IH S-8 skidder project

[pdxh20]

 

Gearmatic winch rebuild, primed & painted all parts, Never-Seize on everything that moves, relined the bands,
replaced the funky OEM hydraulic tube & bearings with a Parker live swivel.




Making a little extra room for new brakes: '62 Corvette master cylinder (Amazon)+'98 Subaru disk & caliper connected by a SS braided brake line, mounted on the Funk trans rear output shaft. Reliable brakes even with the engine off.



Replacing wheel bearings & seals, 2 down, 2 to go. Gotta' love that weld-bead shrink trick to get the races out.



'75 IH S-8, bought for $1,000 with 4 gals of H2O in the seized up 3-53, gutted rear (both planetaries, 1 axle and rear driveline missing), winch brake stuck, hose busted off winch brake cylinder, no brakes, fried front diff bearings.

The rear end parts were stripped sometime after the carrier bearing seized and the yoke broke. Then it got a coat of yellow paint before being driven across the dock at a Ritchie Bros. auction in 2WD and sold to the previous owner who said it ran until he parked it...then it sat in his field in NW Washington for a few years with no air cleaner before he added it to his great best-of-Craigslist ad with a price of "not worth much" (real estate, muscle cars, guns, Rolex watches, jewelry, artwork, heavy equipment) and it came up in my auto-search for skidders.

Getting it out of the field and onto the Landoll trailer involved a big wrecker we got stuck and needed to help along with a backhoe.

I've made a few posts about parts of the story, but I finally got around to setting up a gallery with some pix from my ill-advised shop therapy project (costs the same as the other kind, but there is a finish line, and when you're done it works !) Thought I'd share a few representative photos... 8)

[mike_belben]

Nice work.  How do you like those hougen bits?  Does the magdrill walk around when eating on one side like that?

[pdxh20]

That drill has saved me more times than I can count ! When I'm drilling off-center I go very slow until it's cutting, and sometimes (as here) I have to back up the magnet with a c-clamp. I also switch to the Jacobs chuck and make extra long or short twist drills to get in odd spots. Many of the bolts on the winch were snapped off and had to be drilled out & tapped. The mag-base made it a breeze. 8)

[bushmechanic]

That's some nice old iron your saving there! Really good job and thanks for taking us on your journey. If you have any more pics of your brake conversion I'm sure we would like to see them. It must have been sitting for some time for the bolts to twist off in a gearmatic, they are usually in and out enough that they don't seize.  :D

[coxy]

It must have been sitting for some time for the bolts to twist off in a gearmatic, they are usually in and out enough that they don't seize.  :D

they have bolts   i have zip ties and wing nuts on mine  8)

[sandersen]

Great project!  Keep up the good work...and you're right on about "shop therapy."  Good luck.

[lopet]

Nice work and good to see how old iron is kept alive. 8) 8)
Shouldda called it  " How to turn a $ 1000 skidder into a $ 10000 one " :D 

[pdxh20]

Thanks, glad y'all are enjoying my project...

Here's more pix of the winch rebuild, brake install pix to follow when I get a chance. Project costs were kept down by buying a spare $300 3-53 for parts I needed, and selling some of the rest, project total is now right around $6K for parts including the original purchase & trucking it home.

Fortunately the engine broke free with a 5' pipe wrench, and all it needed were injectors and rebuilding the blower which I did using parts from the spare engine.

I will say that of the small skidders I've messed with the IH seems much heavier built and easier to access key areas. I think it's a keeper here in earthquake country as my breakout ATV, and I've got it loaded with all the tools and gear I need to serve as my main woods-buggy and all-around prime mover. I made a removable pintle-hook tow-bar that can be installed front or rear to pull my 12T tilt trailer (it has an A-frame loading gantry and a big electric winch too) to use it as a forwarder when I don't want to tear things up or move logs down the road to my other driveway.

Also rigging a removable 3/4 yard loader bucket to the blade with 5' detachable forks I built for my old JD 2010 crawler before it died of a blown $1.50 oil seal that would have required complete disassembly.  




Using the trusty mag base drill & Rodman carbide bits on those busted winch housing bolts.



Pulling the winch drum using a 10T jack and a few shackles, and I still had to lift the whole thing with the overhead hoist and bang on it with a heavy sledge to get it started. The bearings had to get cut into bits with a torch, air cut-off wheel and cold chisel too. There were times I thought it was going to get the better of me... :-[

[bushmechanic]

I knew it, I just knew it had been sitting for years!!! :D They say a picture is worth a thousand words ;)

[teakwood]

you quite the inventor/mechanic! i like you project, keep it coming.

[thecfarm]

I made a removable pintle-hook tow-bar that can be installed front or rear to pull my 12T tilt trailer (it has an A-frame loading gantry and a big electric winch too) to use it as a forwarder when I don't want to tear things up or move logs down the road to my other driveway.

Also rigging a removable 3/4 yard loader bucket to the blade with 5' detachable forks I built for my old JD 2010 crawler before it died of a blown $1.50 oil seal that would have required complete disassembly.

Yes,enjoying your project.

How about a picture of that trailer,like to see it loaded when you get the skidder done too. ;D

And that bucket and forks on the blade too.

[David-L]

Sitting home here from a logging accident that happened a couple of weeks ago, your pics are exactly what I needed. Nice work. I have a lot of time with a mag drill set up. We had various sizes in the repair shop 38A on the ship I was on in the Navy. USS Puget Sound AD-38. Keep them pics rolling. Thanks.

[mike_belben]

In for the swiss army skidder. 

[sandersen]

David-L:  Hope your not hurt too bad...jeez.  Sorry to hear the bad news!  Get well soon.

[pdxh20]

Hope you're all healed up and back in the woods. I got two new robo-knees two years ago and I can't believe those carpenters banging away with their hammers, saws & drills didn't kill me, but I'm back to being the fastest guy on the block...truly miraculous bits of titanium and plastic.

70F today and with our road still closed by a major slide for over a year (ahh the peace & quiet) & no traffic. Figured I'd take the S-8 for its first field trial down the steep curvy road to my lower gate and sort out the log deck in preparation for drier weather when I'll be cleaning up some leftovers and wind-throw firs before pulling down some bigger firs and some redwoods I planted 25 years ago that became monsters blocking the view from our house.

Not enough to make a truckload, but I've been selling 'em on Craigslist for a small fortune. Every time I think I've heard 'em all, along comes a topper: two huge dudes show up and don't want help with the mini-ex to load 'em, 'cause they're cross-fit trainers and need to pick 'em out just at the limit of what they can lift...mom shows up with 11 month old daughter in a pink onesie and puts her on the log pile before I can stop her so she can pick out the logs for her nature play area...the TV show Grimm needs 300 pecker-wood sticks random lengths from 7'- 9' and 5"-7" diameter for $20 each in two days to build a stockade for the final episode...pastor wants two logs to make a cross for the church lawn...Hawaiian BBQ wedding needs 65 16" high logs for seating...mushroom growers need starter logs...log cabin repairers need tops 2" and down for chinking...I got WAY more out of that last not-quite-a-load left over from the 4 loads we sent to the mill after a thinning 3 years ago. Got em up on bunks and the dry older ones sell for a big premium.

So she drove down the road just fine, a little scary when I up-shifted, the lag before clunk-engage of that old Funk trans made me want to put the new brakes on in N before shifting to 2nd when rolling down the steep road. On flat ground it's probably fine to coast along and shift ranges on the fly. A few minor leaks :D and some smoke  :D when I wind out that formerly frozen 3-53, but plenty of power to all that 15% rubber and the rebuilt Gearmatic winch works like a dream.

Got the deck cleared out by lunchtime and made a plan for new steel gate posts & 20' gates that meet in the middle for a 40' opening that can be accessed easily from any direction to load.

[mike_belben]

Boy thats a heck of a customer base!

[starmac]

Did international make an s7 skidder. A few years ago I got a call to come look at a cute little skidder, well It was little and probably cute at one time, but there wasn't enough left of it to try and put it back in usable shape. It was small and I was thinking s7, but it might have been an s8.

[Logger RK]

Yes they did make a S7. My neighbor has one. I think it's a paylogger S7. I traded him organic milk for a extra 353 head for it. When he told me his cows had the winter(let's says squirts)I told him the head was paid off. I asked my other dairy farmer friend if that's a thing. He say not that he knew of,but maybe he had some different or bad hay.

[David-L]

Nice work again, love seeing that old iron get revived. I drove my log truck yesterday for the first time in a month. I'm on the mend and can finally bend my knee. It was not a saw cut, I slipped on my skidder cradle coming down after bleeding the injectors and my right knee was angled just right and went into the fan as I slipped and could not recover, It was not pretty from there on. I would post some pics but not sure the moderators would appreciate that. Nice work again on that machine and oh those customers come in all forms, aye.

[nativewolf]

You get the benefits of being in Portland with that customer base, to me that beats hauling to a mill.  Pricing is huge too I guess.