Vulcan 8 x 8

[WaterH]

IMO, diesel doesn't go bad. Just make sure it’s clean and run it.

I went to filter it and found it almost empty. Here the plastic tank split down the side. Very strange. I have two of these Heavy duty 30 gallon plastic tanks for many years. I mainly used them to carry water. It just decided to split now. It must have split at the top and worked it’s way down because I never noticed a puddle in my shop. I guess all that diesel is soaked into my floor.

 

[WaterH]

So I originally wanted to convert this to 12 volts and I still do. But, to do this I would have to source a starter, alternator, fuel selinoid and possibly 12 volt glow plugs. I could use my 12 volt “shop battery” for the time being. Thinking about this, if the current alternator works, I could just get another battery and run it with my shop battery for 28 volts.

That would be easy and if this thing turned out to be not feasible to resurrect, I would have two shop battery’s instead of useless parts for my money. So I’m going to try to get this alternator working.

So if you were going to hook this up, would you just the big cable to hot and the other big post to negative? Then I guess12 volts to the terminal that says “ignition”. I wish I had paid attention when I cut the wire on this.

Edit, so I found another pic before I started chopping wires. Looks like the left post does go to ground.

 

[WaterH]

So today I was looking at the Vulcan and noticed the frame drain plug and fill plug where I had the tire off.

The chain rides inside the frame in an oil bath. Obviously, the oil is only in the bottom inch or so and I guess the chain spins it up around the sprockets and such. I have been dumping scrap oil in the frame for a couple years. I figure it can’t hurt to have oil soaking in the chain. I pulled one of the top covers to see how high the level was.

You can see the oil level is over half the frame. When I was talking to one of the engineers on this project, he mentioned that they had a lot of problems with condensation in the frames. That was in Texas, so I figure I would have the same. That was thick oil in the top, but maybe it was sitting on water. I decided to drain some off at the plug and run it through my fancy funnel that catches water.

Well, I didn’t need to run it through a filter to know there was water.

Amazing how the water separates. I sware this water was good enough to drink.

Once it started pouring black oil out, I replaced the plug. I ended up draining 7 gallons out of one side and 6 out of the other. It still left lots of oil in the frame.

Now this has me wondering about the swing arms.

I see there’s a cover plate on it also. Underneath I see two plugs also. I guess I need to check them out.

Im thinking it would be good to get all oil in these things and tow it around the yard to get the oil worked into the chains.

 

[WaterH]

So I opened the swig arm.

It looked amazingly good. I couldn’t see any oil in it. Maybe it all leaked out. So I opened the other one where I had the flat tire off.

This one looks worse, but most of the rust came off the cover. This side looked like it had something in the bottom, (water/oil) but not much. For now I just closed them up.

I hooked up the alternator the way I figured it should be.

Started the engine. Much like the new exhaust.

Checked the voltage. (No charge) So unless i hooked it up wrong, the alt is shot.

While I had it started I tried to jack up the side with four good tires.

I noticed that it didn’t jack up very good when I only had three tires on. I thought that maybe 500 lbs. psi was not enough to lift the truck with only three cylinders. Now that I had four cylinders, I thought it would work better. It may have, but not much. You can see there is still a lot of Crome shaft showing. It would be completely covered by the cylinder when fully jacked up.

 

[WaterH]

Hooked up the alternator slightly different,

Started the truck. It still smokes pretty good when you first start it. At least the smoke is out the back now. Alternator still doesn’t work.

I put some jack stands at both ends of the truck and raised the tires off the ground. I was able to spin the tires by hand. It’s hard because when you spin one, all four turn on that side.

I lifted the back two wheels and jacked up the front six as much as they would go.

Kind of irritating it won’t go the whole way up. Just not enough power. Question for Cartercraft, Hydrodynamic or whoever knows. I’m assuming this thing is a filter. If you look close, you can see the guage that tells me I have 500 lbs. pressure is on one side and the hose that feeds my wheel jacks is on the other. Is it possible that this thing is also a regulator and I’m not getting 500 on the other side?

Another problem. The gearbox vent was puking oil again. You can see it in the center here. Right behind it, there is a plug. Before I started it, I pulled that plug and the oil was like 4” down. The oil coming out the vent is brown like water is in it. When water and oil get hot and mixed, do they expand a lot? I don’t see how it gets up to that vent. I guess I need to drain and refill with good oil.

I got the tow bar hooked to the tractor and drug it around the yard. The tow bar works good. I think I could flat tow this down the highway. I think the two back tires being off the ground helps a lot. Maybe even better if I had the front two tires off, but I have to get the wheel jacks working better.

On the hydro system, the main drive is a “closed loop” system. That system can get very high pressure when running. (6000 lbs.) But would I be correct that it wouldn’t have any pressure when it is just idling? If so I don’t understand how the wheel jacks are supposed to work. If the pilot system is limited to 500 lbs. and that’s not enough, but the main system has no pressure when not moving, how would run the jacks standing still?

 

[aczlan]

On the hydro system, the main drive is a “closed loop” system. That system can get very high pressure when running. (6000 lbs.) But would I be correct that it wouldn’t have any pressure when it is just idling? If so I don’t understand how the wheel jacks are supposed to work. If the pilot system is limited to 500 lbs. and that’s not enough, but the main system has no pressure when not moving, how would run the jacks standing still?

Based on literature that I found previously, there should be 3-4 hydraulic systems:
1. Pilot system - 500PSI
2. Drive system - 6000PSI
3. Utility/Aux system (wheel lift, weapons , attachments, etc) - 2000-3500PSI?
4. Attachments/weapons? - 2000-3500PSI?

Aaron Z

 

[Bacho]

So does the entire side raise up and down at the same time? I wonder if those cylinders are bypassing making this a flow issue. You might pull one apart, seals could be trashed or an internal stop installed?

 

[aczlan]

So does the entire side raise up and down at the same time? I wonder if those cylinders are bypassing making this a flow issue. You might pull one apart, seals could be trashed or an internal stop installed?

IIRC he has a valve on each cylinder, good point about a possible blown seal.
It would be worth trying to lift one wheel at a time and see if one acts differently, or can be pushed so the cylinder extends by hand.
According to the Surplus Center hydraulic cylinder calculator, if those are 2.5" bore, 1.5" rod cylinders at 500PSI they should each have 2454# of force extending and 1571# of force retracting.

Aaron Z

 

[WaterH]

Based on literature that I found previously, there should be 3-4 hydraulic systems:
1. Pilot system - 500PSI
2. Drive system - 6000PSI
3. Utility/Aux system (wheel lift, weapons , attachments, etc) - 2000-3500PSI?
4. Attachments/weapons? - 2000-3500PSI?

Aaron Z

There’s only 3 pumps. The small pilot and one big one for each set of wheels. Don’t really see where a Aux pump would go. There wasn’t a bunch of unhooked hoses when I tour it apart.

So does the entire side raise up and down at the same time? I wonder if those cylinders are bypassing making this a flow issue. You might pull one apart, seals could be trashed or an internal stop installed?

If I have all the valves open, I can raise or lower one side at a time. The low resistance one will go first, but the others will follow. (Like if I have the tire off one)

IIRC he has a valve on each cylinder, good point about a possible blown seal.
It would be worth trying to lift one wheel at a time and see if one acts differently, or can be pushed so the cylinder extends by hand.
According to the Surplus Center hydraulic cylinder calculator, if those are 2.5" bore, 1.5" rod cylinders at 500PSI they should each have 2454# of force extending and 1571# of force retracting.

Aaron Z

I have installed a separate valve for up and down on each cylinder. When I powered them with my tractor, they all worked fine. Obviously, much faster because the tractor is running 2000 lbs. or more. I will measure the cylinders, but I think you have estimated pretty close.

Assuming, you are correct, that would give me almost 6000 lbs. of lift for all 4. (The cylinders are in “retract” when jacking up) The whole truck is supposed to weigh 12,000 lbs. (I’m not sure if that doesn’t include the big gun) If I had only 3 wheels set to go, I should have 4500 lbs. of lift. So maybe 500 is not enough.

Am I correct about a closed loop system not creating pressure until it is working? If the oil is just going through a motor that has the slash plate in neutral and back to the pump, how would there be any pressure?

 

[aczlan]

If the swashplate is in neutral there wouldn't be any pressure or flow.
Do you have a picture of the pumps? I remember the wheel motors being variable displacement, but I don't remember what the pumps looked like.
The specs I had found said 2000PSI for the wheel positioning system, 1500PSI for the brakes and 350PSI for the charge system (but that given the experimental nature of this beast that may be inaccurate).

This one was especially useful, it has operating pressures for the drive, suspension and braking systems:

Aaron Z

 

[WaterH]

The pumps are also variable displacement. I see what your saying. I don’t know how they accomplish 2000 lbs.

Here is the best picture I have of the pumps.

Not sure if you can see, but there are two giant lines, (One visible here), two medium lines, (one visible here), and the pilot lines.

When I say I have 500 lbs., it maybe 350 because my guage is so large of a scale. 0-10,000. The needle sweep for 0-500 is about 1/8”, so very difficult to say with accuracy.

I was under the impression that the charge pump is internally regulated to the 350. Maybe it is regulated to 2000 internally and externally regulated down further for brakes and pilot system. Of course, I removed so much shit when I was “simplifying” it, I might have removed some kind of regulator. (Although I don’t remember anything like that) The thing is, I’m getting the 350-500 right now, so it must be regulated to that somewhere.

When the engine is idling, I show no pressure on the gauge. When I rev it up, it goes to approximately 450. It I rev it higher, it never goes any higher on the gauge.

I need to correct something. I was using your cylinder force as lift pounds in my last post. That is not correct because the swing arms have leverage on those cylinders.

I would have to do some math to figure cylinder force to lift force. Also, I was using the approximate wt. of the machine, but the tires and swing arm would not be part of the calculation because they are not being lifted. Those sob’s have got to be heavy.

 

[WaterH]

So today I drained the oil in the gearbox that drives the three pumps. It had been oozing oil out of its vent when I run the engine. Here you can see the vent on the top of the fitting stack and the fill plug behind and below it.

There was a drain plug on the bottom, but there is no plug on the side to fill to. How would you decide how much should go in here? I measured the amount that I drained and it was just over a gallon. I put in a gallon of gear lube. I’ll leave it there unless someone has a better idea. I thought I would find a bunch of water in the oil I drained. Surprising it was very clean looking. It must be 30 years old. So now how do I explain the oil going out the vent? It’s not anywhere near full as I can see about 5” down the fill plug to the gears and the oil level is not there.

 

[aczlan]

Splashing into the vent entrance?

Aaron Z

 

[WaterH]

Splashing into the vent entrance?

Aaron Z

That pic doesn’t really show the vent to case very good. It is a elbow. The first gears are probably 2” below where it enters on the side.

 

[aczlan]

Switch the vent to the center top hole (blue) and use the side hole (red) as your "it's full" point?

Aaron Z

 

[WaterH]

I could switch the vent, but I couldn’t fill to the side hole. (Way too much oil)

The thing is, when I look down the plug hole there are gear teeth that would spin off oil to that plug hole. They can’t really spin off oil to the side hole, so it would appear the vent on the top would be worse.

 

[arse_sidewards]

Make a catch can and plumb them both to the can and vent the can?

 

[aczlan]

I could switch the vent, but I couldn’t fill to the side hole. (Way too much oil)

The thing is, when I look down the plug hole there are gear teeth that would spin off oil to that plug hole. They can’t really spin off oil to the side hole, so it would appear the vent on the top would be worse.

Are they slinging it onto the wall and it's dripping down over the hole, then getting pushed out by the expansion as the air warms up?
If you pull the top plug when it's running, does it sling oil out of the hole?

Aaron Z

 

[WaterH]

Are they slinging it onto the wall and it's dripping down over the hole, then getting pushed out by the expansion as the air warms up?
If you pull the top plug when it's running, does it sling oil out of the hole?

Aaron Z

Haven’t tried that Pulling that plug while running. I originally thought the oil must be mixed with water and expanding to go out the vent. I once dunked a Scout and the engine oil did that the next time I got it started. I think the water kind of boils with the oil and expands. On the Scout, it fixed when I changed the oil. That’s what I’m hoping for here. But the oil in the Scout was obviously contaminated. (And was over full) That doesnt appear to be the case here. I haven’t run it since changing the oil, so I will withhold the final word.

Another mystery, the frame was full of water and oil. I drained the water off as per a couple posts back and moved the truck about 20 feet over. Now it appears that one of my swing arms is leaking oil where it enters the frame. There is no leak spot where it was parked, now there is a small puddle at this area. It’s only been there a couple days. Have you ever heard of a seal that will hold water back, but not oil?

 

[aczlan]

Haven’t tried that Pulling that plug while running. I originally thought the oil must be mixed with water and expanding to go out the vent. I once dunked a Scout and the engine oil did that the next time I got it started. I think the water kind of boils with the oil and expands. On the Scout, it fixed when I changed the oil. That’s what I’m hoping for here. But the oil in the Scout was obviously contaminated. (And was over full) That doesnt appear to be the case here. I haven’t run it since changing the oil, so I will withhold the final word.

Curious to see what is going on.
Out of curiosity, have you pulled the vent and blown air through it to make sure it's not partially plugged?

Another mystery, the frame was full of water and oil. I drained the water off as per a couple posts back and moved the truck about 20 feet over. Now it appears that one of my swing arms is leaking oil where it enters the frame. There is no leak spot where it was parked, now there is a small puddle at this area. It’s only been there a couple days. Have you ever heard of a seal that will hold water back, but not oil?

Seal had taken a "set" or there was a flaw that was plugged with dirt, you moved the swingarms, dislodged the dirt and it started leaking?

Aaron Z

 

[WaterH]

Curious to see what is going on.
Out of curiosity, have you pulled the vent and blown air through it to make sure it's not partially plugged?

Seal had taken a "set" or there was a flaw that was plugged with dirt, you moved the swingarms, dislodged the dirt and it started leaking?

Aaron Z

Not checked the vent.

The the location I moved it from was only there for a couple months, but I guess it’s possible.

 

[WaterH]

Not much progress. One of my factory guys sent me some new pics.

Looks like the gun is modular.

Kind of like this set up.

 

[CDA 455 II]

Sub'd

 

[WaterH]

I just noticed the flat covers on the wheels. Mine is just standard Hummer wheels. I wonder if the covers are a standard thing. I’m not sure how they attach. Looks like 4 bolts, but don’t know where they would go into.

 

[ParadisePWoffrd]

I just noticed the flat covers on the wheels. Mine is just standard Hummer wheels. I wonder if the covers are a standard thing. I’m not sure how they attach. Looks like 4 bolts, but don’t know where they would go into.

looks like they would thread onto the wheel studs

 

[WaterH]

So I started looking at this thing again. I don’t really know what my next step should be, but I decided to pull the mechanical “stack” for the right side apart. I don’t know what all it does between the motor and the sprocket driving the chain. I need to know what all is there and if I need to rebuild any of it. Also, it would be nice if the motor was not driving the wheels during my learning and testing of the hydro system.

First thing to do was remove the four big Allen bolts holding the motor on. This took quite awhile, not because they were tight, but because the Allen holes were full of 30 years of grease cement. I figured out that egyptians didn’t move big rocks to build the pyramids, they just formed them out of grease and wait 30 years.

You can see the 4 bolts on the left.

Next, I pulled the motor off. Actually, I beat the shit out of it and it didn’t budge. I finally used a floor Jack to twist it. Then I was able to work it out by hand. Some people might say this thing was heavy. Some might say it was the heaviest substance on earth. All I can say is it didn’t wait for me to lower it slowly to the ground.

I couldn’t figure out how to get the next section off until I scraped the gasket off. Under it were four more Allen bolts. Of course they were a metric size smaller than the outer bolts and the only Allen wrench I had that fit was one of those ball wrenches. The bolts were way tighter than the ball was going to take. So I either have to cut the ball off or get another wrench. Didn’t feel like wrecking the ball and it was getting dark. Maybe tomorrow.

 

[CarterKraft]

I'm thinking that next piece is a parking, e-brake

 

[WaterH]

I'm thinking that next piece is a parking, e-brake

You sir are a winner. I least I think you are correct. I got it off today and I notice the shaft will not turn.

There is only one hydro connection on this. Would it be safe to assume hydro pressure will unlock the shaft and release of that pressure will allow an internal spring to lock it again? There are two sensors. I’m guessing one is to confirm it’s locked and the other unlocked. Maybe one is an rpm sensor? The only other thing on it is a bleed nipple. I did confirm the hydro port and bleed nipple are connected. I did this with compressed air. Conveniently, the remaining hydro oil came out the bleed valve directly to my face.

Question to Cartercraft or any heavy equipment guy, would I assume this will be operated by a pilot pressure of around 350-500 psi? Do you think it would hurt anything to try a 100 psi air?

Next up is the Towing section. I already knew what this does as I found it lets the wheels turn free for towing by moving the lever. You can just see the quick release pin on the right of the pic. (It’s almost out)

Here the inner sleeve is pivoted back to unlock the wheels from the motor.

Here you can see the short splined shaft that floats in this section.

That leaves this chunk mounted by 4 large bolts. This was a PITA because my big box wrench wouldn't fit between the housing and the bolt head. I had a socket that fit and removed the top two, but it wouldn’t even fit on the bottom two. I ened up useing an end wrench. It took a long time because I had such a short stroke.

Best I can tell is this is a hi/low range gearbox. There was a hi/lo switch on the dash. Maybe it’s just a speed reducer. The tag on it is mostly unreadable, but I can make out “Fairfield Torque” on it. Probably it say torque multiplier. When I turn it from the shaft side, the female side turns faster. It turns very free.

There are two hydro ports on it. I’m thinking that if I put hydro pressure to one, it will be in high range and if I put the pressure to the other, it will go low. Have you guys seen anything like this before? I guess that pressure would need to remain to keep it in that gear?

That leaves this on the frame.

You probably can’t see in the pic, but there are three gears visible arranged in a planetary setup. I’m not planing to go any further right now on disassembly.

What I would like to do is run pilot pressure to the ports on the brake section and hi/low gearbox to confirm what they are and that they work. Does anybody think this is a bad idea? Does anybody think I will need more serious pressure than the pilot system?

Comments appreciated.

 

[CarterKraft]

300-500 psi to the brake would be fair, 100-200 psi air pressure won't hurt anything, port-o-power would be fine too.

The sensor might be speed or pressure, pulling sensor and examining will confirm which

Fairfield makes common "torque hub" planetary final drives for equipment. I'm not aware of a 2 speed type box, that would usually be done with displacement solenoids in the hydrostat circuit but could be mechanical like you suggest, I've just not seen that.

 

[WaterH]

Ok, I just got done with some more testing. First, I hooked up the golf cart and cranked up the motor. I can’t believe how good this thing runs. I haven't started it in 6 month. I have a glass cleaner sprayer full of gas. One squirt and it fired right up and idled. It still smokes a bit, but it runs smooth.

I have a tee off the hydro pilot line with a shut off valve. I hooked a line from it to the brake section. Reved it up and opened the valve. Tried to turn the shaft, no joy. I figured it might need more pressure. I unhooked the line and hook it to one of the ports on the gearbox. Opened the valve and tried to turn the shaft. I was watching the female side and it was still turning faster than I was. So far, not so good.

Edit for my information, the port closest to the flange makes the gearbox go 1 to 1.

Next, I unhooked the line and hooked it to the other port on the gearbox. When I opened the valve hydro fluid shot out the open port. I guess I should have figured that. Anyways, I turned the shaft and Shazam, now the female side was turning one to one with the male side. Well that was a win. So then I got thinking that maybe I should bleed the brake section and try it again. So I hooked the line up and opened the valve. I was fooling around to find a wrench to open the bleeder. When I got back to the thing, I just thought I should try turning it again and dam if it didn’t turn easy.

So the day turned out to be a win.

I feel pretty good about all this stuff. My plan is to reassemble everything but the motor. I’ll keep that off for testing it.

Question, all this stuff is separated with about 1/16” gaskets. They spread tons of silicone on both sides of the gaskets also. I’m thinking of just bolting together with some “make a gasket” stuff. You don’t suppose they make this stuff with tight tolerances that a 1/16” is going to matter?

The sensor might be speed or pressure, pulling sensor and examining will confirm which

Both sensors are two wire and the end is just a single pin in the middle like a mag pick up. I don’t think it would be pressure or temp. Either a proximity or rpm. I don’t figure on using either, so it doesn’t matter. I would like to get some plugs for the holes, but they look like a weirdo fine thread, so I may just have to use them.