Saturday, September 3, 2016

Well, now, you just don't see that every day....

I ordered 2 tri-axles of stone to be delivered today. One for my driveway (which has needed stone for 5 or 6 years, and one for the road I am finishing to my barn. After 16 years, the fill has finally stopped settling, and I am willing to put some stone on it so that I don't have to drive in mud.

So the first load was delivered. at 6:30 AM. I spent about 3 hours carefully spreading it, making sure the drainage was good, and carefully filling in the edges.

The other load wasn't delivered until 4:15 PM.

The driver backed carefully down the lane, and set his chains to tailgate it out along the lane.

He lifted the dump box. Higher. Higher yet. Even higher.....then, at the top of the lift, he jerked the truck forward just slightly to make the stone slide....the whole load slid back. All at once. The truck did a wheelstand. No shit, I could have walked under the front wheels.  For a second, I thought the thing was gonna tip over. All the weight was on the passenger side rear wheel.

He ever so gently let the dump box back down. The truck slowly came back to earth. Pretty smooth, actually.

He finished the job, but the stone just wouldn't slide out smoothly. Instead of a smooth road, it's a series of hills.  (I'm gonna work the Kubota tomorrow).

He pulled back to level ground and inspected the truck. No damage (except to the driver's seat) and some new handprints on the wheel. Permanent ones....

The spring on the back was....compressed. Enough to have flexed all of the paint and concreted stone off of it.

I've never seen a dump truck with it's wheels that high before. Neither had the driver....

Kinda like this:



Only uphill and on ONE Rear Wheel.




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