Working the National 1300A

[DMiller]

Trusses fall here they scrap them, truss manufacturer will not warrant load capacity or vouch for ability to retain structural integrity if topple during build. Have seen Carpenters here add blocking to the more limber trusses the engineers qualify for constructions going up here too.

 

[doublewide]

All the trusses I ever set, and that's more than a few, all been hand nailed. Too many things going on to be dragging air hoses around. And always strong backs bolted to the gable wall prior to start and a stack of 1 x 8 rough sawn spruce for temporary diagonal bracing.

 

[DMiller]

We set truss on a barn frame at the BILs place, by hand, 30 footers setting one ear up then climbing and two others shifting the other ear up to a third on wall. Should have had a crane service just was not affordable then. All cross braced and end braced until confirmed square then set sheathing and tar paper. Eventually roofing then a trespasser burnt it down.

 

[Natman]

Well, I am pretty sure nothing was or will be said to the truss manufacturer, so no warranty worries! Hopefully, the building inspector won't notice all the scabbed on 2x4's the carpenters slapped on. If so the expense will come directly out of their pocket, something they are trying to avoid for some reason. If I had to guess, I'd say he won't notice, if he does, the truss company can come out and do what they call a field repair, fix them in place. The way these guys repaired them I'd have no concerns, even if it was my house.

There are 40 or 50 buildings in my area, that I built trusses myself for, back in the days before something called "engineering" was required, and when I was building. 25-40 years ago now, all of them still standing just fine. It's kind of, no it IS, an insult to a good carpenter to tell him he doesn't know how to make a truss, (imagine telling that to a modern day county inspector, ha ha) and the new guys nowadays ARE clueless, they just know how to set the factory built ones. Most here use nail guns when setting trusses, to nail to the top plate, they are spoiled, and the new small diameter plastic airhoses are a lot easier to drag around then the old rubber ones, and the guns are lighter too.

 

[Natman]

Ha! A flying forum I'm on has somehow segued into a show and tell about cranes, like my posts here devolve into plane talk. This 45 ton Manitex shown is interesting, mostly for it's licensed gross weight, guess that makes up for all those tires. https://backcountrypilot.org/community/forum/latest/why-so-much-nose-down-attitude-on-skis-24583

 

[skyking1]

really nice when you have a half acre to maneuver it, LOL!
Those tandem steers are not known for a sweet turning angle, and then there's that wheelbase thing.
I would just pay a guy to bring the 53' trailer for me, thank you very much.
Cool that you have skis. I have my float rating but have never been around the skis.

 

[Natman]

Same deal I'd suppose as floats, #1 being, no brakes! Here's a link to a ski flying vid a buddy did on my ski flying, he's a semi pro video guy and is notorious in the YouTube world for making poor flying decisions, and his good looking Lithuanian girlfriend.

 

[skyking1]

Fun video!
No brakes is different on floats. They fall off the step quick and the water is really draggy. The downer is when you don't plan your docking and doink the dock. Or not-quite-make-it, after you already shut down the engine. Ask me how I know

 

[dirty4fun]

Great video, thanks for the ride. Got to love all the back country lading places!

 

[mitch504]

Yeah, that video was great, almost like getting to meet you.

 

[Natman]

I had to check out an upcoming hot tub job today, driving my car, and things quickly went horribly wrong.

I arrived at the high dollar house unannounced, (the hot tub company always wants me to eyeball things before the big day), and all I had was the address, so no advance notice. I knock on the door, and get checked out before they open the door, and since I haven't had a haircut in 3 months I am looking rougher then usual. So I made sure to have my biz card out and when the teenage girl opened the door I immediately handed it to her and said I was "the crane guy" who was going to be setting the new hot tub. Her eyes got big, she squealed, and jumped up and down. Then her mother came into view, and her response was entirely different. Turns out I had ruined her Christmas surprise to the daughter, and she was PISSED. She made me wait long enough while she "put her shoes on", that I almost drove off as I had a job to get to, and when she reappeared I immediately apologized for letting the cat out of the bag, expecting her to laugh and to say something like "how could you know." But she wasn't buying it, she was still pissed, she showed me the tub site and as expected it will be an easy pick, and as I left she gave me one final glare.

The job will be on the 22nd., and if she still has an attitude, I may tell her daugher there is no Santa Claus.

 

[Natman]

After setting the steel trusses on a new convenience store/gas station, I had to lift the steel panels that lay on the trusses, prior to insulation and the rubber membrane. Some of these bundles weighed over 4K, and one edge was sharp. Residential metal roofing I've picked before "rolled", the rigging pulled it into a cylindrical shape more or less, and it seem to hurt it at all. This heavier, plus shaped different, stuff didn't do that, all 6 bundles remained flat and stable. The welder crew says they always used cables, but he also said they didn't use a spreader bar, so even though they do this a lot, metal roofs, I exercised my authority and told him we WOULD be using a spreader, and my lifting grade chain. Of course they needed them placed at my limit, and at one point I thought I might need a 31 ton crane instead of my 30 ton, but we got it done. This chain is where I currently buy all my diesel, and this new one is just 1 mile down the road from my yard, versus the others in town being a real hassle to get to, so it was great for me to do the work, on a place I'll patronize a lot when it's done.

 

[Natman]

My little hot tub job on the 22.nd got canceled. My tub guy said the people canceled their order altogether, though he didn't feel it was because I let the cat out the bag and ruined their big Christmas surprise to their daughter, but other factors. I think that lady is still mad at me.....

 

[petepilot]

could be the tub really was`nt for the daughter

 

[skyking1]

That pick looks great with the spreader, and would look like puckered nether regions without. I don't see how you could get a decent bite on it otherwise.

 

[Natman]

I rarely use the two lengths of lifting grade chain I have, but the edges were so sharp I didn't even want to use my pads (old fire hose) as it might have ruined them! The foreman on this job spoke English, barely,and we had to work around that (I speak no Spanish) and keep it safe, but I could have swore he said that they didn't use a spreader bar, but once I determined that was what he meant to say, I called BS on it and then had to make my point clear, we are using a spreader bar. A good crew though, they liked how it went. I'd rather work with a crew like them then good English speakers who were dummies and thought they were hot stuff! It's rare, never actually, to see a Hispanic crew here, other then the language thing, not be competent. Guess I'm racist, and a white guy.

 

[skyking1]

We had to use a spreader on our structure set the other day for the grease interceptor.
The submittals and drawings all showed inside clutch pick points on that thing, and there weren't any just the outside ones.
This was extra problematic for me because I had a pretty tight trench box!
I was able to lay on my belly and reach down and flip open the clutch with a shovel while somebody else pried the clutch out of the pocket with another shovel.

 

[Natman]

Lifting fuel tanks for a big farm that was setting up a new site for them all, I found out something interesting. A 10,000 gallon tanks weighs 10,000 lbs., and a 750 gallon tank weighs 7500 lbs., +- a few hundred pounds anyway. This formula came in handy as we had to move them well over 200' away, so multiple setups were needed. I could move the 10 K tanks 70' at a time, 35' from behind me, another 35' in front of me, repeat. We actually measured out my setup points, didn't eyeball it, in order to max out my picks and it worked pretty good.

Some, most tanks were vertical, with no lifting eyes anywhere, so we farmer engineered it by removing the 3" center pipe nipple and rigged my red round sling to a big shackle down inside the tank. This kept my sling just free of the fitting, while the shackle was large enough to prevent it pulling through. One big tank was horizontal though, and against my advice they wanted to rig me to the sides, they claimed that was how they picked it earlier, using two tractors. I said OK, but I'm going to pick it and then wait a few minutes while it's still over the truck. Did so, and with it 6" above the trailer, after 2 minutes, one of the welded on round bar pick points (being side loaded like it was, no surprise) failed and down it came. No harm to it or my equipment, and then we did it the way I originally suggested, with my spreader bar and slings clear around it. Some of these farmers are dangerous, they are expert half assers and are used to getting away with it, not this time. He's lucky it didn't fail over his new tank farm containment walls with it's EPDM membrane, that at least he did real good. Anyway, my forecasting this failure made me the golden boy for the rest of the job, I could no wrong, you guys will rightfully say I shouldn't have picked it that way to start with, and I agree!

Another job on the local Flying J truckstop, this big HVAC that came all bolted together as one unit, after much conferring with the HVAC guys, this is what I came up with. The posted rigging "tips" on the equipment assumed I had rigging of exactly the correct lengths to pick it in 6 or 8 places at once, totally ignoring the geometry of the thing and that rigging comes in even numbers, in my case I carry 12' and 20's, and if warned in advance I'll bring my lifting grade chain and this chain fall. Though I am unclear as to it's use legally, as it's not "rated for overhead lifting," we got the job done.

 

[skyking1]

On the water, they use chain falls like that all the time. That was a mess of a pick to figure out!

 

[Natman]

Got a "hurry up" call yesterday, out of the blue. A good home and light commercial contractor customer, I made record time from my home to the job site. Seems his rented excavator had gotten too close to the hole, and it had caved in, leaving the 20 ton machine in danger of tipping over. I backed in, as is my usual, and only then googled it's model number and found it's weight. I immediately told him all I could do was to act as a dead man, rigging to his undercarriage, and then maybe he could raise the boom(HIS boom) and swing it around to provide a brace to prevent it from toppling. No way was I going to hook onto it, too heavy, too precarious.
It was ticklish, for him in it's op cab, ( I had enough chain rigged from my front tow hook to it, so that even if it had toppled, I wouldn't get drug in) to very slowly move the boom 90 degrees and plant it, but once he did, the pressure was off and we all took a deep breath. But then he found his one track that wasn't airborne, was bound up from the side load, and would not budge, all he could do was tread air with the other one! The more he tried various combos of boom and track action, the worse it got. It was getting towards dark, and it was obvious we were done for the day, I suggested to him that since we hadn't bent anything and nobody had yet got hurt, we bag it, and I unhooked and left. His boom keeping it more or less on an even keel all night.

I gave him the contact info of a guy with an 80 ton Terex truck crane, who I knew was working just 3 miles away as luck would have it, after first sending the Terex op some pictures so he would have a heads up. My other work today got canceled due to wind, and since I was in town already I drove my car over to the site just to see what was up. I couldn't have timed it better, about 5 minutes after I pulled up they made the pick, I kicked myself for not bringing some popcorn. It was great to just be an observer and not have any skin in the game, not to mention the mud they were dealing with. After it was out, I did drive over and roll down my window so both parties could thank me for getting them the right tool for the job, and then I drove off, job well done, and I didn't even get my hands dirty! I barely made it out in my 2 wheel drive car, a mix of mud and frost, and it was getting warmer, there was a good chance the Terex might have problems and I didn't need to be there to see that, besides he had a support crew there. The track never came off, no damage, other then to the contractors checkbook, and no one got hurt, so I can afford to be a bit humorous about it all. I'm not sure why they used 2 spreader bars, other then for extra capacity I guess, first time I've seen two used side by side like that. about it all.