What did YOU do today?

[scotts90ranger]

Just stopped for lunch but I filled the transmission while it was still out (way easier), got it under the truck and mounted up, trans mount is on, T case shifter is mounted to tail housing, slave is mounted. Next step is bolting the starter up then drivelines...

 

[Blmpkn]

FINALLY finished my 2nd crossmember

Kinda at a loss as to what to do about the one that's supposed to be right above the axle though.. not enough space to really put a tube member there.. the diff would hit it on compression long before the axle tubes would hit the bump stops.. can't really put one just forward or just rearward of the axle as that's where the shock mounts need to be..

Almost considering running two lengths of tube parallel with the frame.. one on either side of the pumpkin.. connecting this one I just finished and the one out back. It would give me an excuse to finally use the tubing notcher I picked up a few years ago and would REALLY stiffen things up.. but then I'd need to fab some upper shock mounts since the tubes would likely be in the way of the factory ones.. not a big deal in the grand scheme of things but I'm kinda tired of fab for the year lol.

Decisions decisions..

 

[racsan]

busy day, a lot of local yard sales, went to a few. scored a ‘94 craftsman 4hp/25 gallon w/20’ of air hose for $35. was quite a bit of water in the tank. drained it & tried it out. works but dont know how well it will do with air tools yet. line was directly attached to the compressor and a tire chuck on the other end . no quick-connectors . Bigger fish to fry today so about 1:00 I dove into the 8N. was quite the challenge. the new valve bodies that go on the sides of the pump are slightly thicker, so had to do some clearancing on the tractor housing & slightly on the pump to get it in. still a fight. 50# of pump & your lifting it straight up into the bottom of the tractor. And it was a few tries back & forth. hate to grind but no choice. once the hydraulics were all together I took off the transmission shifter plate to see if I was missing any shift fork to rail retaining screws. (found one last night when I drained the oil) Everything was there so it must of fell out & was replaced some time ago. Put it back together & filled with oil, tested the 3-point. goes higher than it ever did and will do it at idle, before the motor needed revved to get it to lift, eventually it wouldnt lift at all. pistons in the pump did look wore, im sure the corosponding “cylinders “ were wore too, and since they are part of the valve bodies it only made sence to do it all. Hopefully I will never need to be in there ever again. next its rear fenders back on & flip the rear tires around. I only had it in the wide “cultivating” stance so the engine hoist would fit between the back tires, the top plate is a good 75 pounds and as you lower it theres linkange to align. Its odd that the shop manual has no tourque specs, had to pull up a online chart & use average for bolt diameter/pitch/hardness. most of today’s fasteners were 7/16 coarse grade 5.

 

[lil_Blue_Ford]

Worked on my brush hog some more, apparently it is a Howse with an AG-Mo gearbox. 5’ with a 3-point. No idea how to identify the model.

Getting the stump jumper off was an escalation of force. Tried spray lube last night and again today, tried banging on it, tried hammering on it through the window for the blade bolts, wasn’t showing any signs of moving. Finally punched two holes in it so I could get a 2-jaw 5-ton gear puller on it. No bueno. Dragged out ol Smokey the Blue Tipped Wrench and heated up the sleeve that fits over the splined output while the gear puller was cranked tight. Took a bit but it finally let go. Hopefully I didn’t trash the bottom seal. I’m gonna look at ordering parts later.

Welded up all the cracks I could get at and welded the one skid back on. Looks like there’s probably some cracks on the front but I’d need to move this thing to get to them so that will be something to deal with later. It’s still a little rough, but it will work for awhile, I can make nice later, I just need it working.

 

[sgtsandman]

busy day, a lot of local yard sales, went to a few. scored a ‘94 craftsman 4hp/25 gallon w/20’ of air hose for $35. was quite a bit of water in the tank. drained it & tried it out. works but dont know how well it will do with air tools yet. line was directly attached to the compressor and a tire chuck on the other end . no quick-connectors . Bigger fish to fry today so about 1:00 I dove into the 8N. was quite the challenge. the new valve bodies that go on the sides of the pump are slightly thicker, so had to do some clearancing on the tractor housing & slightly on the pump to get it in. still a fight. 50# of pump & your lifting it straight up into the bottom of the tractor. And it was a few tries back & forth. hate to grind but no choice. once the hydraulics were all together I took off the transmission shifter plate to see if I was missing any shift fork to rail retaining screws. (found one last night when I drained the oil) Everything was there so it must of fell out & was replaced some time ago. Put it back together & filled with oil, tested the 3-point. goes higher than it ever did and will do it at idle, before the motor needed revved to get it to lift, eventually it wouldnt lift at all. pistons in the pump did look wore, im sure the corosponding “cylinders “ were wore too, and since they are part of the valve bodies it only made sence to do it all. Hopefully I will never need to be in there ever again. next its rear fenders back on & flip the rear tires around. I only had it in the wide “cultivating” stance so the engine hoist would fit between the back tires, the top plate is a good 75 pounds and as you lower it theres linkange to align. Its odd that the shop manual has no tourque specs, had to pull up a online chart & use average for bolt diameter/pitch/hardness. most of today’s fasteners were 7/16 coarse grade 5. View attachment 133163View attachment 133164View attachment 133165View attachment 133166

It appears that you will get to have some fun with a broken bolt at some point. It looks like you have one in the second picture.

 

[alwaysFlOoReD]

FINALLY finished my 2nd crossmember

View attachment 133155View attachment 133156

Kinda at a loss as to what to do about the one that's supposed to be right above the axle though.. not enough space to really put a tube member there.. the diff would hit it on compression long before the axle tubes would hit the bump stops.. can't really put one just forward or just rearward of the axle as that's where the shock mounts need to be..

Almost considering running two lengths of tube parallel with the frame.. one on either side of the pumpkin.. connecting this one I just finished and the one out back. It would give me an excuse to finally use the tubing notcher I picked up a few years ago and would REALLY stiffen things up.. but then I'd need to fab some upper shock mounts since the tubes would likely be in the way of the factory ones.. not a big deal in the grand scheme of things but I'm kinda tired of fab for the year lol.

Decisions decisions..

I would say the most important places for cross member is where the suspension connects to the frame. Over the axle isn't it.

 

[Bill]

I went to Walmart to buy batteries and was robbed by the Energizer Bunny. The last time I bought a pack of 24 Energizer Max batteris I paid about $8. Today they were $18.

 

[scotts90ranger]

F350 saga is dumb... once I got to the brakes drivers side was to metal as I'd seen so changed that then went to change the pads on the passenger side and the caliper was hanging and the dang rotor was cracked! Conveniently I'd grabbed two rotors when Advance was going out of business but that didn't save me from the $80 caliper... or the $65 pads (they didn't have any of either when I was getting stuff or I would have). When I went to set it down and clean up for a test drive I noticed the drivers side rear tire was low, 10psi... had a rock in the center of the tread... aired it up to deal with later. Then I backed it out of the shop for a test drive and now it won't stay in reverse which is a thing according to YouTube at least, I'll look into that later as I'm burnt out on this thing... Of course the brakes need bled bad, wife was gone for a while so we'll get to that in the morning. A bit ago I pulled the tire with the rock in it and broke the bead which involved working on the dang bead breaker... conveniently I have some of the plug patch things so I got one of those in there after buffing the inside of the tire so it would stick good... Stopped for dinner so will get the bead seated again shortly...

 

[racsan]

It appears that you will get to have some fun with a broken bolt at some point. It looks like you have one in the second picture.

yes, was that way when I got it in february. thats one of the things that told me someone had been in there before. Considering where it is I just let it be & put a little silicone there to keep oil splash in & dirt out. Would of been a different story & headache if it was a bolt on the underside holding the pump up in.

 

[racsan]

Did a little this morning on the tractor. Mounted both rear fenders, installed a ammo box for tools, hitch pins ect. Bracket is for a S.M.V. sign when going down the road. Have a better military ammo box but its a bit wider & wouldnt quite work in that spot. plus it seems to be waterproof & I didn’t really want to put holes in it. this one says “carboloy” on it, isnt sealed & already had drain holes in it. matches tractor close enough that I wasn’t going to paint it. Got exhaust back on, was alot easier dealing with the pump reinstall with that out of the way.

 

[Rick W]

FINALLY finished my 2nd crossmember

View attachment 133155View attachment 133156

Kinda at a loss as to what to do about the one that's supposed to be right above the axle though.. not enough space to really put a tube member there.. the diff would hit it on compression long before the axle tubes would hit the bump stops.. can't really put one just forward or just rearward of the axle as that's where the shock mounts need to be..

Almost considering running two lengths of tube parallel with the frame.. one on either side of the pumpkin.. connecting this one I just finished and the one out back. It would give me an excuse to finally use the tubing notcher I picked up a few years ago and would REALLY stiffen things up.. but then I'd need to fab some upper shock mounts since the tubes would likely be in the way of the factory ones.. not a big deal in the grand scheme of things but I'm kinda tired of fab for the year lol.

Decisions decisions..

Nothing critical here, actually I’m asking to be educated. I have a couple of questions for the group.

I vaguely remember from mechanical engineering classes 50 years ago that there’s a reason why those cross members are riveted or bolted instead of welded. As tight as they are, the rivets will still allow a tiny bit of motion. I realize some of you guys want to stiffen the frame, but again my vague memory tells me that having it riveted with the tiny little bit of motion prolongs the life of everything because it avoids fatigue failures. What do you think about that?

Also, when I built the Road Ranger and added the drag along axle, I had to remove the crossmember at the very end of the frame. That’s the one that bolted or riveted between the frame rails, but the main body of it was tilted on like a 45° angle front to back.

To compensate for that, I had a very strong crossmember under the frame about 15 inches from the back. It was a 2 x 2 square tube, and I want to say it was 3/16” -1/4” wall, bolted. The front of the extra axle’s spring mounts were welded on the bottom of that (trailer spring mounts).

I also put four or five pieces of small angle from side to side under the top of the frame rails and over the bottom of the frame rails. I think it was like three-quarter inch by 1/8” angle. They were bolted with single or double bolts. (3/8”). Two or three were located in certain places to hold a toolbox I have hidden under there or something else, and the other two or three were evenly spaced where I thought I needed them to restore the integrity of the frame.

When it was all assembled, before the fenders or the diamond plate deck, I marked everything with thin crayon marks across the connection points, and I took regular typing paper and glued it from the top little rails to the bottom little rails, and in a couple of spots on three sides to the frame rails. If anything is moving, you’ll see a change in the crayon marks, and if there’s significant motion, the paper will tear.

I literally ran up and down over curbs and over a couple of rough spots to see if I was getting motion or twisting on the frame rails and cross members. Nothing appeared to have changed after three tries, each time going a little faster and a little more aggressive.

Let me also offer that that rig is entirely a highway rig. The worst I’m ever going to do is hit a speed bump, pot hole or back over a curb at a very slow speed. No rock crawling for that toy. (I still remember the pain of slipping in the grass in front of the crew when I was trying to park at the Ford Nationals. Next year, all approach the group from the backside).

My point being, instead of a massive crossmember, could you build a web of smaller members, and accomplish the same thing. If you’re going off road and such, in addition to little angles going side to side, but more of them, I would cross brace some of those angles on the horizontal plane, and cross brace them in a couple places on the vertical plane. Yes/no?

These are my weird thoughts, and I’m wondering what folks think.

 

[alwaysFlOoReD]

WAG the factory uses rivets for speed and to overcome slight discrepancy in manufacturing. Ill check, but i believe I've seen welded crossmember on the front of my 2006 dodge 1500. There is a HAZ; Heat Affected Zone where the metallurgy is changed, so maybe that is another reason...l had a 54 Chev 1ton with an extended frame. The inner and outer frame sections were stitch welded. I never saw any signs of failure, other than moisture getting in between and rust forcing the flanges apart. Also had professionals put in a cross member for a fifth wheel, it was welded in place. DOT questioned me once about the cross member but once I said I paid a professional gave me no grief.

 

[scotts90ranger]

Yesterday I also pulled the old rotten tires off of the pipe trailer I drug home for my brother last week and put the Hankook's I took of my '97 Ranger last year, they're not great but better than what was there... also took out the washers that were under the wheels for some reason, two flat washers on every stud, the studs have an odd step on them which means for normal steel wheels the washers would be helpful but with the explorer aluminum wheels it's just fine...

late start for the day, been a heck of a weekend working on stuff...

 

[racsan]

Still have a lot to do but uts a running, functional machine again. Have lights & a alternator kit to put on, the spare hood needs filler finishing & paint. Going to paint the front wheels too. Not sure yet if I will use the original grille or the ‘48 from grandpa’s tractor. (he put a backhoe & loader on a 8N way back in the day, grille was removed rather than hack it up for a front crank driven hydraulic pump, its in nearly perfect condition). My goal is to get it done before november. We’ll see if that happens.

 

[superj]

Going out for a bicycle ride. Probably be around 15 miles.