FLU419 SEE HMMH HME Owners group

[BigBison]

Is the SEE's charging system ideal for the Group 31 Optimas I installed? Probably not. Does it work? Yes, so far.

Sounds like sophisticated, high-tech batteries to me. Not the sort of setup I'm voicing concerns about, because that's what I'm doing and it worries me.

Will the SEE's charging system croak due to running two smaller batteries? Maybe you're right, and it will. But many FLU owners do it and if it was detrimental I'd think we would've heard from the others by now.

Yeah, we'll have to "SEE" about that, but most owners aren't running their FLUs commercially day-in and day-out, more "weekend warrior" work. I could be completely wrong, but I think time will show that cheapo battery downgrades lead to blown alternator relays on our trucks. Not worth arguing about now, only keeping an eye on as time goes by, and even then I'll be open to other explanations, including manufacturing defects in Bosch 24V continuous-duty alternator relays... I geek out on this stuff, is all.

As a final thought, I'm now curious to find out how long a SEE will operate (once started) without any charging whatsoever. My guess is that if not using any lights, it'll run for many, many hours. Maybe days.

On a full tank, maybe two weeks. So I bought this dually 12V Cummins Dodge from a guy in Long Beach, whose stranger-neighbor sold me the crane-service body. I had a buddy in LA check it all out, he reported back the air filter needed replaced. The seller was kind enough to drive it to me here because he wanted to buy another truck nearby, with the service body on it, so great deal, right? Except to make it run better he *removed* the air filter before driving it 1,500 miles across the desert southwest in September.

Ground a perfectly-good 120K-mile Cummins down to a nub. The last time it started, with a full 30 gallons of fuel, I dumped that "Restore" goop into the crankcase. Not trusting to drive it for 500 miles to "restore compression" I decided to just run it out of fuel and see what happened... took 10 days!!! Never started again. There's just no compression.

I said I wanted Burgundy, not Maroon, on my 3/4 ton 24V (pictured). I haven't seen her in person, but the bodyshop sent me these pics this morning. I'll have my reliable truck back a week from now, boy do I need it! Because I've had such setbacks with all my other trucks. Unfortunately, it's scheduled for interior detailing / headlight-lens polishing, then a repair shop to add another leaf spring to the passenger side before I actually get it back to put the crane-service body on. Oh, and a Jack's Bumper from over in Craig...

 

[The FLU farm]

A good day was had, overall, so although off subject: Sold my M1009 for $400 over asking price. And no, there was no bidding war - the buyer came from hundreds of miles away with the intent to buy it, which he did. Not sure where this fits in with my normal "I'm much better at buying than selling", but I wasn't about to turn down the extra 10% when the buyer offered it.

Back to the world of FLUs, and specifically tire chains: Bison, are these chains good, bad, or indifferent? This is the beginning of the second season with these chains, with no signs of tire damage, so I guess they're okay. Well, they're going on the front soon, regardless.

 

[The FLU farm]

Anybody considering upgrading to larger hydraulic cylinders on their FLU? Apparently Bosch has some beefy ones.

 

[BigBison]

Do whatever you want with your X radials. I've had a long, trying day gettin' to know my SEE. I moved over for oncoming traffic, maybe 1/2" too far for keeping my eye on my dog instead of the ditch I put 'er into for a few hours.

Come here this time of year and try driving this county road with hidden 3' stair-step dropoffs which occasionally take out locals of 2-3 decades, even driving tractors... I've only been here a year. So *of course* I put the SEE in the ditch today. Just as I was moving over, my 4WD dash-light went out, just when I needed 4WD.

Two hours of self-recovery efforts with the bucket & backhoe went to naught, every time I almost got 'er back up on the road, she settled down further in the ditch. Deploying the backhoe was dicey enough, on that angle I had to slew all the way to the right to get the boom unlatched. My big mistake was deploying the stabilizer.

By the time it made contact down the stairstep-dropoff, it didn't lift the rear end, just levered me further into the ditch! Cack. Once the dashboard level indicator maxed out, I decided to extend the boom & dipper across the road to use the bucket as a counter-weight until the recovery wrecker showed up to put two cables on it and winch me out. I'll familiarize myself with all the various systems, once I've figured out how to keep 'er on the road, driving one that's working fine -- 4WD woulda kept this from happening. Still, embarrassed as all whatnot, right now.

Because I was hypothermic by the time I got home. The worst thing I did, was when the 4WD/difflock came back on and I tried driving out to no avail. I didn't realize at the time, what I was doing to the front-passenger tire. Still. After being winched out, and everyone leaving the scene because I only had to go a mile to get back home...

The front-passenger X radial blew out at 10mph. Might not have stranded me in the daylight, but after dark with the temperature plummeting, I made the executive decision to hoof it on home without bothering to set up my warning triangles... My SEE is now stranded about a mile away on the county road with a flat tire. I'll get to it in the morning. I'm kinda hoping I don't need to haul my floor jack down there... can I rotate the bucket down and use the loader to lift the front wheels off the ground to put the spare tire on?

Any warmer than -20*F I'd know the answer to that by now, instead, I'm shoveling logs into the woodburning stove because it's COLD, cold, cold out.

Would chains have gotten me out? Or better tires? No, probably not, although I came really close to not calling a recovery wrecker. Had I been able to slew the backhoe to the left, I coulda pushed myself out. By the time I thought of that option, slewing left woulda rolled the FLU through my neighbor's fence and chicken coop.

Lotsa dicey moments today, behind the wheel of a top-heavy truck with its dashboard level pegged. Everything I tried seemed logical at the time (not just to me, but also the two bystander-ranchers who've stuck their tractors in exactly the same ditch over the years). Putting the backhoe bucket teeth into the road for some purchase might very well have worked, other times of the year, but not now. I wound up just dragging the hoe sideways, instead of moving the SEE, but not before lifting it up enough where failure caused it to settle down deeper into the ditch...

Ugh. Long day. Hopefully nobody smacks into the SEE tonight, like I say, if I'd stayed with it long enough to put up warning triangles, I might not have made it home.

Better tires & chains woulda been nice, but that ditch, I'd like to see anyone do better if they go off into it in anything. As it is, maybe chains on the X radials woulda blown it out earlier, making the winch-out job that much tougher. As it is, when I had to abandon the SEE and hike home because of a blown tire... I was all, are you KIDDING me? Yeah, I've done my research enough to know about the X radials, but now that I have first-hand experience, I promise you, at least in snow country, you don't want to run those for a mile.

I still don't have an hour in behind the wheel of the SEE. Heck, starting it today took half a can of spray-ether held out the window in my left hand, while my right crossed over the steering wheel to push the starter button. Sitting in the ditch for two hours at 30* tilt and almost toppling except for I extended the backhoe as a counterweight, at subzero temperatures, I left it running. It's fuel injected, sure, so I shouldn't have been worried about starting it at that angle if it was running at that angle. But it was soooo COLD out, I didn't dare shut it off.

 

[BigBison]

Anybody considering upgrading to larger hydraulic cylinders on their FLU? Apparently Bosch has some beefy ones.

Uhhh... we're gonna need a bigger boat!

 

[BigBison]

The wrecker-driver took pics after he hooked up the cables. I'll try to get those and post 'em up here, embarrassing as it may be. Because if it had gotten warmer today, late afternoon when I was stuck, the snowpack woulda settled enough before the wrecker got there, to tip my SEE into my neighbor's fence and chicken coop. Not to mention crushed the SEE. Really a near thing, but if you don't drive this sort of road this time of year, you don't even know how easy it is to drop off the side here & there. The wind blows the snow until everything looks level. If I'd been in 4WD instead of just had the knob in 4WD for my little excursion, nothing woulda happened to tell about, ya know?

 

[BigBison]

So I time-shifted "The Grand Tour" from last night, after today's ordeals I couldn't get enough of that episode! Watched it twice, laughing out loud both times, best "Top Gear" ever!!! This is after barely making it home in the cold & dark before hypothermia set in, so perhaps I was a bit delirious. Has everything from charging lithium batteries to military vehicles. My only criticism, is that Vanagon is just a Vanagon, and I'd expect the Top Gear crew to know that a Vanagon Syncro is one of the most-awesome offroad vehicles ever made. Not that I can afford a "Westy" camper version, just a van will suit me fine in a Syncro. It's the one vehicle I covet, which I don't yet own.

 

[Another Ahab]

So I time-shifted "The Grand Tour" from last night, after today's ordeals I couldn't get enough of that episode! Watched it twice, laughing out loud both times, best "Top Gear" ever!!! This is after barely making it home in the cold & dark before hypothermia set in, so perhaps I was a bit delirious. Has everything from charging lithium batteries to military vehicles. My only criticism, is that Vanagon is just a Vanagon, and I'd expect the Top Gear crew to know that a Vanagon Syncro is one of the most-awesome offroad vehicles ever made. Not that I can afford a "Westy" camper version, just a van will suit me fine in a Syncro. It's the one vehicle I covet, which I don't yet own.

I never heard of them, but they sure do look pretty awesome:

 

[The FLU farm]

Holy crap! Sitting at 25 degrees must've felt, um, unnerving. I've only seen just over 20 on my inclinometer and that made me put my seat belt on, for the first time.
Could the loader be helpful for a front tire change? It depends. Not if your SEE's loader is like mine (gutless). But the one on the parts SEE would definitely help.
Wonder if there's a recall on the right front Michelins? That's the one I lost, too.

Both of the above are part of why I'm going with wider and slightly shorter tires. Between the radial sidewalls and not wanting to lay it on its side, plus getting lower contact pressure, finding/making wider wheels for the new tires have been on the list for a while now.
Until yesterday it looked like I was going to end up widening them myself, but found a nearby source that makes it more feasible to have it done, even if their high estimate ends up being the actual cost.
An extra two inches of track width may not sound like much, but having a 4-inch wider stance will definitely help when things start leaning. As will a rear suspension lockout.
And it is comforting to now know that a stock SEE can stay upright even at 25 degrees.

 

[The FLU farm]

Well, this was an anticlimactic experience. Always wanting to learn, curiosity finally made me look up what a "bionic heater" is.
What I found was that every water cooled vehicle I've ever owned, with the exception of early Jeeps, came with a bionic heater from the factory.
A few of those Jeeps had what I refer to as auxiliary heaters.
Oh well, at least I now know what a bionic heater is (even the house and garage are equipped with them), but it was a bit disappointing to learn that it wasn't about a new technology. Just a new word for the same-old.

 

[Hummerdave]

Dang, here I am trying to catch up from November and see this..
I rebuilt mine from what was left of the old one and then saved the 2 grommets since they weren't rotted..
I used a piece of laminated floor underlayer which is made out of a really tough rubberized material.. cut the 3 holes and glued in the
grommets.. kind of a pain since you have to pull the whole loader lever assemby out and apart to do the job right..
also installed 3 rivnuts in the body since the welded nuts all spun out..
Dave

Both my SEES have the rubber boot near gone. I'm kinda waiting for FLU Farm to buy another 6-7 parts SEEs so I can put in a request for parts

 

[Hummerdave]

Try visiting a MB car repair shop.. good chance they may have an old diesel engine fuel line laying around...
Dave

Ah, sorry, too tired to catch that it wasn't the bolt. Can you braze it back together?
If not, some SU fuel pumps have banjo fittings of about that size. As does Holley carbs, come to think of it.

 

[911joeblow]

I am on old Porsche/BMW guy and we have tons of banjos on all manners for fuel and air systems. Most seem to all be the same sizes.

Try visiting a MB car repair shop.. good chance they may have an old diesel engine fuel line laying around...
Dave

 

[The FLU farm]

Dang, here I am trying to catch up from November and see this..
I rebuilt mine from what was left of the old one and then saved the 2 grommets since they weren't rotted..
I used a piece of laminated floor underlayer which is made out of a really tough rubberized material.. cut the 3 holes and glued in the
grommets.. kind of a pain since you have to pull the whole loader lever assemby out and apart to do the job right..
also installed 3 rivnuts in the body since the welded nuts all spun out..
Dave

Welcome back, Dave, and thanks for the tip.

 

[dougco1]

I drain the tanks, disassemble the cylinders, valves, and pump, then clean the parts with denatured alcohol. The hoses are sent to a place that cleanses them chemically.
Then I reassemble the components in a dust free room, much like what large computer systems are in.

Okay, not really. But I do contract all the cylinders to get as much of the old fluid out as possible. And make sure that the filters are happy.

Along the same lines, today I rigged up a very temporary (yeah right, it'll likely still be there in the spring) electrical setup so the chute on the snow blower can be rotated and the lid moved.View attachment 659521
It's supposed to snow again tomorrow, but I crave more. Much more.
So far all we've had is wet snow, very wet, and not a lot. Still, even at 1,200 to 1,600 rpm this 'blower is working fine. If someone wants to try running a low pressure Bobcat 'blower off the rear hydraulics I'd say go for it.

Have you had any snow worth playing in lately? When it does does come, I would love to see some action video on how well your blower works. Been contemplating on picking up a FLU and retrofitting a blower for it like you did. The County I work for has fourteen 911 communication tower sites, and we have to keep them clear and accessible. The access roads are not much more than logging roads and all of them are on top of the mountains. Drifts sometimes taller than the trucks.

 

[The FLU farm]

Today turned out to be a very educational day. Not much progress, but many things learned.

One, which apply to those of us with a SEE in a wintry climate, I thought of some time ago (but actually remembered to check today). Before lowering the backhoe, make sure the levers aren't ice covered and stuck to the seat. I'd imagine that bad thing could happen if they are.

Drove the (formerly) parts SEE to the garage, the plan being to raise the rear with the backhoe and remove the rear wheels. As it idled happily I went to lower the backhoe...and got about halfway before the engine died. In retrospect, it was a good thing that it died earlier rather than later.

Learned that the bleeder bolts can be reached by simply lifting the right side of the hood a bit. Good. No need to remove it. Well, at that point there wasn't.

Then I learned that when the starter won't engage, even after slamming the clutch pedal down repeatedly, it's fairly easy to hold the switch down with the right thumb while pushing the starter button with the left one. Listen for a faint "click", indicating that there's contact.

I also learned (okay, I strongly suspected it beforehand, but foolishly still tried) that you won't save any time by trying to bleed the system after a fuel filter change with the hand pump, instead of getting a can of diesel and fill up the canisters before reinstalling them. Which I naturally ended up doing anyway, after a while.

After much bleeding and pumping, it started, and ran. Sort of. Eventually it ran great at 900 rpm - for about five minutes. During that time I learned that it'll run with both bleeders open, and nothing coming out. No air, no fuel, no nothing.

Sure seems like there's a supply problem, which makes sense as grungy as the tank was when this SEE arrived. Tomorrow I'll try disconnecting the fuel line at the hand pump and blow it out, into the tank.

Lastly I learned that my manual tire dismounting skills are gone. Without a crane over the tire machine (which has spoiled me) they had to be manhandled the old fashioned way.
It took about 45 minutes to get the inner bead off. Only three to go.

 

[The FLU farm]

Have you had any snow worth playing in lately? When it does does come, I would love to see some action video on how well your blower works. Been contemplating on picking up a FLU and retrofitting a blower for it like you did. The County I work for has fourteen 911 communication tower sites, and we have to keep them clear and accessible. The access roads are not much more than logging roads and all of them are on top of the mountains. Drifts sometimes taller than the trucks.

Nah, not real snow yet. As you can see in the photo, I plowed what little there was into a berm to get a chance to run the 'blower. It will shoot it some 50-60 feet even at 1,600 rpm, which is encouraging.
Eventually i managed to plug the chute by going head on into a large pile of very wet snow. But, hey, once I figure out how to operate this setup correctly...
Oh, and PM me a phone number and I can explain how I'll change this setup a bit, come summer.

 

[General Hood]

A good day was had, overall, so although off subject:View attachment 661214 Sold my M1009 for $400 over asking price. And no, there was no bidding war - the buyer came from hundreds of miles away with the intent to buy it, which he did. Not sure where this fits in with my normal "I'm much better at buying than selling", but I wasn't about to turn down the extra 10% when the buyer offered it.

Back to the world of FLUs, and specifically tire chains: Bison, are these chains good, bad, or indifferent? This is the beginning of the second season with these chains, with no signs of tire damage, so I guess they're okay. Well, they're going on the front soon, regardless.View attachment 661215

Hey, now you have the extra coins to buy another auction SEE

 

[The FLU farm]

Hey, now you have the extra coins to buy another auction SEE

As it stands now, I won't need a parts SEE. The (formerly) parts SEE is rapidly regaining its parts status.
There are a few things still to check, but if it continues to refuse to start...

I've learned a lot about the fuel system since yesterday, but apparently not enough.

 

[peakbagger]

Have you tried my worse case method of diagnosing the fuel system?. If you haven't replaced the fuel filters replace them. Rig up a outboard motor fuel tank with a squeeze bulb and sit it up on the passenger seat and connect it up right at the inlet to the fuel pump, install a new style bleeder pump (if you already haven't) and then bleed the system. Crank the engine and use the squeeze bulb to pressurize the system. If it starts then you most likely have plastic fuel lines that leak under vacuum (a known problem with this era fuel lines). You can now move the temporary fuel hose back towards the fuel tank. Make sure you drop the main fuel tank and check the connection on top of the tank that are hidden. I think I have posted before that you may need to put paint stripper on the fuel tank threads and then penetrant to keep the straps from twisting when you remove the nuts

One thing with my method is that the temporary fuel system will still be returning fuel back to the main fuel tank so if you ran for hours like this you would have to drain fuel out of main tank.

Sorry if this is repeat, we really need to break up this thread into specific subparts !