A rare photo opportunity... most of our roadworks gear in the same spot together. We been flat out preparing for a largish resheeting job for a local authority. The only machine without an ecm and probably the most reliable, the trusty 12G. This will be one of the few jobs that we have both graders working together. I’ll post some more pics as work progresses.
Cant beat a G for reliability
With a touch of care that G will still be working when the rest are melted down to recycle.
Never did get around to posting any photos at the time. Currently doing a similar job at the moment.. I’ll try to post some, in no particular order. These are isolated bush roads, which we are overlaying with 150mm of laterite gravel to 5m wide. Zero moisture in the stockpile so adding and mixing enough water is essential.
Never understood the necessity to License machines as tractors and HE as Australia and UK does. Curious as to the three piece ?rock guard? across the Western Star windshield. Looks like a good project.
Anything that goes anywhere near a public road has to be registered here, even mobility scooters, ride on mowers and the like. It provides third party insurance coverage in this litigious world we live in now. I don’t know if the stone guards really work or not but they are very common... a bit like the perspex on the front of the hood supposed to deflect bugs. At the end of the day, it’s probably all just bling.
We have to tag everything here in Canada as well. Even asphalt spreaders, asphalt transfer vehicles, rollers, skidsteers, anything that hits the road. I didn't realize they had right hand drive in Australia as well.
Here's a question. With right hand drive, your throttle is on your left foot, and clutch on your right. Are the foot controls the same on your equipment, or is it North American style throttle on the right and clutch on the left?
Foot controls are same
I was wondering about the Moose deflector. Is there something larger than the kangaroos I have seen that need deflecting? Stray or open range cows on the road perhaps?
Not everywhere in Canada. Manitoba Alberta and Saskatchewan don’t require plates. I don’t think Ontario does either but I know British Columbia does.
Most controls are the same as yours, Shift patterns the same, maybe the only difference is the road ranger splitter button is on the other side of the knob so it can be shifted with the thumb. OIH, yes they are called bull bars here but have evolved into something of an art form. There are plenty of trucks with huge bars that are never likely to see a roo, let alone an unlucky bovine.
Only thing that right handed people have to do "right" is using the left hand to shift gears . Most of the old British colonies have the same kind of road rules. Around here you can license a Cat 657 and drive around with it like an oversized truck.
I worked for a company years ago, and the job was split, with about a mile of existing road between the 2. A young fella was walking the roller from one section to the other, along the shoulder. The DOT stopped him and fined him for the machine having no plates. The foreman, talked to them, and they said on the job, they didn't care, but he was on the road. He said come on guys, he's just a kid, just got his drivers license, he doesn't need a fine on his record, at least put the fine in my name. They wouldn't budge. I did gain a bit more respect for him for trying to help the kid out.
I know it is the case in some provinces with Quebec requiring plates as well. For some reason (I think they like the equipment to have its own liability insurance) our province and at least 3 others don’t require it. Operators are required to have a valid drivers license though.
Keep the pics coming Queenslander! Awesome scenery.
That Western Star is COOL!!!!
A few more truck pics. The three little pumps are filling the tanker in eleven minutes.
Before hauling gravel we prepare subgrade by mixing water, forming to a crown with 4% crossfall and compacting with a roller. The trucks haul over this, so by keeping water up to it, it becomes very tight. Then it’s a matter of mixing water with the gravel. I’ve never counted, but it probably takes something like 40 passes to mix thoroughly. We always try to have two water trucks so the grader isn’t waiting for one to refill.
Eventually, we are able to turn this rubble into a road.
Has the sideshift cylinder ball fallen off that 16 yet..?
Because the overlayed surface is now 150mm higher than the subgrade, the shoulders are pulled up to match. This client requires 100%RDD for these projects.
No Nige, the ball is still hanging in there. We keep that grader for bush work, so it certainly doesn’t get any special treatment.
Nice to know it's still going strong. I suspected it was a bit on the big side for the project you're currently engaged in.
OIH, you forgot to mention wild Camels . In some parts we have them to.
Imagine hitting something like this on the highway........... there are more camels in Australia than there are in the Middle East.
Just like the moose around here that like to lick the salt off the road at night
Q - Very familiar with the yellow nuke box but was does RDD stand for? Assuming it's 100% density just never seen that acronym. Oh yeah - I had no idea there were camels Down Under!
There's a warning not to let the moose lick salt off your vehicle in Jasper National Park.
Saw that on the weather network
RDD =Relative Dry Density Don’t know how the numbers all work, but we usually don’t have any trouble getting to 100% with this material, providing we add enough water and mix properly.
I can not see the twenty traffic controller (19 of them sitting in vehicles) The ten foremen sitting in cars and the the five thousand witches hats. There is also a terrible lack of warning signs everywhere. Can not be being done in Queensland.
I can understand your scepticism. Because we are working for local govt., everything has to be above board. We have traffic management plans and traffic guidance schemes, but for once, common sense prevails and, due to the remote location, we are able to get away without controllers and only a minimum amount of signage.
A great acknowledgement that country folk have more common sense than city slickers .
While I’ve got nothing against our city dwelling friends, I’ll have to agree with you. Most of the passing traffic will call up and ask when and where we would like then to come through. Although, we did blow blow off a bit of steam when someone brought 2 B-double loads of cattle over our freshly laid gravel the morning after we received 2 inches of rain.
Just helps with your RDD
Do you think I am the only one that reads your post with an Australian accent in my head. Might be the Kangaroo.
Good to know you got rain out there though it's a bugger during road work.
Since the initial 2 inches, we have had another 5, all in storms. I can’t see us doing any more work before Xmas. We desperately needed the rain though, so not the slightest bit worried. With all the forecasting and radar that’s around today, we still get caught out sometimes. Managed to drown the three little pumps when the dam we had them in bywashed. Could the high tide mark at the bottom be another way of measuring the crown we have in the road? BTW, we don’t talk that much different to Canadians,eh.
You were not chasing a spare were you? https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-12...ation-warning-to-building-site-thief/13004840
Thieves here stole Med Equipment in Columbia MO, same scenario, DO NOT TEAR IT APART, had a Cesium Source(High Rate) in it and evil. Showed up dumped in a alley. Another was a source container for a Pipeline Radiographic weld inspection service, that one was even more evil!! It showed up dumped along a highway.
So they’re obviously not stealing it for the radiation source, they just think it might be worth a dollar? We don’t have one, all our testing has to be done by an independent, suitably accredited company.
4 years ago we were on a condo project where we were hauling in fill to build the basement portion of the building. It was a sunny day, the fill had perfect moisture and we were hitting nuke tests with strides - love those type of days. We had 3 triaxles brining in fill every 20 mins so we had ample time to spread, compact and test as needed. Geotech told us he needed to run to another job around the corner to check another job - no problem. Geotech leaves then 10 mins or so later I see the yellow Troxler out on the edge of the fill lift. I run over to it and put it in the back of my truck then went up to the office trailer to get the techs cell # as they were working for the owner and we had no contact info for the tech. Call the tech and told him "YOU LEFT THE NUKE GAGE OUT ON THE f'ing FILL LIFT!!". Guy thanked us profusely as it would've probably cost his job if we raised the alarm bell with the GC super onsite - however not our style.
I don't know if it's just our dry climate or if other countries are similar but wildlife tend to congregate on the roadside to feed on the fresher grass due to more water from the run off from rain on the roadway. Nearly every vehicle out bush has a bullbar, this one just cost me 5g, but hopefully will save me much more in front end damage.
Gees Pony those lights will burn their eyes out.
What is the purpose of the deflector that is above the windshield?
It's a European style sun visor.
BBQ bunnies at 400 yards. This was my first go at decent spotlights and I think I'm converted, the upper outside set are Fyrlyts, 250 watt (each) old school halogens, while the middle set are LED'S. Seem to work really well together, 80% of the truck use is night time, so I figure it was worth it.
Spot on Tones, its factory Iveco. I've actually just traded the truck, well, will be trading in May when new truck arrives. I've got previous posts on here about my problems with the truck, electrical gremlins were sending me broke keeping it on the road. Sorry for the hijack Queenslander.
No worries, did you settle on the Fuso with amt? Sounds like a bit of a wait. We recently ordered a Cruiser ute, will be 2020 build but won’t get here till Jan.. or Feb.... or maybe March.
Yeah mate Shogun with the AMT, figured if I was going to go new i might as well get all the bells and whistles. The delay is actually the tray and stock crate. I wanted a Leader Crate and when I first went to see them back in September they had a 12 week wait. By the time I convinced myself to spend the money on a new truck and went back to confirm my order it was.a 6 month wait. So I ended up getting a 2021 build truck ordered for delivery in March and crate finished in May. I have previous experience with TWE crates which wasn't positive, I built my last crate on my Isuzu, but that was just to much work to go through again, so a wait it was going to be. As a side note, I almost forgot. Merry Christmas to all. Looks like 2020 keeps giving, was forcasted for a wet Christmas day, but now changed their mind.
Now that the instant asset write off scheme has been extended, it is certainly a great time for businesses wanting to buy new or used equipment ... providing they have enough income to write off against. It is leading to some long delays on new stuff though. Been there done that with crates, both TWE and build our own.. you shouldn’t have any worries with the Leader. When alloy first appeared on stock crates, I had doubts that it would last on some of the roads we have, but it has certainly stood up on doubles etc.
I guess I need to see a picture of the "crate" after all that discussion, I don't even know what you are hauling!
https://www.gwmanufacturing.com.au/leader-truck-bodies.php
Gotcha, kind of what I figured but wasn't sure.
Some of the names on that website have a long history. Western Transport was Australia’s largest transport company in the 50s to 70s with some 500 trucks and trailers. In the early 70’s the transport division was sold and the company went on to build Leader trucks at the inland Qld. city of Toowoomba. Westco Truck Sales and Great Western Manufacturing are part of the Great Western Corporation, a direct descendant of the old transport company.
And good trucks they now as rare as rocking-horse sh*t.
Well you are not the only one.
I s’pose I shouldn’t grumble too much about our TWE crate. It is twenty years old this year (where did that time go?), and has been Ok without being great...needs frequent small welding repairs now. Doubt that we would buy another new rigid... for similar money we could put a trailer behind the white Western Star.
It is not so much the workmanship with ours it is the design. It has considerable crap design elements. Our neighbour bought one a year or two before ours. He hated it so much he sold it and got another built by a different business.
Yeah the TWE crate I have used was for my off-farm job and similar experience to RC, bad design elements, and seemed to be less care taken during manufacture. However when researching for my new truck-tray/crate, I wanted to stay single drive truck if I was able. Most of the truck manufacturers offered a truck with 18 ton or so GVM which can be utilised if you get the volume loading rating. But I still needed to comply with the QLD 15 ton GVM when carting machines etc, so I researched bare tray weight. Leader was about 500kg heavier for same spec tray (28ft). That's a lot of extra steel and all other things being equal should be a lot stronger tray. As it turned I was going to be overweight with my machinery on a single drive no matter how light the tray, so ended up going bogie drive. But you get what you pay for, TWE quoted about 9k cheaper than Leader and as mentioned I have a 6 mth wait with Leader. Hopefully it'll be worth it.
My biggest gripe is the pins on the centre partition working out due to the way the whole thing flexes. Iam a little surprised that it has lasted 20 years on some of the roads we have to deal with.
Last job on this project was dealing with an eroded gully that was threatening to eat into the road during the next good storm. Luckily, there were some good size goolies close by that we were able to loosen up with the dozer and carry down to the job with the loader. Some were a metre plus in diameter, so didn’t fancy tossing them into the side tipper.
great pictures!
Goolies (referring to fcukoff big rocks). Now there's a word I haven't heard in a while.......
Also known as gibbers, boondies or just rocks, but not to be confused with the pair that some of us have dangling between our legs!
That rock appears to be very hard, based on the edges and shapes. Unlike Limestone rock that we have here which is basically fish poop from prehistoric sea floors.
We just call them BFR's.
We call them leverites, "leave em right there" .
Basically just granite, sometimes with a bit of a basalt influence. The smaller stone on top is the same but been through a reclaimer.
Do you have your truck yet Pony? I was fuelling up in TBA this arvo and what looked like a dealer wheeled in with a brand new bogie with a maroon Leader crate.. I reckoned there was a good chance it was yours.
Yep, that'll be mine. Leader finished with it Thursday, I will collect from dealer next week. The crate colour is actually 'wineberry', but shhhh, don't tell anyone, we'll say it's maroon.
I agree, a true Queenslander would never drive anything “wineberry” . Impressive looking truck..what length is it? I had to pull up briefly to give him room to swing in off the street.
Pics or it never happened!
Yeah, when I ordered crate as I wanted etc, the last detail was the colour, there was about 4 or 5 'standard' colours and anything else you wanted was extra. I said I had seen one of the standard maroon ones and thought it looked pretty good, he replied, we don't do maroon, but we have 'wineberry'. For some reason that has stuck in my head. Crate is 28ft, am trying to get an S10 rating (allowing me to go to manufacturers GVM rather than state imposed road limit GVM, but only allowable when transporting livestock). Engineers Initial input was that he was happy with 28ft but he wanted it set back 500mm from the cab to keep some weight off the steer axle. 500mm was way to much real world gap and I couldn't think of anything useful to put in there so to speak, so we just had it built as per 'normal' and will hope for the best re S10 rating.
I wouldn’t have thought you would need to worry about S10 with the extra axle. Our truck is S10 rated but it only takes it from 16000 to 16500 on the single drive with 25ft.
Been hauling some similar stone here, the quarries here call it "Type 1 Bridge Blanket" where is used to keep scour down along creek and river bank bridge abutments. The mirror shows what I was unloading. Tub bed on the truck accepts the stone some easier than square cornered dumpers here do, also has a steel floor liner to minimize the wrinkles these place in the floor. Also call it Rip Rap.
You sure Queenslander? I thought single drive axle only gave you 15000kg under NHVR. Therefore S10 will get you up to your 16500 GVM. Bogie drive will get you 22500kg under NHVR. S10 will get me to 24000kg on that Fuso, the UD I Iooked at was 26000kg GVM.
No, you’re right.... it’s been a few years. It’s probably only an issue when carrying 700kg bullocks.
Any of the Americans on here know how to read his survey rod? I see it every day, but not sure if any of you guys would.
Centimeters?????
No mate, Metres and Millimetres
Being a Canadian, I build my fence 50 feet long, and 2 meters high. My daughter is all metric. Every number on the rod is 10cm or 0.1 of a meter. Each block is 10 mills. When you get to 1.0, that's a meter. If I see a stake with a cut of 0.1, it's about 4 inches. 0.2 is 8, 0.3 is a foot. It's not a super accurate conversion, but to my eye, it's close. Our surveyors get annoyed when I talk in inches
Why do I need to read a rod in centimeters? We have grade rods that read '10th's of a foot all the way up to 16 feet.
My boss likes the 10ths of a foot as well. We used to have a new Bosh level with a rod in inches in the truck, but a little crew shale up, and the 30 year old with me does the metric thing. Sometimes I forget that the rest of the world is metric, and that Canada is soon going to be once us old guys are gone. It's up to you Americans to hold the line.
The metric system was first introduced here in the early seventies, but we’re yet to be fully converted. Pony and myself discussing the length of trucks in feet but the weight in kilograms for example.
It does make for interesting oopsies
I was just thinking the same thing myself Queenslander, it's funny how certain things are still imperial measured and others simply aren't. Like you said we're talking about 28ft stock crates, no one is going to call it 8.53 metres. Even the manufacturer was talking 27ft, 30ft etc. But at the same time we'll go and buy 8m lengths of steel. I'm still firmly intrenched in pts/inches for rainfall, but find I am slowly becoming a dinosaur there as well.
The US is still trying to convert yet reached the IDGAF attitude where cars and trucks still come mixed bag for fasteners Tires are still Diameter inches but metric sidewall and profile, dashes can be M or US distance as well speed limits and highway markings all in mile. Lumber and raw materials for consumers still in inch/foot/pound, Service manual torques are no longer ft/lbs with NM in parentheses but now reversed All my torque wrenches and so many have seen recently still read Ft Lbs not NM. I suspect will not ever fully change.
Who cares which measurement system is used? I need a hardware system that is common. With metric, the hardware system depends on which country made the parts. German? Its DIN. The rest of Europe? Its ISO. Japanese? Then its JIS. China? Your best guess as to the origin of the component the Chinese copied. Take the lowly 10mm hex head screw. JIS, 15mm head, ISO, 16mm head, and DIN is 17mm. Interchangeable metric my ***.
Same thing goes for hydraulic fittings. At least so far the high pressure flange fittings from Japan are the same as what we use in the US. At one time in my life I had to work on Proclain excavators. It used a French system that was totally different from all the rest. An I'm told the metric system was invented by the French.
I think I learned in school that it was invented by the Catholic church in France in the late 1600s
I meant to spell Poclain and not Proclain. I wouldn't want anyone to think that I had any Pro thoughts about that make of machinery.
Seeing as we've gone from roadworks to bullbars to cattle crates and then onto the metric system we might as keep on hijacking Queenslander's thread. I picked up this dunger on the weekend. Been flat out mustering since then so it already covered in ****.
About 10 years ago a good friend who was a senior engineer in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (among other things, the Corps designs and manages the construction of buildings for the U.S. Army) told me that the Corps required their designers (in house & contract) to design in metric, but that the Corp. would hire a firm to convert the metric plans to U.S. Standard so that U.S. contractors could build as planned.
"Wineberry" my ar$e. That's f'kin maroon.........
Don’t worry about the hijack... I can look at new trucks all day. How do you like the amt?. Maroon is the official state colour of Queensland, hence the concern about the name.
Looks nice. I hope the side ramp is better built then ours. I just finished straightening it, reinforcing it and welding up the broken welds. Apparently ours did not like cows and bulls jumping on it. The tray floor on ours is suffering bad rust after six years. It still has a fair few years in it yet as it is 6mm, but now I realise we should have gone a stainless floor. Todays, pic.
Nice steers RC, at today’s prices there are almost enough in that photo to pay for a new truck.
You're not wrong Queenslander, I just sold some weaners straight off the cows, top pen of steers averaged 327kg and $1676. Phenomenal money. RC, didn't you say your crate was TWE? I don't know what they do to make the floor rust, I know of several like yours. My other truck come with a Big Rigs made curtainsider which I cut down to a flatbed and then made the stock crate. That was 10 years ago and it gets abused, I took a load of fat cows to the works on 14th April, didn't clean it out, took the crate off yesterday to get a load of hay. Dried **** 2 inches thick in places and that is how it is usually treated. Not a spot of rust and it's only standard 5mm checkerplate. So I really don't know why TWE's rust. Maybe someone smarter might have some idea? Nige??? Queenslander, only done 800km so just initial feelings re AMT. Highway and towns are fine, shifts when it should. I have 2 blocks 12km apart on relatively slow dirt roads (30-80 kph). Left in auto it gets confused, will shift down 2 gears going into a corner and then shifts up one halfway through the corner and then back down again with a bit of a hill coming out of the corner. But I just started driving it in manual mode on the dirt and then it's exactly the same as a manual box except I don't have to worry about clutching. So all in all, first impressions are good.
Yeah, a 6 deck road train.
We get out the door on the left too