Telescopic boom loader.

[customsawyer]

I recently bought a JLG 10,000 lbs lift and am wondering what is the reason for the forks to be able to float. I am thinking about welding them up solid as I have no plans to need to move them in and out width wise. I just don't like having them move up while I am trying to get them under a log.

[Kbeitz]

Maybe I would make a fixture to hold them in place but I would not weld on the forks.
It would take the temper out of them and it's really hard to weld to high carbon steel.

[4x4American]

It's to annoy the operator!  I think the idea is to help keep them level if you have it tilted too far forward, when trying to get into a pallet, but not entirely sure.  I know how annoying it can get.  You can weld a tang on the back of them that rides on a bar, so that way they don't float out and you can still move them side to side.  You never know when you're gonna need to move them in for something.  I sure would like to keep it adjustable.  Even if you welded tabs and bolted it.

[4x4American]

Or just weld a bar across in front of them?  Shouldn't take more than a few minutes

[Kbeitz]

Can you use two large U-bolts ?

[Stuart Caruk]

It's hard to see where you're setting the load down on a roof, so the forks float and allow you to back out easier. It's actually a very handy feature. If you don't like it (it's hard to pry crap out of the dirt for example...) Weld a couple plates onto the sides of the fork carriage, 1 on either side of the fork. Use these to support a bar or rod to keep the forks from tilting out, yet still allow them to be positioned. Do NOT weld the forks solid. As soon as you do, you'll need to move something skinny.

You can also do what I did. Go buy a used fork carriage from a forklift dealer that has side shift and fork positioning and mount it on your toolbar. I paid $400 for mine and it's super handy. I can go back to the original system just by swapping the carriage on the tool plate.

[CHill8903]

I welded a few inches of 3/8 chain to the back of each fork and a hook to the frame on each side.  10 second connect/disconnect with no tools, but I've never had to unhook them since I did it 4 years ago.

[customsawyer]

I should have been more specific when I said float. The forks actually move up and down with in their frame by about 4-6" and they swing out from the bottom. The swing out from the bottom is annoying when you try to dump a log that the center weight is behind the center of the forks. The movement up and down of the 2" shaft that the forks hinge on is one thing I am not understanding. I'm sure there is a reason for it as all of them that I have ever seen are this way.

[Down_hand_dave]

The up and down movement if there for when you want to take the forks off. You are able to set the forks  on the ground release the weight from the 2" solid stock that holds them to the frame and remove them. Without another piece of equipment.  A option that you will probably  never use. But that's the purpose. I have owned several of the exact machines you have I made a plate that went over the end of the 2" stock with a hole and then tapped the side of the frame that holds it. One grade 8, 1/2" bolt on each side and it's easy to remove if you ever do need to change implement on the boom. I had a bucket for mine and it made a awesome snow cleanup tool. Could make huge piles!!!

[millwright]

I had the same problem, I took a chain and wrapped around the forks and hooked it together on the back of the frame, keeping them from swinging

[jmouton]

hey jake if you dont like  it  , i know somebody that would take it off your hands ,,,me  ,,  we  need one and have been looking for a while and havent found one with a decent price ,,   maybe  dont weld the forks  but weld  a bar or blocks under the fork area where they move ,,  i know exactly what you mean  ,, i hate that about them  ,  that is a perfect machine for moving and unloading logs,,,, hey  merry christmas bye the way 

                                                                                          jim

[customsawyer]

Well I finally got it home late yesterday so maybe I can get some pics up here to show what I mean. It seems to be a decent machine and the 10,000 lbs ones don't come around every day. I think I got it at a decent price but one never knows what they are getting with a used machine. Thanks for all the reply's. 

[customsawyer]

Here is a pic of the loader.



 

Here is one of the forks and how they float. They are in the up position now as I have the loader sitting on the ground.



 

With the forks moving up and down like this and also swinging when you go to dump something I can see it getting aggravating.

[Magicman]

Da big boy gots ah big toy.   

I see your problem and it will have to be fixed.  I would be looking for a way to "capture" the forks without weakening them.

[4x4American]

Ahh welder up bud!  Ain't like it's permanent!

[Kbeitz]

Like I said ....
Dont weld to the forks. You will ruin them.
It would not hold anyway. Some things just gotta flex.
I do all the welding for our local junkyard and i fix stuff like this all the time.
I would buy two large bolts for the slot. That would stop the un and down.
I like the idea of useing a chain to hold the lower part of the forks in.
Or you could use a spring steel U-bolt.

http://www.dsuban.com/custom-u-bolts-c70/

[POSTON WIDEHEAD]

Here Jake's machine at a 55 foot reach.



 

[Magicman]

Dat's gonna be ah tall stack uh lumber.    

[customsawyer]

I also like that the tires are solid. ;D ;D ;D


 

[POSTON WIDEHEAD]

Thats a TAR.

[jmouton]

thats nice


                                                                                jim

[stavebuyer]

Chain them. A little "float" is handy unloading trucks or getting under lumber stacks on uneven ground.

[Wallee]

Chain them. A little "float" is handy unloading trucks or getting under lumber stacks on uneven ground.

What this guy said ^^^

[beenthere]

Agree that those forks may have a reason for hanging that way, but think they will be most frustrating to use for the many things forks can do for you. And digging out a log from a pile would be one of them.

May also think of a way to position a small camera (like the back-up camera's on cars now) on or near the fork rack with a monitor in the cab would help a lot when "reaching out".

[Dave Shepard]

One of my favorite features of a Tele is that you can level left to right. I'd do anything possible to get rid of the float feature. I can understand putting lifts of material up 50 feet that it can be hard to judge where the forks are, but for log and lumber handling, the float feature is a pain. The floppy fork situation is even worse. If the heel of a fork catches when you are pulling away from a load on the ground or a trailer, it tips the end of the fork up. Depending on what you are loading, this can be a pain, or it could cost thousands of dollars. The first thing I would do is see if you can find a dealer that has a standard forklift style carriage with side shift, and trade your forks in on a set. If not, I would weld a piece of bar stock in that slot above the shaft to keep it from lifting up. As for the swinging feature, I'd have to look closely to see the best way to fix that. You could weld tabs, pieces of 3/4"x4" the width of the forks, to the top of the fork on the round tubing portion and weld something to the back of the fork frame that the tabs will hit if they swing. Not great, but will make a huge difference, as long as you don't try to "back drag" too much. If you need to get logs off of a trailer between fenders, or want to try and pick a single log out of a pile, it is very difficult if the forks swing down when you need them to be vertical.

[Dave Shepard]

We use telehandlers all the time at work. They are the best forklift around a mill that I've used. Payloaders are great for brute strength, but are really lacking when doing delicate handling of finished product.

This one is a 10054, I think it's a JLG.



  

This one is a Mustang 1155 that is owned by the company I work for.



 

[beenthere]

...................
Here is one of the forks and how they float. They are in the up position now as I have the loader sitting on the ground.



 

With the forks moving up and down like this and also swinging when you go to dump something I can see it getting aggravating.

To keep the forks from rotating up, maybe weld some steel blocks on the top of the bushings that are there now, as drawn in crudely on your pic.

[Ljohnsaw]

It looks like some one hacked the frame so the forks can be lifted 90° to let them pass into the middle of the frame so the forks can be close together.  This block would prevent that.  I have the same problem with my SkyTrac.  I'm thinking that I will make a block to stick in the oval slots above the bar.  Put a big washer on each side and a pin through it so it stays in place.  As far as tipping forks, I wrapped a chain around mine.  Put it in the wrong place one time, amazing how quickly you can sever a 3/8" chain!  Now I have a few shorter chains :

[Dave Shepard]

That's a factory notch. If you didn't have a support there, you would certainly bend the shaft. The tele we used on that raising was just like that. A pain, but not too big a deal unless you need to narrow up to lift a pallet.

[Ljohnsaw]

That's a factory notch. If you didn't have a support there, you would certainly bend the shaft. The tele we used on that raising was just like that. A pain, but not too big a deal unless you need to narrow up to lift a pallet.

Hmm, the notch looks a little rough like someone torch-cut the front off.  On my SkyTrak, I have oval holes on each side AND the two middle bars as well.  AND they still managed to bend the bar!!!  One side rides a little higher than the other.  But then, I managed to bend the ends on both my 5' forks popping "rocks" out of the ground.

 

[Banjo picker]

That's one nice machine...   Banjo

[scully]

Those floating forks are like that for good reason ,make them solid and you will have big problems .

[Dave Shepard]

I don't think it will be an issue for log handling.

[customsawyer]

I could see where they would be handy working on a roof 50' in the air but with logs and lumber I prefer mine mounted solid. I had a back-hoe with forks that hung on the bucket and they swiveled from the bottom like these. I hated it for handling logs and slabs as you always get one towards the back of the forks that you can't get off, as the forks don't dump they just swing. I am going to mount them solid I just have to figure out how. I need to make sure that what ever I do can be undone, in case I ever decided to sell in the future.   

[drobertson]

It seems to me that the possible floating shown to me would/could cause issues with loads sliding,, I've never ran anything with this configuration, so I really don't know, but for logs and picking up and setting down, loading and the such, can't see the benefit. This said, as others have said, block the oval to stop the float, and I would start with a top side stop with a stout short block.  If it does not work, try another approach.  Or find out why they do it this way. It would be interesting to know the reasons.  All I know is long logs slip enough as is without the forks tilting sideways.  Hillsides are bad enough without help from the forks.

[customsawyer]

Dave I don't have much problem with hillsides. ;D

thats nice


                                                                                jim

Jim I'm not sure how you meant this statement. If you are trying to say I have a nice machine or "That's nice" as in our other conversations. Maybe a little of both.  :D

[jmiller]

Maybe drill a hole there above the slide and bolt a plate.   easy to remove

[johnnyllama]

I have owned telehandlers and rented many too, mainly for construction work. The main reason for the floatinig forks is these are "all terrain" lifts, meant to be used on uneven ground. If you need to slide into a lumber pile or pallet on a slope, even with a side leveling machine, sometimes this feature makes the difference on getting those forks into the load.
I always used a combination of short chains made to hold the forks tight to the lower carriage and large wedge blocks that slipped into the side slots with a pin to keep them in place. Minutes to remove if you needed to which we often did depending on what we were doing. My machine also had a bucket for dirt and snow (perfect for back dragging stone for final grade), and a 16' straight boom attachment for truss setting. The boom gives you alot more flexibility than just hooking onto the forks.

[jmouton]

just giving you a hard time thats all,,,   havent talked in a while ,,, ill have to call you one day when  i slow down a bit ,,,  i just got a ton of pine really long  and ill have to tallk to you about cutting them ,you know,,


             long log on a short mill,,,                                             jim


                                                                                                       

[fishpharmer]

Congrats Jake, handy machines.  Had one custom milling customer with two of those type of machines at my disposal.  Super handy, moved logs with one and stacked lumber with the other.  @bibbyman has or had a couple of tele-handlers maybe he has a solution for the float. 

[paul case]

Hey Jake,
Bibbyman had the same trouble with his forks being loose on the heel. If I had any idea where to look I would but I don't.

nice machine though. Real Nice.

PC

[mason44]

When you tilt the carriage all the way forward/down the bar will slide up in the notches on carriage so you can push the forks together inside of the carriage mounts. Its very handy when you need to pick up narrow pallets

[mason44]

And the float helps keep you from digging into the ground, if the tips if your forks won't touch the ground you have something mis-matched

[Bibbyman]

Hey Jake,
Bibbyman had the same trouble with his forks being loose on the heel. If I had any idea where to look I would but I don't.

nice machine though. Real Nice.

PC

That's a long time back.

Yes, swinging forks are useless for handling logs. 

I took the forks to a metal fabricator and asked him to add bars behind the forks to clevis pin them in place.  He talked me into welding a big chunk of metal on front like some here suggested.  I didn't think it would work and it didn't.   Took them home and mounted them and set the points on the ground and lifted the machine front off the ground.   The bars bent.  Loaded up the forks and took them back and went back to plan A.   



  

Bars 1" thick by 4" wide bent.  Weld is where they were.



 

The clevis pin can be pulled and forks moved to some other locations - but not anywhere.

[Satamax]

In europe, we have thoses type of forks too. I always thought they were like that, so they could be put backwards over the apron (is that the right word for you? ) when going on the road. It's forbiden to ride your telehandler on the road with the forks pointing forward over here. I like Bibbyman's solution.

[4x4American]

I like Bibby's solution by far.  Leave it to Ole Bibby to have the best idear IMO on the forks

[customsawyer]

I have much thinking to do on this one. Bibby I am worried about welding at the 90° bend of the forks seems to be one of the worst places to weld. Yet it looks like it has worked fine for Bibby.

[Kbeitz]

Would you need to weld ? You could have a bracket made that would slip over
the forks just like that with out welding. It's hard to see in that picture if
it's welded on.

[customsawyer]

Anything that you slip onto the forks is going to effect the way the back of them contact a pack of lumber.

[Bibbyman]

I have much thinking to do on this one. Bibby I am worried about welding at the 90° bend of the forks seems to be one of the worst places to weld. Yet it looks like it has worked fine for Bibby.

This  machine weighs in at some 14,000. Rated at 6500 lift.  Forks are 2x5x42?   I've put the machine to hard use and maybe some abuse and the forks have held up fine.   But it's a gamble.  Maybe you can weld the clevis plates on somewhere besides the corner? 

I actually wanted and instructed the welder to put the plates on higher.  The fork hanging system has about 2" of float.  I wanted the forks at the lowest float point and that's what I went over with the welder.  But he welded them on where the forks are at the highest point.

I wanted the forks at the lowest point so there would be more clearance between bottom of fork and fork frame.  As it is, you pick up a pallet of lumber with blocking that falls between the forks and sticks out past the bundle,   the fork frame hits and pushes the blocking.  I cursed this welder a number of times.

This welder had all the right equipment and had the skill to do a good job but he screwed every project I took to him.  He went out of business and took a job welding at a factory.

[Satamax]

If you're worried about the welding, you could do dot welding, like for cast iron. Do 1/4" to 1/2" weld on each side to hold in place, let it cool down. Do another dot on each side, when cooled etc. You start your dots on the end of previous ones. That's how you weld some types of cast irons. It only affects a tiny surface at a time. Plus, on that side, with the forks acting as levers, you're in a zone of compression. Not traction, so, metal, even embritelled by the welding is in compression, and support this type of load far better.

[longtime lurker]

Me, I'd figure out a clamp system that goes across the fork tyne and aroudn the frame and was held by a bolt.... welding those forks is not impossible but its difficult to get a really good weld.

If you feel the urge to weld find someone who is set up to do underwater arc and welding hardened steel aint an issue. Probably be more issue finding someone who does it and knows what they're doing then in doing it.
If you want to do it at home:
Use low hydrogen rods, rather then MIG.
Preheat the weld area first, and let it cool down real slow after welding.

 

 

... while you got the welder out. :D

[Kbeitz]

I like the picture with the clevis pin . I would make up two brackets that looks like
this and slide it over your forks (forks through the hole). Then I would replace the clevis
pin with a large bolt. It would do the same job with no welding on the forks.



 

[Dave Shepard]

At some point in this game, it will be better to just by the right fork carriage, rather than come with what amounts to a serious compromise. I didn't notice if the machine has a JRB style coupler, our Mustang at work does, and there are many different types of forks available once you start looking at what is available for payloaders. I know that on this machine, you will not want to have that clamp apparatus way out on the tips of the forks. These machines have great lifting capacity, but really start to fail when you ask them to roll back heavy loads out on the forks. We used a machine like this one on a job recently, and you it is no exception.

[WDH]

There was an incident today.  A weather induced incident.  This thing weighs a bazillion tons.  With all the rain the last two weeks, there was the perfect storm.



 

It is hard to bottom-out one better than this.  Halfway to China.  I told Jake that she was so buried, that there were Chinese from the other side of the world stealing parts from the under-carriage  :D.

Jake managed to get it unstuck after much ado.  You would not believe how he did it, but I will let him expound on that. 

It has been unbelievably wet down here.  Hot and wet.

[Dave Shepard]

I've heard pushing with the boom can bend a section.

[Magicman]

Glad that you did not have to call Raider Bill to bring a dozer to get it out.      :D

[Ocklawahaboy]

I would have just planted some kudzu or air potato vine around it and waited for it to disappear.  Out of sight/out of mind.

[Kbeitz]

Let me tell you I know all about getting one stuck and weighing a bazillion tons.
Just not anything will pull one out. Next time I will stay on the pavement.

[Satamax]

Or buy proper tyres! :D

[Nomad]

     Yup, it was stuck all right.  Glad you got it out, Jake!

[customsawyer]

Well the way we got it out was to pull really hard.  :D

[Magicman]

Obviously the slabs under the front tires did not work.   :D

[scsmith42]

Danny, I hope that you weren't driving it when it got stuck...

[WDH]

Oh no.  I was a casual observer  ;D. 

[POSTON WIDEHEAD]

Up here they just set them on fire, collect the insurance and start over.  :D

[landscraper]

Or buy proper tyres! :D

I bet his tires weren't this bad.




The framers working on one of my jobsites (but not working for me) have a used Terex lift they bought from Sunbelt so they could set lumber up on the 3rd floor etc.

I snapped this photo when I walked by the other day and noticed it.  Now I go to the complete opposite end of the job when they are using it.  I have never....ever...seen one this bad in use.  Through the tread, through the cord, into the inner casing.  The right rear tire is marginally better.

[YellowHammer]

Yep, that was a definitely a stuck piece of equipment. Might avoid that particular spot in the future.  I bet the Deere Skidsteer had something to do with getting it out?

[customsawyer]

Well first we hook the JD tractor to the front, and then the back. 85 hp tractor would not even shake it, all it would do was spin in the soft mud. So I went and got my Ford pickup with the 16500 pound Warn and hooked that up. Run the cable through a snatch block, spun the truck in reverse to help get a better hold and then anchored the truck to the tractor. Took a little bit to get the proper balance of the boom, as if it was in to far the back just kept sinking and if it was out to far then the front would sink. Once we got that balance figured out she started to pop up out of the mud and come right to us. This is the same trick I used to use to get Dozers and frontend loaders out when doing land clearing.

[Kbeitz]

Yep... The 16500 will do it...



 

[ScottAR]

I would wager that the green lift has foam filled tires...  I understand it is very difficult to remove the wheel rim from those so most just get new rims. Thus they just run the tires to destruction.  I've seen them worn all the way through to the foam. 

[Satamax]

Landscraper and ScottAR, i've never seen anything that bad over here.  That's mad. When i was talking about proper tyres, i mean, some with air in them. So you can deflate a bit to get unstuck a smidge better. And tyres which have more of an agricultural thread, than the ones on that JLD :D Thoses honeycomb tyres haven't reached France yet.

On my machine, i have 18.4-30 tyres water filled! That's in order to stop the tipping.



About foam filled tyres, i've heard that they just cut them, to remove from the rims.

[redbeard]

Glad you were able too get your rig unstuck. Its Good that you know  where to find some cheap crane mats for driving over soft ground in the future.

[ScottAR]

Air tires are great till they go flat.  :   Seriously, Solid tires are great on a industrial site or scrapyard type environment as they can drive over nearly anything with minimal damage.  They don't do that well in mud as clearly shown in the pics. 

[Raider Bill]

Glad that you did not have to call Raider Bill to bring a dozer to get it out.      :D

I always use someone else's dozer :D ;)