One time about 20 years ago, I was coming down the mountain I live on in my first piece of equipment, a 10 ton JLG boom truck. As soon as I exited my driveway onto the county road, I eyeballed it as to it's condition. Looked real slick, touched the brakes to confirm, OH YEAH... figured I'd put the chains on before getting to the 12% grade section in the 1600' vertical drive to the valley below. I eased it over to the shoulder, which had enough gravel to roughen at least the right side tires up enough to come to a stop. Then I laid out the left side chains in front of the rear single axle, then the right side, and when I walked back around to the left side prior to getting back in the cab and pulling ahead a few feet (putting the rear outriggers down to lift the rear axle up would have turned it into a big snowboard) my previously laid out left side tire chains were missing. They were sliding down the road, by the time I caught up with them they were 20' ahead of the truck. Once chained up, I drove the 1/2 mile to the scary part, the 12% down grade straightaway for about a half mile. Even chained up, I stayed over on the right shoulder to use the roughness there, too much at one point, and got sucked into the ditch, at about 4 MPH. Long story short, I uncaged the 55' boom, swung it a bit to the uphill side (sucked in of course), enough to get some dunnage under the tires in the ditch, and managed to extricate myself. Calling a tow truck was not an option, maybe the next day but not that day. Even back then I didn't keep my rig on the mountain, but in town, but I just happened to have it up there when the ice storm hit.
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new ride
- Thread starter Tradesman
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The Peej
Senior Member
chains on the steer axle? Hows that work?
Hank R
Senior Member
- Joined
- May 28, 2014
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- 2,068
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- Princeton B.C. Canada
- Occupation
- Retired Truck driver and School bus driver
It work great in a case with the tow truck all chained up on the back with a tow or going up a hill or down you some times can not steer so the chains up front lets you stay on the road. On the highway one might never chain up the steering axle but off highway it is different. I was hauling water for some diamond drillers 5 miles from creek in Dec a few years ago and had every wheel chained up with lockers on the drive axles the truck wants to go straight. Makes for pucker power on some of the switch backs.
Birken Vogt
Charter Member
I knew my boss to do it sometimes to get a truck out of a terrible situation some gung ho driver should have never gotten it into, but never felt the need to do it myself. I have run some pretty nasty stuff but discretion is the better part of valor I felt and leave that work for another day.
If the customer does not want to take care of the road (plow it), or worse yet drives all over it with a 4wd packing it down into a bobsled track, then they can jolly well wait I say.
I once had a guy who wanted me in a certain place, snow all over had not been touched, a little Kubota tractor sitting nearby. I said clear out this snow with the tractor so I can get in there and I will do it. He said well it's just a little tractor. Well take a lot of little scoops then but don't call me out here in the worst conditions of the year and expect me to be the hero, no way a heavy tow truck could fit in there to rescue if I got in trouble, we'd be waiting for spring to get the truck out.
If the customer does not want to take care of the road (plow it), or worse yet drives all over it with a 4wd packing it down into a bobsled track, then they can jolly well wait I say.
I once had a guy who wanted me in a certain place, snow all over had not been touched, a little Kubota tractor sitting nearby. I said clear out this snow with the tractor so I can get in there and I will do it. He said well it's just a little tractor. Well take a lot of little scoops then but don't call me out here in the worst conditions of the year and expect me to be the hero, no way a heavy tow truck could fit in there to rescue if I got in trouble, we'd be waiting for spring to get the truck out.
Works great when your operating on top of 1/2 inch ice coating on the road .....
Chains on the rear are for pullin & chain the starboard side steering tire for navigating .
They getter done
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I had a nice job today, this little building is 40x40 with a 16' side wall we set the walls and put the trusses on it in 3 hours. It was one of those days when you look like a genius, I better have my feet braced cause I've got a kick in the azz coming
That's one sad dog, my wife and I went away for the weekend and left him at a boarding kennel, the lady that runs the kennel left him outside over night and he jumped the fence and my son's found him about 5 miles away at 2:00 pm the next day. All she did was phone me at 11:00am Sunday morning telling he was missing. The picture is of him on his way home.
crane operator
Senior Member
That looks like one of those jobs where you were glad to be down in the trees to keep the wind off those sheeted panels.
And look at all that pretty rigging.....
And look at all that pretty rigging.....
I set for this crew a quite a bit, I think they where a little sceptical when I started pulling it all out, but they had faith. It couldn't have went any better the panels didn't bend or twist at all. I'm glad it went so well because two weeks ago when I set the trusses on the house I told them how to build the walls and how to lay them out, so if went bad I know who was taking the blame. I have a bit of a sickness for rigging and I whip it out every chance I get.That looks like one of those jobs where you were glad to be down in the trees to keep the wind off those sheeted panels.
And look at all that pretty rigging.....
Did you hunt him? This is a German short haired pointer, trained to hunt grouse and mooch at my meal time.
crane operator
Senior Member
I've owned two german short haired pointers, both were wound for sound, bird hunting dogs (pheasant). One was the best dog I've ever hunted with, the other not so much. Neither one were good pets, only wanted to hunt birds.
Owned one chocolate lab, he could put his paws on my shoulders and look me in the eye (I'm 6'6"), and he could eat you out of house and home. He'd eat anything, if you threw dirt clods in his direction he'd gobble them up. He was a great companion, useless hunting dog. If a bird flew up- he was just as suprised as you were, and when he got tired would tend to just follow you in the field and let you bust brush for him.
Glad you found him back.
Owned one chocolate lab, he could put his paws on my shoulders and look me in the eye (I'm 6'6"), and he could eat you out of house and home. He'd eat anything, if you threw dirt clods in his direction he'd gobble them up. He was a great companion, useless hunting dog. If a bird flew up- he was just as suprised as you were, and when he got tired would tend to just follow you in the field and let you bust brush for him.
Glad you found him back.
Ye haw!!! Five years straight I got a clean annual NDT. on my boom truck. I was a little concerned about my driver side outrigger. I was setting core slabs before Christmas and the truck I was picking off was on a slope so when the came off they wanted to drift towards me so I told the guys to have two men on the tag line so they didn't hit me, well the first three went perfect the fourth one somebody went to sleep and it drifted over and smacked my outrigger, not hard but hard enough that it chipped the corner of the slab. Man was I ----- ( insert appropriate phrase) , all I'll say is the last two didn't hit me. I actually told the inspector and he spent some extra time on it checking the whole beam not just the welds.
I hear you about short hair wanting to hunt. During dear season or turkey season I have to keep my hunting clothes and gun or rifle at my shop and leave the house in the morning with my work clothes on or the dog goes ape sh!t. And my wife is in let's say a foul mood when I get back.
My last pointer I tried putting him out side while I got ready then went to the back door, when my wife let him in the front I went out the back " good plan eh " didn't work he came in and sat in front of my gun cabinet looking at it and started kind of a whining howl, and shaking. I think you have to have a hunting dog to know what the sound is like.
Bumpsteer
Senior Member
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- Sep 2, 2009
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- Front seat on the Struggle Bus
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We always had Labs.....you could handle a gun, no problem. Touch your hunting coat and it was game on.
Ed
Ed
This is one of our own jobs. That beam weighs a bit over 8,000 lbs I was set up for the beam beside it at 23 ft radius but the iron workers had to fix a post so we did this one first I was 37 ft off the side, I was still in chart but she was a little light on the off side out riggers. The second picture is of a 50 foot mono truss. I got to whip out my rigging again, it's mate is 65 ft. I pulled three out of each pile to build two gable sets. Next week I am bringing in a larger crane to set the rest of the trusses they have to be set at a 85 ft radius.
