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Greasy Water thoughts

milling_drum

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Aug 19, 2008
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725
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out west lately
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asphalt mill operator (ret)
High speed grease isn't a good idea on leg barrels/steering fittings/Conveyor swing fittings because the wear application differs quite a bit. Using high speed grease, I constantly see the leg barrel needs grease but has this ring of worn grease stuck to the body(slide)of the machine which is no longer working on the legbarrel. I don't know if others would agree but thats how I've seen it. Multi purpose grease lasts much longer on a leg barrel or steering pin. (hate changing them out too)

That makes it funny to watch some folks wash the machine down and spray that grease everywhere, then wonder why its all over the rollers and the machine looks awful:) (mostly Wirtgen folks)

Water systems where the age of the machine come into play mean alot of work, Anything old with an uncoated water tank blows lots of rust and clogs spray nozzles. Anybody use dishsoap in the water tank to keep it clean? Had an experience where we used the same tablets people put in pools to control chlorine levels, that worked pretty well. Clean hydrant water helped too.

Any thoughts? Agree Disagree?
 

milling_drum

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out west lately
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asphalt mill operator (ret)
its entirely OK to have a conversation with myself.

Anybody think its necessary to keep the insides of the drum clean? I've actually seen the difference of what buildup can cause. When shutting off the drum its easy to see how quickly it stops rotating after the drives are shut off. (except CAT)

The drum with buildup will stop alot faster than the drum with NO buildup. Obviously that would affect drives, the planetary and upper drive have to work harder to keep it rotating at the correct RPM...hence, blown up planetary box and/or premature bearing failures...

But nobody wants to hear/read this either...like above:)
 

Toegrinder

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Aug 14, 2009
Messages
131
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CO
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Milling Foreman
High speed grease isn't a good idea on leg barrels/steering fittings/Conveyor swing fittings because the wear application differs quite a bit. Using high speed grease, I constantly see the leg barrel needs grease but has this ring of worn grease stuck to the body(slide)of the machine which is no longer working on the legbarrel. I don't know if others would agree but thats how I've seen it. Multi purpose grease lasts much longer on a leg barrel or steering pin. (hate changing them out too)

That makes it funny to watch some folks wash the machine down and spray that grease everywhere, then wonder why its all over the rollers and the machine looks awful:) (mostly Wirtgen folks)

Water systems where the age of the machine come into play mean alot of work, Anything old with an uncoated water tank blows lots of rust and clogs spray nozzles. Anybody use dishsoap in the water tank to keep it clean? Had an experience where we used the same tablets people put in pools to control chlorine levels, that worked pretty well. Clean hydrant water helped too.

Any thoughts? Agree Disagree?

Don't know if you are talking about open gear lube, that's what I have always known it as. I do use it, must be because I am one of those "wirtgen folks". I only use it on the leg barrels occasionally when needed. If you have a ground man or operator that has been slacking on greasing the legs I think it is better to spray some of that on rather than use a grease gun, run the machine up and down numerous times to spread the grease, then regrease to get caught up. And if you have any type of common sense you don't go spraying it all over hell and getting it on the belts, tracks, rollers, etc.

Don't know what they are called, but the wirtgens come with some kind of water conditioner deal that sticks to the inside of the tank by magnets. As long as you keep up on replacing them we haven't had much of a problem with rust buildup.

its entirely OK to have a conversation with myself.

Anybody think its necessary to keep the insides of the drum clean? I've actually seen the difference of what buildup can cause. When shutting off the drum its easy to see how quickly it stops rotating after the drives are shut off. (except CAT)

The drum with buildup will stop alot faster than the drum with NO buildup. Obviously that would affect drives, the planetary and upper drive have to work harder to keep it rotating at the correct RPM...hence, blown up planetary box and/or premature bearing failures...

But nobody wants to hear/read this either...like above:)

As far as asking if anybody thinks its necessary to keep the drum clean, I think that's a silly question. That to me is just as important as checking the oils, greasing the machine, and changing teeth. If someone doesn't want to bother doing it then they don't belong on my crew, let alone on any mill.
 

milling_drum

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out west lately
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asphalt mill operator (ret)
Yes

On nearly all those subjects I've written about, I've had MAJOR fallouts with people over...can't even tell you how many companies I've simply walked away from just looking at the equipment....Most of them are in the South Eastern USA.

The company I just left in NC before thanksgiving had two half lane Wirtgens, and a 4ft. Both the half lane Wirtgens have stretched falling lower conveyor belts, I try to explain to them that they need to change how they do things and try to mimimize the load on the lower belt, not only to prevent the stretch but save a few rollers in the process....NONE of them want to hear it. As it was when I left, they had to leave the conveyor belts running when a truck was or wasn't under it because if they shut it off in the cut they couldn't get it started again. Belt splice? "oh, we ordered one but its not here yet"....running like that on an open road is....well...you can make your own adjectives for that:)

Thats a good idea on leg barrels, I've noticed that using the same grease used on bearings is kinda silly and just makes more of a mess of the leg barrel not to mention the fact it doesn't last as well as multi plex grease. Used regular car axle grease once and that stuff acted like it was never gonna wear out....Imma try that spray on thing soon as I have the chance.

I don't know if you have ever seen the inside of a Wirtgen leg barrel but they have a pretty good system that way. If taken care of the Leg Cylinder will give out long before the casing and sleeves do.

I've got PLENTY more to b*t*ch about too....
 

milling_drum

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725
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out west lately
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asphalt mill operator (ret)
"As far as asking if anybody thinks its necessary to keep the drum clean, I think that's a silly question. That to me is just as important as checking the oils, greasing the machine, and changing teeth. If someone doesn't want to bother doing it then they don't belong on my crew, let alone on any mill."


Thats the best reply I've seen or heard since the mid 90's anywhere:)
 
Last edited:

milling_drum

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out west lately
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asphalt mill operator (ret)
BTW Toegrinder, you are in NO way what I meant by "Wirtgen people". That reference is left for those who have run nothing but Wirtgen their entire milling lives and believe everything they know to be dead on accurate and right when in fact they are pretty much worthless milling without a Wirtgen machine to do everything for them. You can tell those types by one close look at the machine.

The only company I've ever seen that exclusively run Wirtgen that know what they are doing is called Texop, outta Justin, Texas. Great bunch of people. The back ground they come from is with a company called Dustrol who still run machines that are 30 years old and will NEVER purchase a Wirtgen from what I've been told. (interesting story too)

The value of running a mill as level as possible is completely lost these days because of 4 track auto grade systems. Nobody pays much attention to it at all until parts start breaking then they stand there wondering how and why. No one that has run a Wirtgen exclusivelt could set a three track CMI/Roadtec down on grade and take off smoothy, they wouldn't have the slightest clue about having to bring the back track up to zero once its in the cut.

Which brings me too this, I was with some dummies in Alabama in 2008 who were doing some removals with a W2000. I show up on the job just HOPING for once to be impressed instead of distressed. Distressed won easily though.

The operator sets the machine up on the edge of the previous pass at the begining joint, lowers the back down to zero and cuts the switch on with the grade boxes punched down to 9 inches deep....the front of the machine bottoms out on the leg barrels and its riding the front mouldboard/bulkhead....I'm just standing there watching in disgust, as the machine starts moving the operator is almost falling off the front of the machine because the @ss end is so high and the tracks are slipping badly as its trying to move forward....its a train wreck too watch but...

They get all hissy and put me up top because I had been hired as an operator and they got sick of me trying to help them on the ground. The guide for the rear of the left side ski was getting pushed up into the belt guard and would have eventually caused a nice break down, didn't take long to straighten it but its something to keep an eye on IF you know to do so....So when I get lined up and go to set down, I lower the rear end past the zero mark, to about 3 inches on the grade rods on the back. Hit the autos, comming into the asphalt at about 3 inches, I shut the grade off and bump the back end down a little more, cut the autos back on and so forth until the machine is all the way down. cut the down pressure to the rear mouldboard off and start moving...no tracks slipping and the machine is pretty much level.

About 4ft into it, cut the down pressure to the rear mouldboard on, tap it down a few times once you know you have cleared the inside edge of the cut and then as the tracks drop in, start bumping the rear end up to zero....You should have seen the looks on their faces....once dudes dip fell right out of his mouth.

End of the day I told them none of them would last 5 minutes with an old school mill atall. Plenty more horror stories from that bunch too;)
 

milling_drum

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Any preferences here from operators of 4 track or 3 track machines? I prefer a 3 track of course.
 

Toegrinder

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131
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CO
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Milling Foreman
City streets with intersections, radius, bullnose, cul-de-sac cuts...3 track. Mainline...4 track, more stability, less stress on the rear tracks.
 

milling_drum

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Good call, there is an awful lot of pressure on the single rear track, The CMI1050 could not be run at a decent travel speed with over drives on if you wanted to manuever hard. The lighter machines weren't too bad though, just had to be careful.But I'm sure you know this all too well:)

Last summer my foreman screaming at me to go faster all the time with the W2100, this one time I was moving pretty good on a city street in Devils Lake, ND, hes trying to play with the zero side because we hadn't zero'ed the machine out in a few days, checking for flush with the shovel....he looked back while he reached in for cut edge and the track flattened the shovel of course....

I had been after him to order some of those end pieces for the rear mouldboard, the trail it was leaving was heavy for that machine. He gave in and did after that.

Some of the 4 track configs do pretty good in the city against the curb, it surprizes me sometimes. But they simply cannot get into some areas where the 3 track configs can.
 

Toegrinder

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CO
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Milling Foreman
Yeah I broke a couple legs off 800's back in the day, one of them was right in the middle of the interstate between vegas and mesquite, nv. I've flattened a few shovels myself, even the contractor supers foot with a PR-1000, broke his foot.
 
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Foreman Welfle Inc
I remember seeing a back legtube yoke snap off the tube in the middle of a busy intersection before during rush hour. It was on a roadtec RX-45. Don't miss those machines at all lol!
 

milling_drum

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The older series of Roadtec were horrible with leg barrels giving in from what I remember. After a cylinder bent in the tube, everytime after that I set it down into anything past 3 inches, It was done very gently. Another thing they sucked for was when being set into the cut they LOVED to travel backwards. Even with the parking brake on. I'll skip telling how many times that happened comming over a manhole:)

CMI legbarrel designs had a some pretty serious issues way back, I remember at Delta, who had never seen a CMI until Donegal sent an older PR-800-7 made quite a few mods to it that seemed to work ok. They welded the upper and lower castings together...then the steering fittings would only last 100 or so hours but the leg barrels stopped all that floppin around. That thing looked terrible when it walked because when they got that machine they were about wore out anyways.

Back to the Roadtec....I could never figure out why the rear track would pivot to the right as the rear end was being lowered into the cut...Thankfully a few years of rear loader screwups with Barber Greenes makes one become leary of leg barrel issues and so on....
 

Turtle

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president of Turtle Southeast, Inc.
The rear steer cylinder on older Roadtecs was attached to the Machine frame and to the rear track yoke so when you lowered the rear leg it would push the track the right as if you were extending the steer cylinder. All the newer roadtecs have the steering attache at the very top of the leg barrels to eliminate this issue.
 

milling_drum

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I bet your operations had a huge impact on how Roadtec redesigned there machines. Turtle had quite a few of the 50's, used to see them all over Florida.
 

milling_drum

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Over here at APP they use a different grease on Legbarrels then on the bearings. Guess that Idea wasn't limited to my dumb @ss after all:)
 

bean

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Dec 20, 2008
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Canada
Vogele pavers use different grease on the screed extentions aswell which is kinda like a leg tube I guess ***
 

milling_drum

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My problem is that high speed grease makes a mess of legbarrels which needs to be cleaned off constantly before washing down or it makes a mess.
 

bean

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like this mess the auto greaser makes.
 

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milling_drum

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out west lately
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asphalt mill operator (ret)
Yes. Thats exactly what I meant. Get some of that nice fine dust produced by milling with little water to the drum coated over that grease and its quite a treat to have to clean off....
 
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