Auction Risk

[Roundhouse]

The risk is that if I look I may find. I was doing pretty good, I really was. I had stayed off the sites for a while. That was until my dad sent me a link for an older F350 dump truck up for auction and in really good shape. I drooled over it for a while before realizing it was bound to sell for more than I have/want to play with. It was only one year newer that my current dump but in better shape in every way. Of course it didn't end there, while on the site I started looking around...

In another sale was another F350, not nearly as mint but not as likely to fetch crazy money. A few days out with a steal-it next bid. Now I was in trouble.

Why was I going down this rabbit hole? My dump truck is a 1988 F350, the right size for me but with some serious rust issues. I've sunk money into it for repairs, I've done plenty of work on it myself and it's functional but loosing the battle against underbody cancer. For a time I was convinced my next move would be a dump trailer. I started casually shopping for one but couldn't stomach the prices they bring used, so I started shopping new. I didn't need a large trailer so the one I was eyeing was just a tick over $4K. I didn't need it right away so I shelved that plan to build up the fun money account. 

My next project was turning a trail into a road. The short-wheelbase easy to turn around dump truck was the best tool for the job, so I patched it up again for another go-around. The truck has done alright (see: Dirtwork thread) but the creaks and groans are multiplying. I checked in on dump trailers again this year and the price has jumped to 5500+. The jump in price cooled off that plan yet again. 

Looking ahead my primary need will be more for moving logs than dumping. The other F350 on auction was a flatbed but maybe that is for the best. For my operation I have 10 acres of woods surrounding my sawmill, another 10 acres a half mile away and a third 10 acres 3 miles away. I would like to bring in most of my logs from the farthest lot for the foreseeable future, lack of brakes on the dump truck make that a no go. With a flatbed I could transport small loads over the short distance and roll 4 or 5 logs directly off the flatbed and onto my sawmill log deck. I like the maneuverability of a small truck for loading on small roads and lining up the load with the log deck. My current trailer isn't a deck-over so unloading at the sawmill is not a seamless transfer.

I kept tabs on the auction and it was going pretty cheap, until the end of course. My thinking was that my dump box and hoist, which isn't in bad shape, could be moved over to the newer truck. Other pieces like tires, axle etc. could be moved over if I part out the '88 dump. As a bonus the flatbed had a nice little electric crane mounted on it, unsure how important that will be to me I didn't factor that into what I bid. As expected, with it getting close to the end the price was four times what it had been the day before. I wasn't as excited as I was as the day before but threw down a couple bids. I was about at my max and watched the extended close tick away having decided I wasn't going to chase any longer, if someone out there wanted it more it would be theirs. It closed and I had the top bid. 

The city selling the truck was 65 miles away from me and three days later I headed over and picked up the truck. It was exactly as described, they handed me the title and seven keys (two of which fit neither the door nor the ignition). I've long been intrigued by the venerable 300 6 cylinder for this type of service and this was my first chance to own/drive one. It does purr just like they are known for. The truck has 72K miles on the clock. I took county highways all the way home and wasn't in a hurry. That was a good thing too. It turns out the truck has a C6 transmission and a 4:10 rear axle. It does NOT like to move at speeds above 55. Not an issue for a municipal truck that probably didn't leave the city limits in 25+ years. This is going to a great arrangement for around the sawmill but getting it there will be a long trip.

So here it is the '94 F350. The storage boxes are about a foot deep, this side only the opposite side of the bed is open. I plan to take them off, maybe hang them on the underside of the flatbed. Not sure about the crane yet, I'll probably be loading the logs with forks most of the time. I'll see how the crane works on smallish stuff, maybe it will be worth keeping on there for TSI firewood stuff.





As for putting a dump on this truck the future of that is a little more cloudy. It seems with the C6 using the PTO is not the easy process I was hoping for. So I may just try to wrap up my remaining dump truck work next year and either retire it or sell it cheap for a farm/bush truck. Otherwise, I've pondered setting up a pony engine to run the hydraulic pump. Taking that a step farther, perhaps I part out the dump and convert the dump box including the frame under it, hydraulics, controls, and added pony engine into a self-contained unit that can be slid onto the flatbed when needed. The dump box has wood sides and a wood floor so I don't think it is too terribly heavy. Once I'm done road building my dumping needs will be much less, limited to touch-up repairs filling pot holes and the like. It wouldn't take much to build a shallow dirt box that rests on the flatbed, I could shovel-push over half the load off the side where needed, then use the crane to tilt the rest of the fill off the box by lifting one edge.

Anyway that's the new purchase for my tiny shoestring operation, any ideas, tips or tricks are welcome. Especially if anyone is using a little onboard crane like this. I'm sure it has plenty of limitations but there may be uses I'm not thinking of, or perhaps it will just be in the way and I'll end up removing it to make more room. It is manually extendable (with a consequential reduction in weight rating). The yellow stickers on the boom denote the capacity, fully retracted as it is now 1500lbs, halfway out is 1000lbs, all the way out 800lbs.

[SwampDonkey]

Just a comment on the little lift at the back. Could grow potatoes and hand pick via ash baskets into barrels and use the lift for the barrels to load the truck. The good old days. ;D

[metalspinner]

 Could the dump bed be fabbed into a dump trailer?

[thecfarm]

I had a '76 with a 300 in it. That was a work truck. Only was about 40 miles from home about 10 times. Good thing, as like yours, it had low gears in it, top speed about 50mph and I could hear it howling at that speed.  ;D  That was a nice work truck. Got about 8 miles to the gallon with a cord of wood in the back, or without.   This was a 250 HD 4 wheel drive.

[moodnacreek]

Hinge the flat bed and put a hoist kit under with 12V hyd. pump. Keep the frame and brackets, etc. painted with used oil. That will be a good cheap truck.

[firefighter ontheside]

Looks like a nice truck.  As a guy who learned to drive in the late 80s, I always wanted a green over tan F150 Eddie Bauer edition.  When I was ready to buy my first new truck in 1997 they had just switched over to the new body style.  I still would like to have one of those body style trucks and flat bed dump would be perfect to have.  4wd would be nice to have.

[DARRELL1972]

I use a flatbed to haul logs some I would think the Crain would be in the way. My bed is 10' and I'm usually hauling 8' logs. I've had 2 trucks with the 300's in them sold the engines running when the transmission wore out and scrap the near useless bodies in sort some of the best engines ever built I think.

[Corley5]

12v pump to power the dump.  My newest 550 is electric as is my older one.  Never an issue dumping a load and no PTO cables, drive shafts etc. to deal with.

[mike_belben]

 belt driven central hydraulic snow plow pump can be rigged up anywhere you can fit it and get belts to align.  you can weld a sheave to the front of any other pulley that doesnt have rubber in it, in order to create the necessary belt take off power.  

word of caution if you go this route, size the pump small.  2-3 gpm so that at 2500+ psi it doesnt just smoke a single A belt or whatever the weak link in the chain is.  driving off a little single sheave alternator pulley would be a bad idea for example.  a large power steering pump belt would be a better place to weld on an extra pulley because the steering belt has way more wrap and is less likely to slip. 



move the crane to the front center of the bed and brace it to the headache rack.  put a spar on thats twice as long as the current one and with the mount point down lower. use a chain from just below the winch to the tip of the spar.  you want a lot of triangulation here. the chain is in tension and the spar is in compression.  its very strong if the post doesnt tip over, which it wont when braced to that headache rack.  youll have yourself a great cable loader and then the logs can hang off back.  

before long youll want a bigger winch.  and then youll want limit chains that go from the mid point or so on the spar to the BOTTOM corners of the headache rack with clevis hooks for quick a adjustment.  what this will do is hold the crane pulley wherever you need it to stay.  with little blocks of firewood or whatever you can just manually swing stuff.  with logs it will swing where it wants and you will constantly be winching a log up underneath the frame of the truck because thats just what happens with a free swinging crane.  chains are the cheapest way to lock the crane where you need it.  put them on the bottom so that you can adjust from the ground.  you will be on the ground helping to load the log.  it takes man and crane together working as a team.  a $15 amazon remote control winch is critical.  


with the crane at the front you can build a wooden dump box that hangs off the tail and pins into some kind of simple pivots, maybe something that drops in the last stake pocket and gets bolts through the side.  the crane should have no trouble dumping it entirely if you do about a 30/70 tipping point and dont load the front too heavy. 

[mike_belben]

oh and use tongs.  you will be constantly relocating the pick position, several times per log.











if the end pulley can swivel it is much much much much much better.  if it cant it will be limited in sidepull and will often walk off even a tall pulley shoulder.





a redirect pulled over the rear tires will allow for parbuckling bigger logs up ramps.  

[Roundhouse]

Could the dump bed be fabbed into a dump trailer?

I've considered that for a while but the frame is pretty bad. The nice way to do that is fabbing the frame forward of the bed into a hitch but there isn't enough meat left on the frame to do that. I could reinforce or replace the frame. A better way might be to find a used solid ~10K dual axle trailer whose wood floor is shot, remove the floor and mount the dump bed to that.

Hinge the flat bed and put a hoist kit under with 12V hyd. pump. Keep the frame and brackets, etc. painted with used oil. That will be a good cheap truck.

12v pump to power the dump.  My newest 550 is electric as is my older one.  Never an issue dumping a load and no PTO cables, drive shafts etc. to deal with.

I like the 12v hyd. pump idea, that sounds like a much better install with less maintenance than a gas engine.

Looks like a nice truck.  As a guy who learned to drive in the late 80s, I always wanted a green over tan F150 Eddie Bauer edition.  When I was ready to buy my first new truck in 1997 they had just switched over to the new body style.  I still would like to have one of those body style trucks and flat bed dump would be perfect to have.  4wd would be nice to have.

We're about the same age and it's funny you mention the green over tan F150. In those days our small town mall was the place to be. Next door to the mall was the Ford dealer and when the new models came in they would park some of them fresh off the transport inside the hallways of the mall. In about 1987 when the redesign was released they had a full size Bronco on display a loaded Eddie Bauer edition in that paint. It was probably the nicest rig I'd ever seen up to that point, and I've had a soft spot for them ever since. 

if the end pulley can swivel it is much much much much much better.  if it cant it will be limited in sidepull and will often walk off even a tall pulley shoulder.

Thanks for the response Mike, I figured you would have some ideas on this. Mounting the crane up at the headache rack is a great idea along with the ways to strengthen it. I like having it available, reinforced, yet out of the way for all the times I'm loading "real" logs with the forklift or the skid steer.

The tongs and swivel will make it more useful as well, I was already wondering about any odd angles and the pulley. This is obviously designed to dead lift engine blocks, hydrants etc. straight up off the ground and swing onto the bed, dragging logs on is a different animal.

Thanks everyone for the ideas and responses, it'll be fun to see how this helps my workflow with a few tweaks.

[mike_belben]

swing it over the cab and winch the front bumper when you want the bed clear. 

[Roundhouse]

I recently wrapped up the first round of work on this truck so I figured it was a good time for an update. I had a list of change/upgrade/tune-up items I wanted to make before putting this truck to work at the sawmill. Beginning this spring I started chipping away at that list. I also did some local test runs that both helped me evaluate what the truck may need and at the same time soften my wife's opinion of purchase. She runs a school farm and there is always something to haul. This spring it was a large load of hay bales. The truck handled it well:




By June I was giving it more attention to change up the arrangement of the bed items; removing the tool boxes, disconnecting and moving the crane, and drilling holes in the new positions:




I was originally planning to apply my usual coat of gloss black until I came across quart containers of Herculiner at the store. It rolled on in two coats pretty well leaving a surface much less slick to work on than paint would have provided. 




With the herculiner applied I followed up with the gloss black on the headache rack and sides of the flatbed. As Mike B recommended above I moved the crane to the front and added a brace to tie it into the rack, makes both the crane and the rack considerably more stout.




Closer to done but more items on the honey-do list, one more trip to Fleet Farm for supplies before I take the truck and trailer out of town.




With the work done for now, I'm all loaded up for the trip up to the mill. It's a half days drive so the car has been loaded up on the trailer to provide my ride back. The last item was installing the smaller toolbox under the bed behind the cab. A little tricky to get the spacers lined up and bolts through the top of the box, I kept at it and some foul language got the job done. The box for the crane controls had been mounted inside the large tool box. After moving the crane I mounted the control box in an ammo box onto the headache rack. The crane is offset a little to the drivers side. I didn't want it right in the middle and blocking the rearview mirror. I can still extend the crane and pick up items on the other side of the truck. Loading the truck with the crane allowed me to pick up the large tool box and trailer ramps quite easily. Originally I had planned to mount the large toolbox under the bed on the other side of the truck. Once I unbolted it I could better judge just how heavy it was. I strained to pick up one end and ended up using the skid steer to move it off the truck. No wonder the truck had a pronounced lean to that side. Having that box under the bed wasn't worth giving up the payload or having an unbalanced truck.




The truck did a decent job pulling the car but of course didn't want to exceed 55mph by much. The day was warm but vent breeze kept me reasonably cool. It went well with no issues. Here is the truck at its destination once the ramps have been dropped off and put back on the trailer. The heavy tool box is loose and will be used as a stationary outdoor cabinet somewhere once I decide the best place for it. The little grain conveyor will be used for piling/loading split firewood.

[Walnut Beast]

Nice job and nice rig 👍

[Resonator]

Nice rig! 
That extension (stairs I'm guessing) on the back end might get pinched making a hard turn. I carry a short step ladder that folds small enough to fit behind the seat in the cab, for getting up onto the truck bed.

[thecfarm]

On the truck at work there is a pull out ladder behind the cab.

[Roundhouse]

Nice rig!  
That extension (stairs I'm guessing) on the back end might get pinched making a hard turn. I carry a short step ladder that folds small enough to fit behind the seat in the cab, for getting up onto the truck bed.

It's close but I would have to really jacknife the trailer to put it against the steps. I thought they were odd when I first picked up the truck but after a couple dozen trips up and down I'm totally sold on them. Super handy, always there and it doesn't matter how uneven the ground is under the truck. It's a little bent from backing into a pole or a tree I assume but as stout as it is that doesn't change its function. 

[petefrom bearswamp]

Firefighter I had a 95 eddie bauer green and tan 150 302.
Engine bullet proof, but it had other ford issues and  swapped it when the oil pan rusted thru.
Sure was purty tho.

[firefighter ontheside]

I ended up getting a 98 dodge flatbed that you may have seen in another thread.  I ultimately decided against anything older than 99 ford because of airbags.  I wanted airbags in case my wife or kids drive the truck someday.  They did that color scheme on the newer trucks, but it just didn't look as good as it did on the square body.