"JCAlan" (jcalan)
09/06/2016 at 21:37 • Filed to: None
2
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"JCAlan" (jcalan)
09/06/2016 at 21:37 • Filed to: None | 2
| 13 |
Doing truck stuff!
I had read horror stories about how difficult walk-behind trenchers can be to handle, so I was a little nervous about renting one this morning. Well that combined with the fact that the last time I rented a piece of equipment, hauling it home was a legitimate nightmare.
I’ll go ahead and tell you about that incident first. A few years ago I rented a Bobcat with a bucket to move some stone. I could have had them deliver it, but that costs extra and takes longer. Besides I, being a manly man, had a truck. A black (of course) 90 GMC Sierra regular-cab short-bed 4x4 with a shit-ton of miles and no front bumper for reasons unknown to me. It had a trailer hitch on it, but I don’t think I had ever towed anything with it before. If I remember right, it didn’t even have the proper wiring setup for the lights. But we hooked it up, and away I went. Bobcats are heavy. And even though it was a double-axle trailer, they put the thing all the way to the front of it so the tongue weight must have been insane. A few miles from my home, the bolts holding the hitch onto my truck RIPPED THROUGH THE FRAME, and the tongue of the trailer hit the ground. Just the rear bolts ripped through, so the hitch was still held on by the front two, but the whole thing was now dragging on the road. Through shear will, and whatever power was left in that 200k Chevy small block, I managed to drag the thing home. The safety chains got under the tongue and were sheared off from grinding the pavement. The Sparks must have been fantastic! After I got home I unloaded the Bobcat, used it to cram the hitch back in place, and pick up the trailer to attach it to the bumper ball. I bought new chains out of my own pocket, and towed it back to the rental place using the bumper without incident. For months you could see the marks on the road as evidence of the embarrassing affair. To this day, I wonder why we use frame-mounted hitches when this episode proved that bumpers are actually stronger, at least on old trucks.
So you can see why this last ordeal, combined with horror stories online about trenchers lurching out of control, had me a little shaky about the whole situation. But everything went quite well, despite the kid at the rental place hooking the trailer up like this:
The chains weren’t long enough, so he just hooked them together behind the ball. Luckily, the ball didn’t come undone, because I’m quite certain this fail safe would have failed. But I made it home without any incident that would have left me liable to the Department of Transportation for road surface damages. So with that aside, and the Dingo unloaded, how did it do?
The Ride:
It’s a walk-behind. Actually, it’s a walk-in-front, because you use it backwards. Kind of weird, but it works.
The Controls:
Pretty simple. Across the top you’ve got throttle, choke, and ignition. On the bottom you’ve got chain control (left for reverse, right for forward), then the unit movement control (whole thing forward for forward, whole thing back for reverse, twist for turning), loader control (up-down for up-down, left-right for pivot), and parking brake.
Utility:
It kicked butt. I had about a hundred foot trench to dig, and it did it in about half an hour. I had it back at the rental place in well under the three hour window that gets you half your money back. Overall I was impressed with how easy this thing was to use and how quickly it got the job done. I never felt like I was out of my league using the Dingo. Plus, it did not eat my baby. Bonus!
Here’s some time-lapse dashcam footage of me doing the trickiest part where two trenches had to meet at an intersection. Notice the end when I realize that I can’t get the trencher back to the truck without crossing the trench I had just made, and after some contemplation finally decide to go all the way around the house with it.
Urambo Tauro
> JCAlan
09/06/2016 at 22:00 |
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I installed a receiver hitch on my ‘95 Sierra just a few months ago. I’m trying to visualize what it would take to make the bolts rip out like that.
Was it just because of the added tongue weight, or do you suppose the receiver wasn’t bolted in properly? (Maybe both?)
I see that this was all a few years ago, but do you recall if you balanced the Bobcat on the trailer better for the return trip? That might have have something to do with the truck’s bumper holding up...
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JCAlan
> Urambo Tauro
09/06/2016 at 22:09 |
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I think the load was horribly imbalanced, and possibly the frame was rusted and weak? I really don't know...I've never seen anything like it, thankfully. On the trip back in, I did make sure to center to bobcat better on the trailer.
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Urambo Tauro
> JCAlan
09/06/2016 at 22:23 |
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The receiver is held in by six vertical bolts, each of which ought to have nice big, thick washers on them. The bumper is held in by only four horizontal bolts, and they’re grouped closer together on brackets that are mounted to the end of the frame channels.
The bumper should NOT be stronger than the receiver hitch (if the receiver was installed correctly on a good frame). Maybe you did have some rust or other issues under there. At any rate, I’m sure that balancing the load helped a lot.
RandomTask
> JCAlan
09/06/2016 at 23:00 |
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That is a damn good looking Sierra. I can’t tell from the picture, but is it an All Terrain X Edition? Looks like it, but it doesn’t have the tumble bar in the bed.
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JCAlan
> RandomTask
09/06/2016 at 23:08 |
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It’s an all terrain, not an X. However, I blacked out the mirrors, door handles, window moldings, door moldings, running boards, and wheels. All of these it shares with the X. When I first saw one, I was like, “hey they did everything to that truck that I did to mine!” Except for that stupid roll bar.
Clown Shoe Pilot
> JCAlan
09/06/2016 at 23:09 |
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Whatcha gonna put in that trench? I’m doing an underground electrical service later this week. My irrigation guy is going to cut the trench for me, but I need to come up w/ the auger to dig the 5' hole for the meter loop pole.
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JCAlan
> Clown Shoe Pilot
09/06/2016 at 23:11 |
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Ruining power from the main in the barn to a sub panel in the shed.
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Clown Shoe Pilot
> JCAlan
09/06/2016 at 23:19 |
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cool. I’m running power to my workshop, but it’s getting its own service. My house service (built in the mid 80s) isn’t beefy enough to run the house and the workshop simultaneously. I have welding machines, a plasma cutter, and a big ass compressor to run, and I’ll be air conditioning the shop as well.
OpposResidentLexusGuy - USE20, XF20, XU30 and Press Cars
> JCAlan
09/06/2016 at 23:38 |
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Rental equipment reviews are always the best review.
http://oppositelock.kinja.com/vermeer-s450tx…
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JCAlan
> Clown Shoe Pilot
09/07/2016 at 07:32 |
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Nice shop!
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JCAlan
> OpposResidentLexusGuy - USE20, XF20, XU30 and Press Cars
09/07/2016 at 07:35 |
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Nice! Yours had a cup holder!
Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer
> JCAlan
09/09/2016 at 09:43 |
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Bumper hitch vs frame mount hitch:
Come at me bro. That’s both in one unit. Can’t see that it matters really, they both attach to the same place.
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JCAlan
> Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer
09/09/2016 at 09:44 |
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That’s pretty wild.