Been having a good time running around with my restored 1978 W900A KW rollback equipment hauler this season. Doing a lot of homeowner, buyer/seller moves with her, hauling a LOT of backhoes and various pieces of interesting stuff all over New England and beyond. Added a 35 ton detachable lowbed to the fleet recently, with a 35 ft. flat deck (paver's special trailer,) that is nothing short of handy for trucks, etc...
More pics, Iron Mtn Iron & Equipment, llc moves.... Few more pictures...
Iron Mtn Iron & Equipment, llc...last set of pics. Rollback and 35 ton detach lowbed at work, various locations from New England to southern Pennsylvania in October 2015.
Always enjoy your pics Lowboy! If I remember correctly the rollback is yours? Are you self employed now? Your fleet looks great!
Is that Martin's Farm Trucks where you were at in PA? Can't quite tell from the picks.
Thanks nedly! Long time since the last visit here...yes, the rollback is mine, as well as the detachable lowbed. Self employment has overcome me once again. This time, for the duration. Can't seem to work for anybody that thinks like I do, or I'd stay with them, hahahahaha. How's everything up in the mountains?
Everything is going well up here, very busy! Did you sell the little single axle fixed neck? Keep the pics coming!
Hahaha, good eye GrainBinMan. Yes it is. Bobtailed down there 2 weeks ago and brought it home...just finished the wetline up to run it Friday finally. I like those guys at Martin's Farm Trucks. Wesley Martin seemed to be a very straight forward guy, as well as his brother Roger and their dad.
That's fantastic that you're busy, good for you. I couldn't really use that little fixed neck lowboy for anything other than hauling an antique truck to the shows, or the occasional short, local move because the well was just so small at 16'. Plus it was a bear to deal with that tire/axle configuration. Soooo, I began my Barter King process one day with it, by placing it on CL for sale or trade. Got a call from a guy around Poughkeepsie, NY that wanted it for the same exact thing, hauling a B Model Mack to antique truck events. I traded him for a fairly new Toyota DIESEL powered forklift with full cab, excellent shape even for the trailer. (That's what the pic above of the forklift and the old Allis Chalmers dozer is all about.) I drove the rollback down and had my buddy follow me with the tractor, pulling the lowbed. On the way home with the forklift on, I pulled a non-running AC HD5 dozer on by running the cable under the forklift and got the dozer on too...dropped it off 20 minutes down the road from home so I made a payday out of it all. I was intending to keep the forklift for my own use, but I started getting inquiries from passers-by about selling it, which got my gears turning. I threw it on CL for an experiment, got bombarded with emails wanting it (evidently diesel powered lifts are rare and popular around here anyways,) and a month later I delivered it to a pallet company 2 hours from here, and got a check for $5,000.00 on a Sunday. That little wheel-deal took me to the next level, of buying this detachable for the bigger, taller stuff now. It's perfect for what I do, which is a variety of all kinds of weird stuff that most guys would whine about doing. Looking for a 25 ton drag winch for it next, to mount low on the rear so I can pull dead stuff onto the deck next.
Sounds like you are on a roll! That's a nice w900 you got! Do you have any cheap older day cabs you want to sell?
Did you build the roll back bed?
Good to see you posting again. I always have enjoyed your posts, and it looks like you are well set up now. Good luck with your business.
Sorry for the delay, my electrician buddy showed up yesterday to get me some 220V outlets and some farm lights..I had to pay attention. We moved a year ago, about 35 miles east of our old location, more towards where most of my business is now in Mass., NH, Conn., but I still go anywhere. Just nice being A) off that awful mountain in the wintertime, and B) being minutes from the interstate now. What are you looking for exactly nedly...? What are you looking to do, make a dump truck, keep as a tractor...what motor/trans./suspension? I have a LOT of them around as I see stuff everywhere I go and keep it on the back burner. Let me know, I'll tell you what I know of. I don't have any at the moment personally for sale anyways.
NO, I didn't nowing75. It was completely together, functional when I bought it two years ago, only REALLY tired. I went through it front to back to get it roadworthy, then this past winter gave it a complete cosmetic surgery to make it what it is now. Still have a lot to do, it's a work in progress but that's OK...nice to be able to earn with it while I work on it to make it complete. I need to get someone that won't murder me with price to make me a custom headliner...but so far I haven't found anyone that is even within the same line of thinking about that. The area up in that roof is only about 3' x 5', but these upholstery people are all wanting $1,000.00 and up for a simple, straight forward (to me anyways,) piece of cardboard with some vinyl covering it. I don't even want a full headliner; I want to make a smaller strip across the console so I can just remove a section of it to access the cab lights, radio, speaker wires, etc....it isn't that much but again, these automotive interior shops are making me look for alternatives.
Thanks JDO, I always enjoyed yours too...you have a unique deal going for sure.
Iron Mountain Iron & Equipment, llc... more W900A rollback photos of recent moves. This was just yesterday (Sunday, 10-25-15) in Hinsdale, New Hampshire loaded an older Ditch Witch that a kid bought to bring to his house to do some stumping, grubbing, etc. (good luck with that I said to myself.) Powered with a V-4 Wisconsin gasser. Clumsy, awkward, top heavy machine to do anything other than cut a ditch with really. Better than nothing I guess, but his property is one big side hill slope after a clear cut, with a million stumps and boulders to pluck. I'd prefer a 320 with a thumb personally......
Somthing with decent power and gears. Must have a jake. I would keep as a tractor. I would like to be able to find a lowboy reasonable and do some local moves as well as haul some logs in the winter. I'd rather not have anything that's whipped. DOT has a strong presence in this area.
I'll think about it and keep you informed then, now that I know what you're looking for. We can PM back and forth on the stat's... DOT has a strong presence EVERYWHERE nowadays pal....but NY State is a whole other subject in itself. You care if it's a sleeper? Reason I ask is daycabs are simply more expensive because everybody wants them. You can find one with a bunk and take it off and be ahead of the game, unless you think you can deal with a bunk. They have their advantages too. I know of a 379 Peterbilt right up the road from me for sale...reasonable, with a bunk that is removable. I can check on the stat's for you if you think you'd be interested in that one...I think it'll be fairly cheap as it's "not all that pretty", meaning it's faded...but she'll clean up nicely. Let me know.
I'm not opposed to a sleeper! If you have a chance maybe look into that Pete. Thanks!
I'm going to check into it tomorrow for you nedly... I'll PM you with the info.
Beautiful! You are the best!
Good to see you back around Lowboy.:drinkup That's a great idea with the HD rollback. There are so many tight places we go from time to time that it would be the ticket. What's the overall height with a backhoe on it? I hire my moves out as we stay in one place for several months at a time, if you were closer I'd give ya' some business.
Tell my wife that...Ba Hahahahaha! It's nothing, I like helping hard working people out. I'll let you know later on about that Pete.
Hey CM...good to hear from you too.:drinkup That (rollback) started out as an experiment. I intended to have that strictly for an antique truck show piece like all the others I had, but I hallucinated a lot about restoring that one to pristine condition and made that happen. Then I proceeded to test the waters so to speak by pounding on doors looking to solicit some work. I did some pretty funky things with it at first (like hauling hardwood T&G flooring for a customer and had to tarp and hand unload every board, and carry them into peoples homes/garages, etc.) to moving dead vehicles for just about free to get the word out. Then it started coming around, so I decided to invest into the remake and I am glad I did. I enjoy every minute spent in that truck, meeting new people, doing the work...It's great. The truck works slick for tight spaces. I get into deals that you can't use a lowbed or even a tag trailer for...and am able to place dead equipment on point where folks want them parked in tight quarters. Future plan for that also is a 12 ton tag trailer, so I can drop the height of some of the TLB's. Plus I tend to get some long stuff like that Ditch With that if I had a trailer behind it when I have an overhang, it will fall within the footprint of the vehicle and won't be so ugly going down the road with 4 feet hanging off, lol. The overall height for backhoes is always about 13' 3"...the deck stands 4' 2" off the ground, so most of the TLB's I move fall just at 13' 6" as they're typically 9' 4" high. Some I have to remove a strobe light or something to get it down a little. I just bought a detachable lowbed for the higher stuff so I could do more too. Plans on mounting a 20-25 ton drag winch in the rear so I can drag dead stuff onto it without any effort. I want a hydraulic driven one so all I have to do is detach and get up close to the winch, plug the lines in and pull. Yesterday's mission: Challenger 445B tractor for the Town of Brattleboro, Vermont I brought back from a repair shop up in northern Vermont a month ago ON THE ROLLBACK, lol...it carried it fine, but was a "tad" high. That made me decide to get the lowbed on that particular move. They had a pump failure that put shavings all throughout the hydraulic system and had to have the tractor split, system flushed, and internal pump replaced. Expensive little deal.
I'll tell her, have her give me a call! Thanks!!!!
I just PM'd you with all the info nedly...
11-7-15; D8 2U series dozer moved from Manalapan, New Jersey to southern Vermont. Iron Mountain Iron & Equipment, llc ...project on Saturday 11-7-15 prepping an old D8 for transport from Manalapan, NJ to southern Vermont to it's final resting place to be cared for. I tried to get it permitted to move the day before, but the states weren't very cooperative in getting things done in the time frame I needed them to happen in. It was a little bigger mission than expected due to having to remove the blade to get it down to legal width, but thanks to the seller Chris Sullivan of Sullivan Excavating, he made this easy for me. He let me use his service truck, torches, and excavator and skidsteer to do anything I needed to do and he saved the day with his generosity. I cut the bolts and retainer bolts out of pins and dropped the blade. (This dozer doesn't run by the way.) The I had to cut 3' off the push arms to get them down to a good height on the trailer. 7.5 hours later, I was headed north with a good load all secured and legal.
Few more shots of the project/load. Next mission is today (Monday 11-9-15) unloading this thing with a 45 ton wrecker. Have to pull it off, and run a snatch block off a tree and reverse pull it up into a tight little yard inside a fenced in spot next to the two other machines I have brought in there recently. Another few hours and it's MISSION ACCOMPLISHED.
...And...on the other end in southwestern Vermont Monday 11-9-15 unloading this beast Had my friends at A's Auto & Truck Repair of Guilford, Vermont come join in on the fun. Not everybody can say they towed a D8 with their wrecker...but now it's on their resume. Steep hill we were working on, all different angles, tough spot to be working in made this little simple project a lot bigger than anticipated, but the bottom line is it's sitting where I wanted it to be in it's spot. The hill was so steep I chained the lowbed to a tree in case it decided to take off backwards. That could have gotten ugly in a hurry....
Continuation of pics...
Final pics... It didn't come easy....:drinkup
Here's a little piece of video of the deal... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpPI-i65oiw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EU313VptV2Y
Some really, really recent moves. (I stumbled across this thread here just now and figured what the heck...why not? These were taken Saturday 6-3-17 up in nedley05's neck 'o the woods in Vermontville, NY after loading this 2000 F-550. It was purchased off Craigslist from a guy down in Taunton, Mass. that called me to haul it. I was in Swansea, Mass. the previous Friday delivering a Hydro Axe tree shear to Schmitt Equipment, so this guy met me enroute and handed me a pile of cash to go up and purchase the truck sight-unseen. He wanted it for the strong running 7.3L IH diesel, the 6 speed transmission and the rears is all. The rest is toast.
More of the Hydro Axe and F-550 dump...
Memorial Day weekend; Cat 525 skidder relocated from Vt. to Mass. to another woodlot for a customer.
Good to see you are keeping busy Lowboy. I still love that rollback you have.
You should have gotten hold of me, I'd have bought you lunch!
You know how it goes...always in a big hurry, never have time to do anything normal...not enough hours in the day, etc. I wish that would change someday. Next trip up through there I'll try and hook up!
Im with ya buddy, definitely would be neat to meet in person and see whichever beautiful rig you have up close!
I passed thru town again on Friday...but of course I was in a mad rush against that joke of a logbook to get home though, or I'd have stopped for a few hours nedly. I grabbed a couple of Humvees in Jericho, Vt. Friday morning the 9th and shot straight up to Fort Drum and got them off, then I came down thru the Adirondack Park across 3, 28 & 30 to Warrensburg to get home before I turned into a pumpkin. Next time, I'll try to plan it out better....