Re: [ihc] Trailering weight..

[bearbvd@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx (Greg Hermann)]

Speaking of which--

Further adventures in overloading and asking decrepit vehicles to do more
than they were ever meant to, even when new ----

Acquired a lathe at an auction five miles SE of Naturita, CO, last
Saturday. A _NICE_ 'little' lathe !! As in an Axelson 16" x 54". Estimated
about 8,000 lbs. of it, all iron, of course.

Thought I had a nice late Dodge diesel dually & fifth wheel lined up to
bring it home. That fell through. So--after scratching around, trying to
find an appropriate flat-bed truck to rent, with NO luck, on Monday I fired
up the old Traveller hitched up my flat bed trailer and headed down there
(about a 5.5 hour trip in a NORMAL vehicle).

Traveller + trailer has GOT to equal 7K lbs. Add 8K lbs. of lathe to that.
I put all four 10.50 x 15's on the Traveller at 50 psi, all four trailer
tires at 55 psi. Made it home. The lathe is safely unloaded, under roof,
and under a tarp in a friend's shop. Even made it up to 55, mebbe even 60
mph on I-70 between Grand Junction and Rifle. Not much over 45 the rest of
the way. A LOT slower than that going up, and MOST especially DOWN various
grades. Slowest we got on any of those was about 25 mph, especially coming
down into Whitewater off of the Unaweep divide.

The poor old 345 in the Traveller is _past_  READY for retirement---and
it's front seal is about non-existent. BUT--the amazing thing is the
primary needles and secondary jets I made for the T-Quad. Even beats Dan's
T-Q tune-up routine !! Between Gay Johnson's (just east of Grand Junction &
Palisade) and Craig America, which is 133 miles, BY THE MILEPOSTS, although
we 'consumed' about a gallon of motor oil (and killed a BUNCH of skeeters,
especially when going up grades) (the LoadStar fan takes the oil from the
front non-seal and 'lubes' the exhaust quite thoroughly, and then when the
engine is working, the heat un-lubes it all), we ONLY BURNED _8.5_ gallons
_ of fuel !!!!! EVEN if we assume that the tank got a couple of gallons
fuller in Craig than it did at Johnson's---that's WELL over 10 miles per
gallon when pulling right about 15K GCVW !!!!!!!

I gave the old girl a fond pat on her dash for coming out of
semi-retirement to do such difficult duty, and promised her the IC 392
recently swiped from a school bus and a narrowed Dana 60 1100 rear with
oversize rear wheel bearings in the very near future--- body by Kentrol is
in the works , too, but not quite so soon !!!!

Hofs--you should likely oughtta avoid mentioning that last to your sweetie,
lest she might turn the tables on ya---- :-)

Greg