Ideas on winch cage/ hydraulic PTO

[SkidSteerSteve]

I finally bought a new truck (ok, new to me...'99 International 9100). One of my projects for this winter is to put a winch that I've had sitting in the barn for several years waiting for me to get a truck big enough for it. It's a 30Klbs Braden mechanical drive PTO unit. Age....not a clue. Anyway, my plan is to mount it behind the cab. I've seen a thousand trucks with winches mounted like that, but never really paid attention to how they were built. Anybody ever built up a cage and/or headache rack to go along with one. I'd be open to design ideas and especially pictures.

Also, I'm debating whether or not to build up the PTO system myself. My plan it to do a hydraulic pump driven from the transmission (10sp Rockwell, I can provide more specifics if someone needs them) then plumb the other parts and couple a motor to the input shaft of the winch. This way I can have variable, reversible power to it. Also, I'll have hydraulic power for other things down the line if the need ever arises. The biggest kicker is that I can work on hydraulics, but I've never built an entire system from scratch. Anybody know of a good website that cover the 101's of hy design?

SSS

[Black Wolf]

Now your talking my language

Cool. Winch rig ups are my specialty. More than happy to help out. Winch guards can be made out of almost anything. Probably the two most popular up here are 2" square tubing 3/16" wall for the lighter rigups and 3" sch 80 pipe for the SOW bed trucks.

Any thoughts yet on how to attach winch to frame? Winch on subframe or direct onto truck frame? Tie-down bolts or shear plates? Are you using 44W Mild Steel or QT-100 for winch mounts?

I will give offer up a word of caution using hydraulic orbital motors to power up the winch worm gear..... Not really a good idea. Most mechanical winches have a double-reduction built into the jackshafts because of the different sized sprockets. I agree completely with the concept of what you are trying to do, but we've tried it up here and it really doesn't work. You end up either sacrificing speed or power. Yes, I know that through valving etc. that you can have different flow and speed of orbital motors, but this will not give you the results that you are looking for. Some winches, depending on year, are eligible for a hydraulic drive upgrade which replaces some parts on the worm gear side of the case, and converts the winch over to hydraulic with all the benfits you already mentioned.

Most of my pictures are brutally huge but I'll try to get some posted on here for you to look at.

Later,
Jason

[HMW]

Thats going to be a cool tuck steve, post some pics of it. We install Braden PD18s [all removed from older trucks] on the front of our new Buckets and digger derricks. All are hydraulic driven but we have tandem pumps to use for power. One section runs the aerial unit the other the front winch. We use air over hydraulic on the controls so we can operate the winch from a couple different places. I designed this for my company about 12 yrs ago and the aerial manufactors took pictures and now offer them that way. I mean the air/hydraulic parts were already around , it just seemed nobody put then on a bucket truck like that. Used to use cables. Baum Hydraulics has a ton of stuff like that. Does the truck already have a PTO on it?? If so the shaft driven winch would be cheaper than hydraulic. Unless you really need the hydraulics for something else I'd make it shaft driven I think.

[SkidSteerSteve]

I'll definently post pics as the project comes along. The 9100 is currently set up as a day cab, single axle, low profile tractor. For now, I just replaced the traditional goose neck coupler on my main trailer with a king pin unit. That way I can use the truck while I'm building it. My overall goal for the project is to pull the fifth wheel plate and replace it with a regular gooseneck ball. Then put the winch just behind the cab and from there back built a custom flat bed for it. Probably put a pintle hitch for the "dozer hauler" down the line and regular ball hitch for bumper pull trailers. It's going to be my super, super duty pick up...with factory air ride. My reason for picking this truck was many fold. Originally I was just going to get a one ton or a 450. But... those are $40K new and close to that used. Also if you find one reasonable, it's usually trashed out. Since this is only going to be a work truck and not a daily driver I figured why not go for the gusto. Used heavy truck are very reasonable. I gave around $12k for it. All new tires, new clutch, all new brakes. It has 528,000 miles on it, but I figure I can get another 200,000 out of it before major repairs. It was a company owned and maintained truck so I have all the records on it. With a 350hp M-11 cummins and a 10sp, it should perform very well for what I need it to.

I am starting to lean more toward the shaft drive pto. I'll have to come up with some sort of reversing gear box, though.

SSS

[HMW]

That sounds like a geat deal. Funny parts for some of the medium/heavy trucks are cheaper than the newer smaller trucks. Things like brakes and suspension parts will last you forever Why the reversing gear box?? The winch does not have a gear box that can not reverse the direction?? Or do you want to use the pto for a couple different things?

Good luck, keep us posted

[Black Wolf]

You've lost me on the reversing gearbox????? Check your transmission for PTO mounts. Should have 6 or 8-bolt covers. I can't remember off-hand the part # for the 6-bolt but the 8-bolt PTO from Chelsea is an 863. They can be driven either direction and are reversible. Can be operated by cable or pneumatics, your choice. This should solve your issue with reversing the winch. It may be a touch of overkill, but I would recommend using a Velvac (I'll find the part# if you want it) dual acting air cylinder to activate the dog-clutch on the winch drum. Just an ordinary service only brake pot works well for the band brake.

Just because you brought up changing over hitches, I built a tow box in June for a customer that should be of use to you. It has both a pop-up ball type gooseneck hitch and also a flip up Binkley mini 5th wheel rated for over 35,000 lbs. Both hitches fold down out of sight when not in use for clear deck loading. Both hitches share the same coupling centerline so all you have to do after fabbing it up is locate it on your frame in relation to your axle centerline and attach to the subframe for your deck. I forgot to mention the the hold-down bolts for the Binkley wheel, as well as the trailer plug-in are in the well where the Binkley flips into.

Later,

[Black Wolf]

More Pin Box details

Binkley welded to hinge plate using FCAW.

[Black Wolf]

More Pin Box Details

Gooseneck ball hitch & Binkley hinge details

[Black Wolf]

More Pin Box Details

Side View of Binkley Flip Over to rest of Pin Box

Hope the pictures help. Pin box is made from 3" x 3" x 1/4" tubing. Binkley hinge plate is 1/2" 44W steel, more than enough for this application. Pop up gooseneck hitch is by Buyers. Fifth wheel is by Binkley, a division of Holland Fifth Wheels and is rated for I believe 35,000lbs. Binkley welded to hinge plate is FCAW. Gooseneck hitch to pin box is FCAW. Everything else was GMAW. Hinge for Binkley is 1" Cold-rolled with 5 pieces of pipe that just slide over it arranged in a staggered finger joint. Some of the dimensions are on the tape in the photos. Just my way of keeping all the info together. If you require any further info on this, just let me know.

Later,
Jason

[Black Wolf]

Some winch & h/a rack photos

Fist two photos are of Tulsa Ruffneck 60 (30 ton) winch mounted as a second winch on a SOW bed truck.

Photo 929 is of the primary/secondary winch setup for the SOW as viewed from the deck looking towards the rear of the cab.

Next photo is of primary winch & h/a rack. Winch is a Braden 125which is rated for 125,000 lbs single line pull or 62.5M ton. Take note of the checker plate drum guard installed between the winch guard and winch drum so the winch line cannot get outside the drum and cause the operator a bunch of grief.

Last photo is of driver side pneumatic controls of Braden 125. Shown is the Velvac air cylinder controlling the dog-clutch on winch. Care should be taken when orientating the pneumatic cylinder to operate the dog-clutch, as one direction is stronger than the other. You want the stronger action holding the dog-clutch into the winch drum. Cylinder is stronger in extension as you have the full surface area of the piston to act on. In contraction, you have less surface area on the piston face because you have to subtract the area taken up by the push-rod. I'm sure for your application, either orientation is fine, I just wanted to supply the correct info for anyone building these rigups for industrial use.

Also shown in last photo is a little "extra" that I build onto winches for operator convenience. Instead of using the OEM band brake system, I cut the splines of a normal brake "S-cam" and weld it onto the OEM hex rod. This allows me to install a non-ratcheting brake slack adjuster into the band brake system so the operator has infinite adjustment in seconds with a 9/16" wrench. Slack adjuster and band brake are actuated by service pot in photo that I mentioned in a previous post. Not shown in picture is the brake spring that I usually mount between a bracket on the service pot to an empty hole in the top of the slack adjuster to help the band brake to release. The return springs in the service pots are really tiny and do not exert much force, so over time the band brake tends to drag.

Later,

Before I forget, all the winch guards and h/a racks shown are made out of 3" sch80 pipe. You can use whatever you have handy. If you require some assistance later laying out the winch guards etc, let me know and I can walk you through how to figure out the length of all the pieces and all the mitre cuts for the style that you want.

[Black Wolf]

I suppose now you want to see what that goes on???

It all was mounted on a very large tandem steer, tandem drive SOW bed truck that I built a little while ago. We built two identical. Both have full hydraulics powered by F.E.P.T.O. (Front Engine Power Take Off) pumps, meaning they have full power moving or stationary. Both have double winches (Braden 125 & Tulsa RN 60) Both have gin poles. Both have hydraulic lift kick rolls. Both have hydraulic gin pole risers. All in all, I believe when we were done building these trucks we added around 15 tons of steel to the overall weight.

Some pictures are of the completed trucks. Some are of gin poles in the air. I'll even throw in a couple of pictures with my Super Duty in them to give you fellas an idea how massive these things are.

Hope you enjoy the pics.
Later,
Jason

[SkidSteerSteve]

Thanks for the pics

Thanks Black Wolf for all the pics. I haven't had a chance to look through all of them, but trust me I will over the next few days. I like the hitch box idea. Never would have thought about going that route. Part of me really wants to keep the 5th wheel plate because I know as soon as I take it off, I'll regret it. Just because Murphy works that way. This might be my answer, though. I dug the winch out from dad's barn this weekend. hadn't seen it in 6 or 7 years but I knew it was heavy enough that I'd be the only one to every mess with it. I'm going to track down the serial numbers and such this week and download a manual from Braden. That way I can have all the specs on it. I bought it at action and then stored it years ago, so I'm not a 100% sure of what I have. I just know it's Braden and takes a tractor to pick it up and set it on the trailer.

I'll post more as it happens.

SSS

[HMW]

Blackwolf, cool looking work. Your right you must have added a mess of weight to that truck. What is it used for?? Nice welds and really neat design with the pipe to protect the winch
thanks for the pics

[SkidSteerSteve]

Intresting find

So today I started following up on the model of winch that I have. I got in touch with a product support rep from Braden. When I first gave him the numbers off of the ID plate on the unit, he sounded a bit confused. He told me that they didn't really make sense and that they weren't in the standard format for their products. He asked me if there were any other marking on the unit so that he could research it. I told him the only other markings were "Braden Winch Co, Tulsa Okla." that were cast into the end cap of the worm drive. He paused for a second and said "Tulsa??" We haven't built anything in Tulsa since the late '40s. That's when the company moved to the Tulsa suburb of Broken Arrow. Looks like I have a little piece of heavy equipment history sitting in the shop floor! Now I'm not sure if I even want to use it. Even though it's in good shape, I'd hate to tear up something like that. Maybe I can find a museum that would like it.

SSS

[Black Wolf]

Scott,

Hey, thanks for the compliments. Always appreciated. Bed trucks like this and larger are used in the Oil & Gas industry in Alberta, British Columbia, and Saskatchewan. They are used to move Service Rigs, Drilling Rigs, Productiont Testing Equipment, and Rental Equipment.

I used to drive larger beds than I have in the pictures. Basically what they do is unload all of the skid-mounted equipment off of the tractor/trailer units, and winch the loads onto the bed, and carry into location, or just move around location and spot into the correct place on the lease. The gin poles pictured are used to unload pipe, collars, blow-out preventers (BOP's) and the like off of tractor/trailer units. They are also used to remove the draw works off of the drilling floor, and to remove the derrick mast from the substructure. Another common use it loading/unloading 8' x 40' rig matting, and spotting into place. You get the idea.

The bed truck in the pictures has a special type of gin poles on it. It's hush-hush so I can't give out too many details. Short version is that the gin poles, along with the rest of the bed that we built, and the specs off the Kenworth cab & chassis were sent to an engineer for certification. This is the first bed truck we know of with an actual engineered lifting system on it. According to the engineer, after de-rating the poles to allow for a industry accepted safety factor, the truck is certified to physically lift 69.8 tons (139,600 lbs). We further de-rated the poles to 40 tons so we weren't working to the limits all the time and using up the life of the truck.

Now that you're used to that piece of iron, I'll post pictures of the biggest machine in the yard. For the record, we did not build this unit. It was hand built by the manufacturer in Calgary. It costs just over $1.2 million. This company bought 2. I did some revisions and customization to this unit after the pictures. Also a previous trucking company I drove for, it was part of my job to load and haul this piece of equipment to & from the location.

First picture is from 1997. This is the winch tractor I drove for a local oilfield hauling company. The jeep & lowbed I used, and the Commander that I hauled. This photo was taken by a professional model builder. Behind the reception desk at this company is a scale model replica of all the equipment in this picture down to the last detail. My name is even on the driver's door.

All the following pictures are of the new 2006 Foremost Commander C's that I mentioned earlier. I tried to post a few photos showing how large these things are. Guys in photos are two of the welders I worked with at this company.

Enjoy.
Later,
Jason