I did find a spare fuse in the removable panel on the '02 that I needed for the '95, which was strange because that particular fuse isn't used in the '02 (mini 15A fuses all over the place in a '95, not a one in an '02, 15A are regular size). So at least I know where to start when the Knapheide/AutoCrane goes on the '02, but the details are not the same.

Anyway, Knapheide's chassis-grounded LED taillights don't have enough current drop (rather, it doesn't happen fast enough, picture sine wave vs. square wave) for the stock relay in the '95. There are two solutions I tested, both work. Neither allows re-installation of the stock fusebox cover. One is basically the same as OEM except for a ground wire. Hook that up, enough current comes back to the relay from the LED taillights (instead of following the path of greater resistance through the chassis to the batteries), the relay functions. The other option (total cost between the two, under $15, so less than replacing the LED taillights with filament taillights) is a digital relay, plug & play solution without having to ground a wire, same result. Nothing wrong with the stock relay, other than being an outdated analog device in a modern, digital world.

WhyI'mrippingoutthewiringintheGMCmotorhomeandstartingoverforLEDsandsuch.

 

[BigBison]

If I'd gone out and bought LED replacement taillights for my Dodge, they woulda been plug & play, no new relay required. Because harness vs. chassis grounding. Ford & Chevy have a different wiring philosophy, so no shame on Knapheide for catering to them and not wanting to support Dodge. I didn't ask them about anything but my 2nd-gen CTD Rams, maybe you can get a dongle for a later Ram, I don't know? Older trucks, Knapheide dealers will only have dongles for GM & Ford. I'm out of practice, but it's never taken me two full days to get park/brake/turn/hazard/backup lights working on anything, before, in my life. Having things blink when plugging back in the stock taillights, then not blink when wired "the same way" to the Knapheide, required sleeping off a drunken stupor to realize I was trying to graft an apple tree to an orange tree. Kudos to the guy at NAPA who knew two solutions to this, I'm hardly the first guy, but I did go in and specifically ask the gal about it who went and got the guy, and learned a third solution from it.

I coulda taken my "bad" relay in and bought a replacement, then driven 45 minutes back home and been really confused about wiring. All rodents aside!

On a happy note, trying to decipher the SoCal wiring on this rig led me to discover the tucked-away white-LED strip lighting snaking through all the shelf levels in all the compartments on the service body. Crazy! Nice 3KW sine-wave inverter, too. Dead Optima Blue Top. Would prefer working hoist winch, to R&R the leaky ram on my HMMH using my "other crane" that's such a worthless POS at this point. Also to R&R the air compressor mounted on the Knapheide, although when the hoist-winch did work, I used it to unload & install the biggest-of-big Wilton Bullet vise onto its custom rear-bumper mount. It's bullet nose has a gash from some dumbass slamming the (undented) tailgate on it, but I'm in for $2,600 on the AutoCrane since then and that's still the only job it's done, mounting the Wilton vise.

Just sayin' Knapheide = way nice, but new service body on older truck (regardless of crane) reveals the deviating-from-OEM-spec problems becoming increasingly common in simple aftermarket upgrades these days, like LED/projector lighting which requires ballasts, etc. older vehicles aren't wired for (good argument for PTO-hydraulic winch/crane, for anyone who thinks hoses are easier to deal with than circuits). Let me know when your spiffy FLU LED work lights, by virtue of not blowing the fuse they're drawing less amps from, cause wider, rat-like problems of some kind? I.E. replacing filaments w/ LEDs in older vehicles should also involve less fusing on those circuits, which leads to needing new relays if you go whole-hog.

I got 'er done today on the '95 CTD, but the cons outweigh the pros of just putting in a new relay. By the time the Knapheide goes on the '02, those taillights will be filament, not LED. "Just sayin'." OTOH, visit here and you'll see the dashboard of the '77 GMC holds all the old filament/fluorescent light fixtures I've removed. Going LED on that rig without setting it on fire despite the lower current requirements, is a little less straight-forward than you'd think. I'm just glad my FLU problems are 95% mechanical, 5% electrical, because some days catching up on this thread is just horrifying!!!

If I may rant a bit before signing off for the night... who the **** at Knapheide thought it would be a good idea to make BLACK positive and WHITE negative? Maybe the New Zealand ("All Black" heheh) approach on the FLUs is the right one, rat damage aside? Diodes, as in LEDs, only work one way. My customized Knapheide "bargain" is about 60/40 white = ground, black = the new red. Filament = who cares, LED = wtf is going on here for gosh sakes? I'm going to bed now, but I'm worried I may have nightmares. Maybe the coyotes will move on and I'll only hear the elk!

 

[Mark1954]

View attachment 651779

View attachment 651778

Pics of the new LED lights. These are H4 housings with hi/low LED bulbs. Half the power and twice the light!

Pardon my ignorance, H4 housings?

 

[Another Ahab]

Every time we take a break from working up at my place, we look across the small box canyon (and county road) from my homesite, to the aspen grove (with the binoculars, my malamute doesn't need 'em, just a calming "stay with me" now and then 'cuz she really, really wants to go hunting) on the neighboring 7,000 acre ranch on the other side, and see/hear a big, beautiful bull elk with a harem of at least 20 cows moving through the now-leafless trees. All day to set up a 1/4-mile, cold-bore shot, eh? Most every day. At anyone don't belong up here lookin' to poach that fella! Harvest a cow, not a trophy! I've had my property for a year now, the handful of others who belong up here go further away to hunt, and leave this little herd alone. Nice!

That's special, living in that kind if country with that kind of wildlife around you.

The way I see it, what you got won't be lasting long. I give it a 100 years, but that's just a guess.

What I mean is, you see roads going in new places all the time, and the roads that exist getting widened all the time (of course, maybe that's just D.C.).

You never see anybody "undoing" roads anywhere.

There are just too many of us.

And more coming. Enjoy it while you got it, Brother!

https://www.census.gov/popclock/world​

 

[911joeblow]

H4 housings are the Euro version of the headlight housings. USA spec are sealed bulb/housing where H4s are replaceable bulb versions. So with the H4 housings and the LED H4 format bulbs I have what you see.

 

[BigBison]

Oh, I definitely hear ya, on here come all the people to Colorado -- that's been happening since before legal MJ. To the north of my spread is a 3,000 acre ranch, all but 40 acres of which is being donated to the National Forest surrounding it. To my south, is a 7,000 acre ranch; to the west, a 2,000 acre spread the county road crosses. Both of those are in conservation easements. The upper Yampa Valley is now some of the most-protected ag lands in the country. Buying property here is easy, so long as you want to ranch. Buying land you can build a home on, now that's the trick! Up my road, the # of neighbors could go from 3 to 5, but only 3 of us would be on the plowed section of road. So my seclusion, sweeping unobstructed views, and elk herd, should last!

 

[Migginsbros]

Due to the helpfull link from peakbagger to the Extract from the Army PN´s we do execise to the Hydraulic cylinders this evening.
Our Hyraulic hoses behind the pintle hook does not have the recommended sleeves??? We taped the rear of the pintle hook mounting nut and pin with tape, this time, to pevent scrapping to the hoses.

 

[MSMOG]

How do I confirm whether or not I have 10 weight or hydraulic oil in the hydraulic tanks?

 

[911joeblow]

How do I confirm whether or not I have 10 weight or hydraulic oil in the hydraulic tanks?

Taste test, 10 weight is a bit nutty, HYD is a little sweet.

Wish I knew!

 

[The FLU farm]

How do I confirm whether or not I have 10 weight or hydraulic oil in the hydraulic tanks?

If you bought it directly, it's a safe bet that it's 10W. If you got it from somewhere else, it's anybody's guess what's in there - well, my guess is that it's 10W which may or may not have had THF added to it, since few of us have 10W laying around.
Oil analysis would provide the best answer, but why? If you have any doubts about the quality or age of what's there, change it.

 

[The FLU farm]

PCrane hoists are worm-gear, so maybe that Pierce can go "vertical" because the admonishment against that, has everything to do with too tight a bend running a wire rope over a roller.

I think that whether a winch can be used for "vertical" pulls or not depends on how it's mounted. and which kind it is. A Warn 8274, for example, doesn't have anything preventing a vertical pull. Especially if the solenoid box is moved (since there's no law against not using a fairlead, yet anyway). Yes, the mounting wouldn't be as strong as when pulling horizontally as intended, but that would hold true for a Pierce, too.
I'd think that the easy way to make any winch capable of vertical use would be to have a hinged mount.

 

[The FLU farm]

That's special, living in that kind if country with that kind of wildlife around you.

Yeah, it could come in handy some day to be able to club a deer with a 2-foot pipe, or open the sliding door and shoot an elk at 30 yards while laying in bed. Oh, and by the way (so to speak) long sections of Route 66 are undoing themselves.

 

[911joeblow]

Yeah, it could come in handy some day to be able to club a deer with a 2-foot pipe, or open the sliding door and shoot an elk at 30 yards while laying in bed. Oh, and by the way (so to speak) long sections of Route 66 are undoing themselves.View attachment 651902View attachment 651903View attachment 651904View attachment 651905

I had a 6 point knocking on my door the other day. Also had a moose drinking from my dogs outdoor water bowl a few days ago. I live at the base of the Uintas at 7500ft in North Eastern Utah.

 

[The FLU farm]

I live at the base of the Uintas at 7500ft in North Eastern Utah.

Maybe wildlife likes 7,500 feet? That happens to be the elevation where I live, too. And I like it.

One thing I learned to dislike today is trying to run 3/4-inch hydraulic hose under a SEE, the length of it, rear to front. Every time I thought I had a decent routing through all the stuff already there, something prevented completing it.
In retrospect, it'd been a lot easier to run 10 (or whatever the equivalent would be) 3/8-inch hoses than one 3/4-inch.
Not finished with the first one yet, and sneaking a second one in next to it won't be any easier. Whose dumb idea was it to try running a hydraulic snowblower on a SEE, anyway?

 

[The FLU farm]

I didn't ask them about anything but my 2nd-gen CTD Rams, maybe you can get a dongle for a later Ram, I don't know?

The easy way to make LED lighting work on a Ram is to order the VSIM. Aside from allowing LED use, there's wig-wag functions for head and taillights and a whole lot (well over 100) other useful, somewhat useful, and useless (to me) functions available.
A bit late for you, but the last three I ordered had the VSIM option ticked. Better to have it and not need it, I thought.