Skid steer fixin'

I blew a bucket cylinder on my bobcat 610. Turns out I had a chunk missing out of one rod and had to make a new gland. They used a buttress thread on these, so I had to make some special tooling. Had to machine the piston and cylinder to clean them up. I ran it for about a half hour tonight and it seems to be doing just fine.

They wanted over $250 for an aluminum gland! Rods aren't cheap either..., but at least I could make the gland from scratch. Tomorrow I get to make a set of forks!

 

Wow, that's some talent right there. Glad you were able make the part and save some

 

That is cool that you can make your parts from scratch

 

That's some purty whittling there!
Being so handy with a pocket knife, be sure to show us your forks.
(Nice work!)

 

Nice work and talent!

 

Don't worry. I will be sure to get pictures of the forks. I didn't get to start on them today because I was picking up more shelving for my shop. Can't pass up a good deal....

Here are the shelves I picked up. It's a crappy pic from the ad. 16 ft long, 7 ft high, and at least 3 ft deep with a full length steel plate work surface. Got 'em for $100. The colored bins were not included.

 

Now you will have to buy more stuff to fill the shelves

 

OH, No.....I have plenty of stuff to fill the shelves......that's why I got 'em.

I was headed over to buy steel for the fork carriage today and found a kid with a pickup truck at my railroad crossing with a hay rake behind it and he looked confused and troubled. I asked if everything was ok and he said the pto had fallen and caught the tracks. Sure enough, the pto shaft looked like a boomerang. I tied it up and had him follow me back to the house. I put it in the shop press and straightened it out before sending him on his way. I gave him my phone number in case anything else went wrong. He showed up tonight with some money and thanked me for fixing it. He said it never ran that smooth before.

The pallet forks have to wait another day...

 

Sometimes generosity goes a long way

 

Nice work Ike.

 

Hre is what we got done on the forks today. It took a while to get steel and get started. There isn't much left to do on it. I have to weld a couple of gussets and the lock plates and then paint it. It's 4.5 feet wide and weighs about 320 lbs with the (5,200 lb) forks on it. It is extra wide because we move 40 ft poles and they get kind of tippy. My son helped me today. He is growing up fast and seems very interested in what I do. He loves learning and really enjoys finishing a project and seeing how well it turns out. I am trying to make sure he knows everything he needs to, and has the tools to take care of himself. He is a smart young man. We are planning to finish the forks tomorrow.

 

That looks really good. That's nice your son is interested in what your doing and wanting to learn. I think he has a great teacher.

 

Looking very.... "factory"
Since you mentioned 40' poles and your so handy with metal, and it's still a project, how about a middle fang, grapple that could capture long stuff in between the forks?
I have several sets of forks and have always wanted to do something like this. Just getting around to it is the problem.

 

Looking real good. I worked at a hydraulic cylinder manufacturing plant for 10 years. I hate Buttress threads.

 

Here ya go...

 

i have a few ideas rolling around my head on that subject. I'm planning on building a grapple also, so not too worried about it at the moment. I have a few linear actuators that are pretty strong. I have thought about putting a clamp on the forks with one of those.

 

I'm not a fan of them either. They gall up too easy and have minimal unscrewing power. I greased the threads on every buttress gland I work on and make sure there is an o-ring to keep water/dirt out. That seems to do the trick.

 

When assembling them we would mix silver anti-seze and wd40. Made for a slick lube.

 

I never tried that. I might give it a try.

 

X2...I like this spray lube that we get from ACE hardware too...smells like coconuts and works great...reminds me of the lube we used to get from Grainger, it was labeled Dayton IIRC...but wd40 works fine to make this paste too...easier to find I'm sure.