Ok I read a thead a while back about a cherry picker with 7" pnumatic tires , and a 3 pt hitch hook up .... That got me thinking.. Have any of you guys welded a 2" reciver hitch male end to a cherry picker? I'm thinking of doing just that. I would weld it to thebottom side and reinforce it, ( sitll be able to use it in the shop to) I was going to look at some cars tomorrow 1 flathead and possibly a hemi! If they are what they say I'm bringing them home! If this picker idea is dumb please tell me now . HERE IS AN IDEA OF WHAT I WANT TO DO... If this will work I could drop the trailer, put this in the reciever and pull a motor , put it on the trailer and go on to the next.
Your reciever needs to be rated for the weight and the leverage. It's the leverage that will cause you the most problems. Figure a way to tie the mast back towards the bulkhead of the bed, make sure it will hold 2000 lbs and have at it.
I think its a cool idea if you can get it to work out. too bad you can't figure out how to make it turn so you could swing it into the back of the truck after pulling it out.
The reciever is probably only rated for 1000 pounds or so down pressure , plus you are going to have an exaggerated twisting action due to the height. ... if your planing on using the lift to tow cars ... nope. If you are just after something to haul your lift with, yes, but you dont need to weld the hitch to it ... a 4" channel welded to the hitch give you a "trough" to lash your lift wheels to. .... and tie the upper to the stake pockets
OK good point. Here is a picture of my bumper, It's a bronco so there's no place to tie to other than the bumper . It has 2 clevis on it ( not in picture but you can see the mounts. The hitch is not part of the bumper but mounted to the frame. Do you think a chain wraped around the kmast near the push handle ted to these points and secured with a boomer would work?
They make units that do just that. most of the affordable ones are low weight capacity and won't pick an engine. The ones that will pick an engine aren't cheap.
It would be OK to transport the picker, say around a yard or field, but I wouldn't trust it to pull an engine with attached to your hitch. All the stress would be on the back side of the upright unless you had as mentioned before a way to support the top with a cable or something, think old style boom pole truck. Not to mention the pickers legs, if it is attached to your hitch, the legs will be a foot or more off the ground! How would you get them under a car? Like I said, OK for short term transport is all I'd use the hitch mount for. Just my 2 cents, take it for what it's worth.....
No, look at the length of the legs on an engine hoist. The go towards the front and support the load. You can do exactly the same thing, as in support the load, towards the back. You need triangulated support (cables in tension with weight) from the upper portion of the mast & attached to a counter weight ( front of your truck). Don't be surprised when ths ass end squats and the front rises quite a bit. You'll have, 1000 lbs on a 4' boom off the back of your truck.
Probably the biggest obstacle is going to be your connection at the upper end ... I have a450 pound genie lift that I hook to my reciever and strap to the lumber rack ... and it works bitchen, but like I said the upper connection is the critical part.
Real good advice there. The leverage of six hundred or more pounds hanging out five feet behind the rear bumper is going to be pretty serious. I would want some pretty good straps or cables connected from the top of the mast on the cherry picker to the front corners of the bed and then move forward with the load just far enough to set the engine on the ground, set the cherry picker on the ground and lift the engine so you can back under it and load it.
Wel I might just have to bring 3 sheets of plywood snd mak a run for the picker. If the ground's flat enough! I think I'll ditch the reciever hitch idea. I guess this is why they don't come set up this way!
you might be able to leave the support legs attached and use a couple jack stands or blocks on the ground to support them to take the strain off the reciever.
I don't think the picker idea is dumb, just don't see the need for (engine removal) ever having to use one. Why not just take the whole vehicle home and then pull it apart on some concrete with the help of everything in your garage. It's going to take twice as long, if the ground is wet it could be unsafe to block it up, unlevel ground, snakes, wild dogs, tweakers, poison ivy/briers, and if you don't get going early vampires/tweakers could come out after dark and get you. Not to mention accidentally leaving any tools behind or forgetting a crucial peice of something that you left on the car/truck. After you get whatever it is home and yank out the engine & trans, you could resell it for whatever you paid for it to someone who would want to put a SBC in it anyways. The only scenarios I can think of where you would need to remove an engine from somebody's field is if there's something wrong with the person doing the selling.
I made a swing arm with a come a long that fits in a reciever. I have use it a lot for picking up engines an also for swap meets. It is very handy. It is offset so the load stays pretty much on center and swings just enough to pick up and land an engine.
I used something like this. Got one of those truck bed hoists from harbor freight. Welded it to a piece of tube to fit in trailer hitch. Also mounted a trailer jack to it. So I would back up to engine, (on the ground or in a car) swing hoist around, lower the trailer jack, pick up engine, and swing it around to get it inside the truckbed, on top of an old tire. Last time I used it, I got a 324 olds and transmission loaded by myself.
Well sometimes that poses a great challenge in it's self - The 2 engines I'm after are both in very immobile big trucks 1.5 and 2 ton , and they are a long ways from any tractor , any tractor I have access to is to large to transport on my trailer. Relly the trucks are to large totransport on my trailer. SO I nee dto pull the engines there.
I think it could work if you run cable from the top of the boom to the box. You could put a hook in the middle of your box and use a winch or come-a-long with pulleys on the boom. Trouble with this plan is getting it in the back of the pickup. Any trees in the area?
Well, Its a bronco,so I'm kinda limited on where I can attach stuff . I was wanting to place the engine on my trailer after it was pulled, - I wanted to show up with my empty flat bed and leave with a flathead, a hemi , a 35 chevy 2 door , and the front clip and doors from a 46-48 chevy ....
Last ones I did in the field if it came down to it I just cut them in two around the cowl with a battery powered sawzall, if the cars were junk. You could pull the whole front end out and usually the motor mounts fell apart.
If I wanted all that stuff. Id go out and do all the prep work, get them ready to pull out. Find a guy with a tow truck, boom and cable, to follow you out there and have him pluck the motors out. It might cost you a few bucks, but much cheaper than an ER trip or being stuck under a motor in the boonies. If I was just after one, rake, break down pickers, plywood, atv wheel dolly, and help.
I have 2 friends that are going to help. And wetre doing the plywood thing. I don't wanna get smashed, or drop an engine
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