AussieGarbo
Heavy Duty Stress
My latest inconvenience on the weekend job involved a truck completely shitting itself at the start of the shift. I left the yard early on Sunday morning, arriving at the first site a little before 2am, pulled the compactor onto the truck and rolled forward to drop it back down, so I could hoist it back on from the other side for emptying. As I was raising the dino frame to sit the bottom of the packer back against the ground, there was a loud clunk and thud, followed by a brief jerking movement at the back. It was too dark to know what had happened, so I resumed doing what I was doing, until I noticed the frame and packer lean to the side... which simply told me something was no longer connected. I went to the back of the truck, shined the light from my phone in a particular area and spotted a crucial steel part had broken. This part is critical because it supports the shaft on which the dino frame pivots, therefore connecting the dino to the chassis. On the left side of the break you’ve got an arm which is connected to the roller, but that’s quite insignificant compared to the stress which comes from the thick arm wrapped around the far right of the shaft. Note that roller is there to absorb the weight from a load, but it’s kind of useless when there isn’t a hydraulic attached so you can adjust the position.
This area is subject to a lot of downward force, which comes from gravity pushing the weight of the load towards the ground. When you initially lift a compactor or container off the ground, this area cops the forward weight of the load, but the stress reduces as you pull the big bin further onto the frame of the truck. However, as soon as the rear of the compactor or container leaves the ground, the full brunt of the entire load is focused on this shaft and chassis connection. That’s why you straight away lower the frame onto the chassis to distribute the weight, then pull the load on the rest of the way to further distribute the weight across the length of the truck. A load might involve an empty skip weighing a bit over a tonne or a loaded portable/integrated compactor weighing over 10t (such as this circumstance). It wasn’t until this situation that I took notice of which parts get absolutely hammered by the job.
The truck it happened to has been around since 1997, so I won’t bother guessing how many dino jobs it has handled, but clearly life has taken it’s toll. I wonder how the same join on the left side is coping with all the pressure; might totally break away too! Anyway lucky this happened very early in the morning, because I dropped the packer in the middle of a busy shopping centre carpark for a good couple of hours while I went for the long drive to get another truck... totally fucked me over for the day but. Just a few weeks earlier with this same truck I got stranded in a loading dock for over 4 hours due to a rooted starter motor and a couple of weeks before that the hook disconnected from the hydraulic cylinder (different operator but). Old truck wear and tear? Yep. Time for a new truck? Overdue.
Heavy Duty Stress
My latest inconvenience on the weekend job involved a truck completely shitting itself at the start of the shift. I left the yard early on Sunday morning, arriving at the first site a little before 2am, pulled the compactor onto the truck and rolled forward to drop it back down, so I could hoist it back on from the other side for emptying. As I was raising the dino frame to sit the bottom of the packer back against the ground, there was a loud clunk and thud, followed by a brief jerking movement at the back. It was too dark to know what had happened, so I resumed doing what I was doing, until I noticed the frame and packer lean to the side... which simply told me something was no longer connected. I went to the back of the truck, shined the light from my phone in a particular area and spotted a crucial steel part had broken. This part is critical because it supports the shaft on which the dino frame pivots, therefore connecting the dino to the chassis. On the left side of the break you’ve got an arm which is connected to the roller, but that’s quite insignificant compared to the stress which comes from the thick arm wrapped around the far right of the shaft. Note that roller is there to absorb the weight from a load, but it’s kind of useless when there isn’t a hydraulic attached so you can adjust the position.
This area is subject to a lot of downward force, which comes from gravity pushing the weight of the load towards the ground. When you initially lift a compactor or container off the ground, this area cops the forward weight of the load, but the stress reduces as you pull the big bin further onto the frame of the truck. However, as soon as the rear of the compactor or container leaves the ground, the full brunt of the entire load is focused on this shaft and chassis connection. That’s why you straight away lower the frame onto the chassis to distribute the weight, then pull the load on the rest of the way to further distribute the weight across the length of the truck. A load might involve an empty skip weighing a bit over a tonne or a loaded portable/integrated compactor weighing over 10t (such as this circumstance). It wasn’t until this situation that I took notice of which parts get absolutely hammered by the job.
The truck it happened to has been around since 1997, so I won’t bother guessing how many dino jobs it has handled, but clearly life has taken it’s toll. I wonder how the same join on the left side is coping with all the pressure; might totally break away too! Anyway lucky this happened very early in the morning, because I dropped the packer in the middle of a busy shopping centre carpark for a good couple of hours while I went for the long drive to get another truck... totally fucked me over for the day but. Just a few weeks earlier with this same truck I got stranded in a loading dock for over 4 hours due to a rooted starter motor and a couple of weeks before that the hook disconnected from the hydraulic cylinder (different operator but). Old truck wear and tear? Yep. Time for a new truck? Overdue.