Making a Bombardier log skidder

[Sliver]

Hello all,
Brand new to the forum. (please be gentle)
I am attempting to put together a logskidder of sorts. I have an old Bombardier sw48 similar to what spruce bunny has.  The biggest issue that I need to overcome is hooking up a hydraulic system. It has a limited system already in place but it has a low flow rate.(belt driven pump and small lines). My question to everyone is what would be the best way to rig up a hydraulic pump? ???  It has a chrysler flathead six industrial engine with a three speed transmission. I have a 20ton tulsa winch out of a wrecker that I want to hang off the back of it ,weld up a small arch and call it a cable skidder 8)I was thinking of bolting a flange and driveshaft on to the fanbelt pulley and mounting the hydraulic pump externally. Any suggestions or insights would be greatly appreciated. I will post some pics as soon as I figure out how.  thanks 

[jason.weir]

Mount the hydraulic pump right to the front of the crankshaft..

Use a flexible coupler between the crank pulley and the pump shaft and you'll have plenty of hydraulic power.

-Jason

[Sliver]

Thanks Jason,
Thats what I meant( crank pulley).By flexible coupler did you mean a u-joint?. What do suggest for a flange to attach it to the pully? Is there an easy way to make one?

[jason.weir]

a u-joint drive shaft would work - I was referring to a LoveJoy coupler

http://www.lovejoy-inc.com/content.aspx?id=206

I'd make a bolt on flange that uses the existing pulley bolt pattern so it would not affect anything you already have.

mount the pulley solid to something and run the drive shaft or coupler between them.. 

Sounds like fun..  I bet that thing goes good in the snow\mud

-J

[isawlogs]

Are you sure the pump wont run the winch ???

[farmboy1tn]

welcome, vast knowledge here and great suport,your learn much here   :P

[Sliver]

Are you sure the pump wont run the winch ???

The pump will turn the winch but very slow(like the second hand on a watch). If I remember correctly the hydraulic motor on the winch is 167cc/rev. Is there a way to get around this? as I dont think power will be an issue.

[simonmeridew]

Hi
There's a guy around here who skids a lot with a machine like that. Nice winter machine. It should work well. Keep us posted
simonmeridew

[Ironwood]

Wish we had snow to use one, here's one near Cleveland Ohio. 

[Sliver]

Here is an update on the project.
I have acquired the steel that I need to make the winch mount from the scrapper and also picked up front portion of a ag-trailer to make the arch out of . The hydraulic pump was donated to me from my brother who used to use it to pump waste vegetable oil to run his truck. The flange is being fabricated now by a neighgbour who has a lathe.He was also kind enough to donate a controll valve that he had( it was no good to him as all of his farm equipment is John deere which works on a closed center and the valve is open center)  8). The only components that I am missing now is the reservoir and the hoses. The big assembly and fabrication should take place on the weekend of the 29th-30th. I will be sure to take lots of pics for everyones enjoyment. I will also try to make a movie of the rig in action to post on you-tube. As always I am open to suggestions and tips anyone wants to share.
;D ;D Its all starting to fall into place pc_smiley

[farmboy1tn]

  keep them coming 8)

[arojay]

My first skidding machine was a bombadier.  Not bad for pulling but not great for decking.  I never had a winch but fabbed a fairly tall arch and towed a length of 3/8 chain.  had some chokers made with a grab hook on the pulling end and just hooked them to the towed chain as close to the arch as possible.  Crude but relatively effective.  I went on to a small JD dozer with winch and arch, then a 440B skidder.  Bombadier was pretty cheap to run.  Good luck with your project!

[Sliver]

Here is another update with some pics(hopefully) :-\
Well the drive shaft hub for the pto is done and installed. I have also tried to cover up all of the yellow overspray with some black paint. I spoke with Brad at MN-outdoors and he has a couple of wheelbearing caps for me. i just need to figure out the shipping to Canada. Here are the pics to whet your appetites. The big build is next weekend 





smiley_alcoholic_01 smiley_alcoholic_01 smiley_alcoholic_01

[Sliver]

Well, This is how it turned out. All of the welding and fabrication were done on the weekend and I worked on the plumbing this week. Everything is ready to go as soon as I connect the love-joy and fill it with hydraulic oil 8). Oh ya and it needs some paint :

[stonebroke]

Are you going to put on some front end weights to balance the load?

Stonebroke

[Sliver]

Counterweight? I thought "wheelies" in a tracked vehicle would be fun . I do have a fairly heavy power angle blade for the front--probably 3-4 hundred pounds. I will include a picture of the of the finished rig when I am done.

[Hilltop366]

Nice .... I'm thinking I would add a heavy steel plate guard to protect the winch and keep log ends and branches out of the space between the top and bottom horz. iron.

Logs will hang up and then let go and hit the back when draging them.

Looks like a fun rig.

[mike_van]

Nice looking job! You'll have to see how it pulls [winches] you may have to lower your winch point if it always pulls the front of the machine up.  Hilltops idea of a 'butt plate' is a good one, as you want to keep log ends off your backside.   When I built my 3 point hitch skidder, I made it sort of like an arch, where the log rides free to pivot, it makes turning the tractor easier, and saves bashing the machine with the log end.

[sprucebunny]

So .... how does it work ???

I finally found a tree big enough to use the winch on my J5 and it's great  8)

[Coon]

It's nice to see someone else is building a tracked skidder.  These people are  right about you needing a butt plate (not butt plug though that may become a necessity if you live in hilly country  :D ) because tracks and wheels  become expensive real quick.  It can only take one log to do it to. 

I am building a tracked unit from scratch.  Project is on hold right now due to too much work and I am gathering up some parts.   Just got a rain day today and now doing some catching up with the forum.  ;D   Gotta feed my withdrawl symptoms if ya know what I mean.  :D

Brad

[Sliver]

A few more pics of the skidder build. Everything is done now except for the Butt plate >:(. The blade that I made came from the scrapyard for a total of $30 in materials. I found an old 3pth scraper blade cut out some cheekplates,and welded some heavy angle iron onto the back to re enforce it.(5lbs of 6011 rods :D ).
A couple of questions for sprucebunny. 1) How big was the log that you tried out on your rig?
2) any problems skidding or any tips to make things go easier?
I still havn't had a chance to try it out yet( It looks too nice to wreck)

[beenthere]

That outfit is looking great. Real anxious for you to try it out on some logs, and let us know how it works.

Other than scratching the nice paint job, what is holding you back?   
Start small and work your way up. 

[sprucebunny]

Looks good.

I don't have a good way to immobilize the machine to use the winch. Newer machines have a disc brake on the driveline. Best way to over come that is back up to a stump. Second best; move vehicle while winching.

Be very careful about 'side-loads' with that machine.... make sure the pull is as close as possible to directly rearward.

[Ironwood]

I am not planning on "snow activity" w/ this one, but will be putting winches, roll bar, and front blade on it as well. Yours looks great, I have yet to decide if mine will be power angle. I may cut a 6' meyer snow plow in half so it's not too high. I may alos put a quick removing lower cutting edge that could have some teeth, as it is likely I will be scruffing some light underbrush at times.

Ironwood. 

[Sliver]

Well I finally got a chance to try it out. I cut down a dead cherry tree about 16" at the bottom and tried winching it about 20 feet over to the machine. It worked great for the first 15 feet and then the winch stopped!!! thats when I noticed a pool of oil under the machine(about 5 gals worth). Well here is what happened. When I was hooking the hydraulic pump up I had to switch the lines (intake and output)around for it to work. I thought that it was just a matter of clockwise vs counter clockwise. Well I was wrong smiley_dunce smiley_dunce. This all worked fine in the garage, but as soon as I put a load on the system it immediatly puked the mechanical seal on the pump. Three hours later I had the pump in my hand and I was off to a local hydraulics shop to find out what happened. Well the guy there wanted $75 just to look at the pump to tell me if it could be changed around internally. I was not too keen on that--there are 4 bolts on the pump body and a total of about 6 internal parts-- to give someone 75 bucks for three minutes work is way out of my budget. So to make a long story even longer I took it apart myself switched the internal seals around and rotated the pump body 180 so the suction line was the 1" opening and the output was 3/4". Stuffed it back in the machine, filled the reservoir back up and it worked fine  ;D. I dragged a little ford 1500 tractor, with the bucket all the way down front wheels in the air, across the yard. So I'm back in action and will try to post some pics of the rig at work.