Seems like we're getting taken advantage of by our hired mechanic. Can anyone tell me approx. how long it should take to remove the belly pan on a 963C?
The belly guards can be extremely heavy if they haven't been down for a while and are full of cr@p. My answer would be "it depends", on any of the following:- Quantity - How many of the three guards (front, center, rear) were being removed.? Location - Inside, outside, (what sort of weather conditions if outside), dirt floor, concrete, etc.? Tooling - jacks, come-alongs, etc, available.? Big rattle gun available for bolts.? Manpower - doing it alone any decent mechanic would be working VERY carefully IMHO. Those things have killed people in the past. See here - HeavyEquipmentForums
Always looks easier when watching then it is when doing it
How much time is in this now and how many are down?
My 973C has two big doors at the back. I have taken both of them down and fixed a small hose and reinstalled doors in around 2.5 hours alone.. Doors were pretty clean when I stared. I was in a small shop concrete floor with floor jack and air tools.
When we drop the ones on our 953C it takes 2 guys about 2 hours to R&R - that's operators/laborers not mechanics.
It also depends on how many rocks they have been parked on. Nige is right. There was a fellow killed not to long ago removing D10 skid plates for one of the customers I work for. They rewrote their Job Hazard Analysis for removing skid plates. I didn't make the job any easier.
Last night it was -11*F was pulling stuff off the 955C D315. Nothing moves and EVERYTHING takes longer. Seems I spend more time putting on and taking off my gloves than removing bolts. My hands hurt, tools are so cold they bite and OMG you should hear the language Siri uses. Tried to take a video and five minutes in, or so, the dang ol phone quit working - it under-heated I guess. You preach Nige and I'll turn the pages on this issue. Sorry forgot to talk about the rock guards/belly pans, Went to pick one up for the 955C and it took three of us to load them on a trailer.
Normally less than 1 hour but if bolts are froze it could take longer
It obviously wasn't that important to the OP. One post a week ago and never came back.........
Maybe the OP decided to do it themselves. May still be trying to install sprung belly pans.
....or lying underneath them....
That was a possibility that slipped my mind when I was trying to think of possibilities a ways earlier.
What are there say 8 bolts at 15 seconds each with air wrench that should only take 2 minutes to drop the belly pan! Now if you take into account this machine could be 20 years old, The bolts have never been touched since it left the factory. Then most of the heads have been bashed by running over rocks so a socket won't fit with out grinding and beating on and off with hammer. Then the fact that as the pan has not been off in 20 years the mud has turned to concrete. Then the poor SOB is trying to do this out in the field on half frozen ground with no way to get an air hose to the machine. Also guy has to carry his tools and chain jacks 1/4 mile through a swamp to get to the machine. All the while the owner is standing there asking:"How much longer, you done yet, that's not how I would be doing it, guess I should have thought to fix that leak when it was in the heated shop last week, are you done yet?" Well it may take a little longer. Just hope the mechanic doesn't decide to dig a hole and toss the owner in it when the job is done, at least not till he has cash in hand!
If someone questions me about time on a sprung belly pan, forestry screen or anything of that nature I’ll gladly step back and let them have there hand at it.
This. I’ve taken all day to drop bellypans when it’s a real pain. Seized bolts, stripped and spun bolts, hooks/catches, smashed in, full of debris and mud, etc it’s never easy. They love to hang up and get crooked on the hooks, slip off the jack and so on. My first and only concern when doing bellypans is not getting hurt or killed.
Those pans are deadly. Truth be told its one of the jobs I fear most. I've yet to have a close call and hope I never do. Last bolt I'm literally reaching as far as I can with the impact because I don't want to be anywhere near it. If it drops or slides off the jack or rigging the wrong way you don't really have many options in terms of which direction you can take to escape.
I can take the three off my 973c in an hour, on gravel, floor jack, few chunks of a chunk of 6x6 wood, with a 3/4" impact. Floor jack, hold it tight up to the belly, undo all the bolts, get out of dodge, stick two pieces of 6x6 under each end, let the jack down. Drive machine forward. Floor jack is easier put back underneath, bolts in a bucket, antisieze on every square inch of your body.
I always run a chain under belly pans when I removed them, suspended with my crane and hooked to a track pad on the opposite side. If you have ever had one of those full of dirt weighing 500lbs drop and slide when the last bolt is removed...……...and hit you in the shoulder (several times over the years I might add)…...for me the safety chain is a must. As far as sprung pans, they are almost impossible to get back in original shape. Some of the worst I've had too 2-3 hydraulic jacks, a couple of line up bars, and a lot of muscle to get back on.
I pulled one off of a D-8 that came from a land fill and I did not know that they had pressure washed it a few days before so it sat and made soup in 90 degree weather. when it came down I got baptized in a rotten garbage dirty diaper tampon brew. needless to say it made my day.
There are not enough bad smilies to adequately express my thoughts on that! Closest I have come to something of that nature have been a couple cabs with left over food under the seats or the truck I had to move that had been a mouse motel/bathroom for a couple years. Hit a bump in the road and it started raining mouse turds!