moving machines and cargo weight

On Thu, 18 Dec 2003 17:23:06 -0600, Wayne Cook brought forth from the murky depths:

Amazing! Fords have always had much thicker frames than GM or Mopar. What do you mean by "newer"?

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On Thu, 18 Dec 2003 21:23:34 -0500, Mike Hanz brought forth from the murky depths:

Mogs are truly cool.

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Haven't seen anyone bring up the problem of brakes . Overloaded and trying to stop will blow your mind. You ever hear of brake fade. The last time it happened to me I had brakes for about 1 second and then nothing.

Don't overload it isn't worth it.

WOW! thanks for everyones input,

I was initially wondering if I should call this OT, but figured I am moving machines. Now I realise that this is a very RCM type of topic :)

Turns out my truck is rated at 2080 lbs payload capacity but after careful consideration I opted to rent a 14' truck from UHaul. I am paying 19.95 for the day with 79 cents a mile, since it is only going to be about 15 miles round trip the total cost will be around $35. This gets me a loading ramp, enclosed cargo area and the ability to do it in one trip. I am still wondering if it was the best way to go, but I am certain is the safest way.

I have a cherry picker and a hydraulic elevating table as well as plenty of dollies to help with unloading. I suspect I will use a standard moving dolly and wheel them down the supplied uhaul ramp. I hope it can support 700lbs.

Another benefit is I will go ahead and use it to move my shear and worktables to my new shop which is 1 mile from my home. My wife is also seeing how maybe I do need to buy a 5 ton flatbed truck :)

Thank you for all your advice,

Oliver

Oliver,

You should know all about overloading machinery if I understand your handle to mean you put a V8 in a TR4! Is it a Rover V8 or did you put a big American iron thing in there? I had a TR4 and while it was a neat car, it was incredibly flexible. It would be pretty scary with more weight and a lot of power. What diff and gearbox did you use?

Keep in mind, I'm not casting aspersions on your sanity. My daily driver is a '93 Volvo 940 wagon with a 400HP Ford 347 and Tremec.

BTW, I agree with the folks that said that you're more likely to overload your tires and rear end then anything else. I'd go one at a time or rent a trailer.

Regards,

Peter

"V8TR4" more then 2000 pounds of stuff. I always assumed that 1 ton meant it was

Ford puts out a brochure on hauling and pulling that gives that kind of information for the current model year and your manual should also give the info. If your F150 is not a Harley Davidson or a Lightening, or what ever they call the current fancy sport model, it should have a load carrying capacity of at least 1600 pounds. Two would be ok, but three would overload it. Just take it easy.

I second that. I put a 10' box on a new Dodge diesel cab & chassis, then spent three days finding someone to insure it as a tow vehicle for our travel trailer. No problem at all getting insurance if you don't mind spending $3,000 a year for something you drive perhaps three thousand miles per year. We finally found insurance reasonably, but I got close to selling the truck before we did. Regardless of your intended use, the insurance industry wants to group you with the big boys when you use big boy trucks.

Harold

"V8TR4"

Rear end is a live axle and I am working on a disc rear with a spicer pumpkin. Transmission is a Saginaw 4 speed, but am going to swap out for a 5 or 6spd.

The car has become a test bed for ideas, used to just be my sports car for tooling around town. Your brick (Volvo wagon) sounds very cool. I love station wagons and have looked at some of the conversions done on Volvos. I have always liked the Volvo 1800 sport wagon, that would be sweet with a updated engine.

At 6 miles, the transporting is not really the challenge - you could make 5 trips if you had to. The real challenge is the loading and unloading. The vehicle bed _height_ is the most important factor here. If you could use a small trailer with a bed say 16" high it would be a _lot_ easier than truck bed 42"(?) high. Vehicle trailers are pretty low to the ground.

Whoa - 700lbs (plus your weight) on a, what, 10' aluminum ramp?! I dunno - it could be expensive if you break the ramp and dump the machine and break a leg or two!

Bob

I like this one:

Then you've not looked at a Ford lately. :-)

This frame seems to be only on the F150's made since the body style change in the 90's till recently (I understand they've improved it on the new models). It's definitely not thick measuring 0.085" IRC. That plus the fact that's is a simple C only 3 1/2" tall or so at the said location makes it very weak. Both trucks I've repaired are used in the oil field which has a history of using 1/2ton Fords for this purpose. But these models don't have the frame to take the overloads along the bumpy roads. One of the trucks has had both of the rear spring hangers break as well as the frame.

Wayne Cook Shamrock, TX

"V8TR4"

I recently moved three full size Equipto modular cabinet from Gary Indiana to Metro Detroit in a F150. These items are around 600 lbs each. I estimate I had close to 1800 lbs in the back of that truck and it handled it very well. My biggest concern wasn't the truck, it was the tires. As I started out under load I stopped on occastion to monitor tire temperature. Tires and truck pulled through like a champ.

Unless you modified your tires from OEM, there is next to no chance you will rub the tires on your fenders. It was mentioned here, I don't know where that information came from, but these trucks are not designed that way. Even with no jounce bumpers, you should have tire clearance.

Nobody has mentioned it yet but it is also very critical is where the weight is placed in the bed. You can definitely move two mill/drills at once. Keep the weight as close to the cab as possible to distribute the weight as evenly on all four wheels. The biggest concern is too much weight behind the rear axle. This will unload the front axle putting that extra load on the rear axle. It also creates a vehicle that doesn't steer very well if extreme. Also when you stop, this is where the weight will want to go anyway. You can decelerate much faster than you can accelerate.

Since you aren't going very far and can take it easy on surface streets, I say you don't have much to worry about. Plan each step and have a backup plan in case semething doesn't go as planned.

"V8TR4" the day with 79 cents a mile, since it is only going to be about 15 miles

Lots of good advice. I have one more suggestion. Rather than renting a U-haul, find your local broad selection truck rental place. (Del's in woodinville WA, for example) They will rent you trucks of a sort I at least have never seen at U-haul.

Last Sunday I rented a 16ft box cube truck with a full-on rail-lift-gate. The gate was rated at 3500#. For moving drill-presses, band saws, and the like, this is an enourmous advantage. Note that even a slight incline makes moving things upslope and downslope inside the truck a big hassle, so you still have to be careful with that.

And, er, why would you want 5 mill-drills? A little more variety in your machine diet might be a good thing...

bmw

that's a classic if it's the one posted here some time ago. those look like hi$ wheels/tires, the guy obviously was a lunatic or an rcm'r on a bender. the jogging part is funny, do you suppose?

--Loren

Hey there are a lot of buick 215 aftermarket suppliers on the net, just google. I am commiting heresey by putting one in my mercedes 250SL. The original engine is an overcomplicated low-output POS.

dean s

that would be the place to test, West Tx/NM Permian Basin, most pu's go 100,000 miles annually. used to be lucky to get two years use back before unleaded gasoline, thus there were many propane powered vehicles. --Loren