Something for the weekend

[Brian]

We have talked in the past about the Commer TS3 engine. This is a You-tube film of one, I will bet you all wish your tractors sound like this.

A bit further down the page is a lovely article about the Blackbird. I have seen this before but it is well worth the read.

http://oppositelock.kinja.com/the-comme ... 1695889471

[oehrick]

I always thought the Foden version had the edge over the Commer for raising goosebumps on goosebumps

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pwhm_xoDiY

Unfortunate that this one doesn't have 20 ton of timber behind it (Grooms our local timber extractors had one of these cut down with a jib & winch and with a loaded drug behind was a fine sight and sound on a dusky evening.

And of course 3 banks of these formed the famous Napier Deltic of railway loco fame now they did sound good on a bank

[Brian]

We had a car showroom in the middle of Swaffham near the War Memorial and a local coal company used to haul coal from Leicestershire in a couple of Foden 8 wheelers. When they took off up the slight incline from the traffic lights, fully loaded, you could see the plate glass windows in the show room vibrate!

Beautiful noise but it would do my head in today no doubt.

[SkidRoe]

Great video of the Foden. That is a lot of clutching!! I am used to trucks that you only have to clutch when starting out, and by no means on the splits. The only time I clutched like that was on my driver's test - no floating gears allowed. Neat location for the split lever too. Love the old stuff!!

Great links, guys - SR

[oehrick]

I wonder how one of those Foden engines would perform in a Major.

Not too well up on wagons SR but is that an air shift clutch or gearbox?

[SkidRoe]

Hey Rick,

It is definitely an air-operated 2-speed shifter.

Over hear, if it was a Fuller or an Eaton box, that would be a split shift - no clutch required, just let off on the throttle, and the up shift willl occur when the torque is released. It is also air operated, and is controled by a slide-switch on the side of the gear lever knob.

It looks like on the Foden, it is a 2-speed pre-select that does not engage until the clutch is depressed, hence why he is single clutching on the pre-selects, and double clutching on the main box shifts.

Still a way less effort than a twin-stick set-up.

Cheers - SR

[oehrick]

Different machines but we have seen the Australian Big Lizzie here before, well she had steam powered forefathers in the logging business

http://pickeringbrookheritagegroup.com/sawmills7.html

Lot of faith in wooden wheels

[Brian]

That is what I love about this site, the diversity of information. That is a great article Rick.

[oehrick]

Forest conversion to dustbowl apart, the ingenuity of both Oz & Kiwi timbermen and the gear they aquired or created with little tooling has long amazed me Brian and its wonderful to see them being commemorated in these small special interest or local community websites.

Its easy for 'modern folk' to be over awed by lifting & shifting large objects, they have had the misfortune to be brought up in the 'must be a huge crane job' era we had a large oak limb blow off a tree a while back when I was wanting to pass to get to a blood test appointment. when the boys in blue arrived talking about road closure and Highways Authority involvement I already had the towrope around the thick end and over the Swedish Brick's tow hitch, on confirming they had a broom in their car I skidded it down to the farm (past their open mouths), dropped it in their yard and went to see the vampyre - on my return it had been reduced to firewood and the police were still chucking brash over the hedge and sweeping !

The idea of having enough clearance to do that with a trunk underneath is very attractive, I'm thinking ridiculously Hi Major here

[BearCreek Majors]

Great stuff Rick!!

Pat

[BearCreek Majors]

I have always thought these were cool as well, there is an operational Phoenix just an hour north of us that they brought down to the Symco Thrasharee several years ago.

http://www.alternativefinland.com/finla ... og-hauler/

Pat

[oehrick]

Cheers for that Pat, I have seen the Lombard before but not the others and my comments about the 'upside down' loggers was in no way to diminish the efforts of Yanks & Canuks either, the size of those Redwoods !! however I think there was more factory technology available to buy in with such things as Donkey & other haulage gear, the weird and wonderful array of Shays, Heislers, Climax and other 'off road' railroad engines and especially those steam unloaders that just shoved an entire railway car or its logs over the edge into the pond for marshalling into a raft. Even the variety of US headsaws, resaws etc does not seem to be reflected downunda where locally made and knife and forked equipment appears to have been more the rule rather than the exception - possibly less well documented, maybe Pavel or one of the other Southerners can comment more objectively with local knowledge.

From reading up on UK traction engine makers it seems that other than the dedicated stump pulling engines which had heavily engineered back ends and axles, not much else was available for the timber trade heavy end hence take what you can get and modify it to what you want.

As for Scandinavia while there is a lot of timber out there I'm not sure how much the equivalent of your 'old growth' timber in both size and quantity either existed, due to latitude, or survived into the mechanised era but they certainly have got the efficient handling of current timber well mechanised and export it elsewhere.

Hope you've had a warmish winter and not had to send granny out in 6 ft of snow with the ax for more fuel to keep you warm. (I think you should award her one of these for what she has to put up with and a cookie for not grumbling about it too much - thats if you can't lay your hands on a Mason jar full of liquid sunshine that is

BTW one of my favourite internet lurking spaces is the series of films of the Phillips Box Factory Steam Sawmill and wood butchery https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_mKSKZa ... D3A6AB9D8A that three wheeled Best engine of theirs looks unstable on solid flat ground, let alone soft hilly forest tracks!

[BearCreek Majors]

Love the videos Rick! only got through the box factory so far. Got to wonder why the dogs tail is so short with all those open belts and machinery????

The old growth trees were long gone in this area by the time I was born as it was the reason most of this state was settled in the 1800's. once in a great while we will stumble across a small stand that was never cleared out, it can take you by surprise when you realize how big and dense these virgin pines are.

We didn't have a half bad winter, we cut quite a bit of fire wood and dropped one big dead Dutch Elm that was probably 4' across the base, this stuff is a bitch to split but it makes good firewood. And yes Granny did get to help!

[Brian]

Have you seen this one? Not tractor related but I did see one fitted onto a Major back end.

Ann's father was working at the Derby factory for an electrical contractor, Rashleigh Phipps, during the war and involved with the expanding factory. He was also involved with Fords Dagenham plant during the late 1950;s and early 1960's.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-fo7SmNuUU4

[oehrick]

Wonderful bit of archive film Brian - I've a picture of a steam hammer somewhere which had a 24/7 armed guard and AA installation as for quite some time it was the only thing able to knock out the crankshafts at adequate density - think they ended up press forging them as they upped the power output.

Pat that dorg may have a short tail but it still has all its legs - start counting the steam engines on that site, its addictive............

[oehrick]

We don't seem to have a Joke thread on the forum so I'll tack this on here as its a pretty wide ranging topic - this had me howling with laughter when I saw it - ex Volvo forum

A gynecologist had a burning desire to change careers and become a mechanic.

So she found out from her local tech college what was involved, signed up for evening classes and attended diligently, learning all she could.

When time for the practical exam approached, she prepared carefully for weeks, and completed the exam with tremendous skill.

When the results came back, she was surprised to find that she had obtained a mark of 150%.

Fearing an error, she called the instructor, saying "I don't want to appear ungrateful for such an outstanding result, but I wondered if there had been an error which needed adjusting."

The instructor said, "During the exam, you took the engine apart perfectly, which was worth 50% of the total mark.

You put the engine back together again perfectly, which is also worth 50% of the mark.

I gave you an extra 50% because you did all of it THROUGH the exhaust."
__________________
To stupidity & beyond

[Pavel]

Nice one, Ricky; dredge up some more.

Pavel

[oehrick]

I was thinking about rebuilding an injector pump as I read it Pavel
As a long time Goons / ISIRTA fan the surreal has always appealed - text, like wireless where the pictures are clearer and funnier!
His previous one was

After being married for thirty years, a wife asked her husband to describe her.
He looked at her for a while ... then said, "You're A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K."
She asks ... "What does that mean?"
He said, "Adorable, Beautiful, Cute, Delightful, Elegant, Foxy, Gorgeous, Hot.
She smiled happily and said ... "Oh, that's so lovely ... What about I, J, K?"
He said, "I'm Just Kidding!"
The swelling in his eye is going down and the doctor is fairly optimistic about saving his testicles.


You might like to have a trawl through some of the previous ones if you are shivering indoors at a loose end one of these cold winter nights, the thread is here

http://www.volvoforums.org.uk/showthrea ... 2&page=135

I think a lot are simply pasted links to social media or funny videos which I tend not to bother following up but among them have been a few gems like this one

Any ex pats hungry for sights of the UK there is also a photograph of the day thread and some of the landscape & nature pictures posted are stunning

http://www.volvoforums.org.uk/showthread.php?t=133106