New portable lift in our shop

I had to bring the truck to the shop today and they had the spare pumper up on our new portable lift.

that looks really neat but i would still be paranoid working under it

My department uses similar lifts made but they are made by koni. They use six when they need to lift an aerial. They are pretty cool, but I think a lift you just drive on or over is actually more efficient. As it takes a while to slide each one around each wheel.

I can't make out the writing. What fire department?

We have mostly Koni ones also.

That's super cool, and super scary, all at the same time. That's a whole lotta truck on 4 jacks that aren't bolted down.

I think Wally posted a bus on those a while back. Looked terrifying to me too. I just don't trust the machinery.

When I put a car on jackstands I always shake it, both fore/aft and left/right, before I get under it.

I'd be scared to shake that. Although I'm not sure it would notice my best efforts. ;-)

David

mndsm wrote: That's super cool, and super scary, all at the same time. That's a whole lotta truck on 4 jacks that aren't bolted down.

Yeah, but at least the rescue equipment is close at hand...

(yes, I realize that's an Engine, not a Rescue, but work with me here...)

That's impressive and scary at the same time...

Before lifting the truck, you have to dump the 750 gallon water tank. That's about 6200 extra pounds.

How much does that truck weigh (within 5k or so)?

It's been a long time since I've driven that one but to the best of my recollection, it's about 35,000 pounds.

Each post of the lift is rated at 18,000 pounds.

That's just a crazy amount of weight. Even with the jacks at half their rated capacity, I'd give some serious thought before ducking under that monster!

Even knowing it's safe from an intellectual standpoint, it would still give me the heebie jeebies to stand under that truck. Sort of like being in underground mine shafts. In both cases I'm not supposed to be underneath the things I'm underneath.
Way cool though.

I had to duck down and walk under it once today, just for fun.

mazdeuce wrote: it would still give me the heebie jeebies... In both cases I'm not supposed to be underneath the things I'm underneath.

I dated a girl like that for a while when I first moved to Daytona. Except the lifts would have the rated in crazy instead of pounds.

jg

We have those made by Gray, after you use them for ten years you don't even think about it....I'm not sure that's a good thing though.

Woody wrote: I had to duck down and walk under it once today, just for fun.

tell us the truth....did you kinda walk fast, or did you mozy on through there?

I looked around a bit, but I couldn't help thinking "low bid"...

Go to the airport and watch the mechanics lift airplanes that weigh ten times what that truck does using jacks that aren't bolted down. They tend to move around a bit when you're swinging the gear.

I see im not the only lazy bastard to only lift something high enough to roll under it while sitting on a chair/stool.

Everything is relative, as anyone who has ever worked at a heavy railroad locomotive shop will tell you. Our shop was two locomotives deep per track and about a block and a half wide. Each track was on a 25' center.

Various operations are done in different areas of the shop. So often a locomotive will be carried from one area of the shop to another by overhead crane at least two or three times while under repair, even more for a full rebuild. So of course they pass over all the other locomotives and workers in their path.

The first few times a 100+ ton locomotive passes over your head while hanging from a 75' high overhead crane and traveling at a fast trot you duck. After a week or so you don't even look up.

Now OSHA has made that process much safer. They can only pass a 100+ ton locomotive over your head if you are wearing a plastic hard hat. That always made me feel so much safer.

Wow, that is cool. I never figured you'd be lifting locomotives when working on them, but I guess you have to sometimes. But actually carrying them around the shop? Eeek.

Rupert wrote: Now OSHA has made that process much safer. They can only pass a 100+ ton locomotive over your head if you are wearing a plastic hard hat. That always made me feel so much safer.

Do your OSHA inspectors have an unnatural fascination with desert birds?