IT'S ALIVE! er, sort of. M543 resurrection

[Ferroequinologist]

Well...

It works, sort of. Runs great! wrecker part not so much... boom up and down works great, crowd in and out works great too! The hoist motor makes some noise, but doesn't turn. (watched the jackshaft on the back of the motor.) the swing motor works great! but doesn't turn the boom...

Had to run all kinds of hoses all over the dang place to replace the rust pitted hard lines. Works, but looks like crap.

I'm going to go ahead and replace the whole bed.

It's going to be an M543/62/936/816 by the time I get done. lol.

I was really hoping it would work so I could use it to help clean up this tree...

 

[zebedee]

I'm going to go ahead and replace the whole bed. ..

Should be a fun project....

It's going to be an M543/62/936/816 by the time I get done. lol..

Naaahhh - only if you tell people. I mean, it's hardly like they reinvented the wheel every generation now - is it..?..!

I won't tell if you don't

 

[Ferroequinologist]

boom operation of 1967 M543 wrecker - YouTube

 

[gimpyrobb]

What happens if you "crowd out" and "hoist down" at the same time?

 

[Ferroequinologist]

I tried that, I even chained the hook to the back of the wrecker with a couple of those 40,000lb chains, and did boom up, hoist down, and then tried crowd extend and hoist down. Nothing.

JP stopped by for a bit, so I ran it for him to show him, and we noticed that the hoist drum will now ever so slightly move in each direction. I imagine if I were to keep working it it might free up. I'm now working on a bed swap, so I don't know if I will spend any more time on this one, I definitely won't spend any more money. I forgot how expensive hydraulic hoses are!

 

[SCSG-G4]

Well,
we all know where an M816 bed is, just gotta get the coin in a row!

 

[swiss]

Ouchy, that tree looked like it fell a little close to the barn

Glad nothing got damaged.

 

[Recovry4x4]

Question, when you try to operate the hoist motor, does the engine labor at all? Trying to figure if this is a hoist motor problem or a hoist winch problem. If it's a hydraulic motor issue, tugging at it won't yield much as I'm pretty sure they are worm dirve. Could be wrong.

 

[timntrucks]

that was close on the tree coming down. glad no trucks were hurt in doing this film. just the actors were effected!!!

 

[doghead]

I see you wear your safety sandals when operating your crane, also.

 

[EMD567]

When he does operate the hoist motor, the engine does labor. My guess would be that the drum bearings are frozen. What he might want to do is hook the front of the 818 to the hoist.
The other problem is the swing motor. It works, but the crane won't swing. I think something is bad in the driveline for the swing motor.

 

[pctrans]

 

[Ferroequinologist]

I'm going to pull the hoist and swing motors today, to check things out. In the TM, that's the only troubleshooting for those systems- motor turns, replace hoist/turntable gear. Motor doesn't turn, replace motor. That's all it says.

 

[gimpyrobb]

Well get to it then!

 

[Ferroequinologist]

Ok, went out and braved the heat for a bit to pull apart the hoist motor. Motor runs both directions with little noise when free from the gearing.

Pulled the cover off the bull gear casing, and besides being half full of water and oil, everything looks ok in there too. So, might be the drum bearings are locked up?

Didn't pull the swing motor yet, would have involved laying on the tool boxes which were hot enough to burn my feet through my 'safety sandals as DH put it. lol

 

[EMD567]

From the rust on the worm gear, I would suspect frozen bearings. I hope you threw some fresh grease on those gears..........

 

[Recovry4x4]

Thinking like a briar here, if you could pull the worm gear out, might be able to secure the cable to the back of the truck and jib out the boom to unspool it a bit. Trying to free it with the worm gear in there will likey break some parts.

Maybe fill up the housing with ATF or something of the like to help break it free. LOL, a gallon or tow of Kroil.

 

[Ferroequinologist]

I might get up at 2am when it is bearable outside and do that Kenny.

I don't want to think about how much $$ a gallon of Kroil would be!

I would think it wasn't the bearing in the housing but the one on the other side of the drum that is pretty much out in the elements.

 

[gimpyrobb]

Use equal parts of atv and acetone(mixed), that works the best.

 

[m816]

Did you try just using one lever at a time. Like boom up/down untill the oil gets into ever thing and then move to the next one? The air has to get out of all the lines you replaced and they are big, so it takes some time. I'm thinking that with all the water in the gear housings, that thing must have sat for a long time or spent some time in the pond. I wouldn't contaminate the hydraulics with any solvents or atv/acetone of kroll unless you can afford to dump that 55 gallons of ten wt oil in order to purge the system. I would clean each gerar box and lube them up. Then try again. It's a robust system. once the gears and berings are lubed it should almost free itself. especially with this heat.