Bridge on the River Jube

Sure glad I had front ballast and a little practice on the tractor before my inaugural runs!

I think I discovered that the higher the carryall of firewood, the lighter the front end. So after the first scary liftoff, I kept the carryall low till the tractor was on the bridge and then lifted it a little so the carryall cleared the top end of the ramps.

The bridge beams are two 10'6" treated big butt ends of two cedar telephone poles the pole replacement guy generously put in my yard for me.

Built the bridge to get over to a pile of firewood logs that the lady doctor who owns the wood lot gave me. Used the crane to position and level the beams.

And yet people still kind of insultingly sometimes say, "What do you need a tractor for?"

Anyway there's my bragging for the day. :wink:

Terry


P.S.
For other rookies like me I just learned something else the hard way, or in this case the dangerous way. When rolling backwards to get yourself out of lift-off trouble, if you hit only one brake, the tractor twists!!! Why didn't somebody tell me!

Maybe some longer ramps or burying the beams a bit would help.
Not sure what you're crossing, but it looks like they could be dug in.

My son learned the roll back one brake trick. He was loading his tractor onto my trailer and did not have enough RPMs. Stalled on the ramp and nailed the right brake. Left front wheel came down on top of my trailer fender. Fortunately my fenders are well braced and it only dented the top a bit.

Yikes, that made my behind pucker up a bit! :shock:

Good advice Royse!

I was for some reason going through an energy drain while trying to get it built or I probably would have gone deeper. One side is a lot of rock and the other soft soil and the land is on an incline too so the beam on the right would have really been buried. I was thinking too that the deeper they were, the quicker to rot in our super wet winter weather.

Today I was thinking longer ramps, but if the ramps were wet and slippery, I might even be better off with the short ramps.

But you're right, I should lengthen the ramps especially on the side where I'm getting onto the bridge with a load.

Would it be better to drag my firewood trailer over to the wood and pull it across the bridge instead of using the carry-all?
I'd have to create some more space for movement using my goldberg drag.

Thanks for the visit,
T

John,

Sounds like the same scenario all right but my front end only swung about 4" sideways on the bridge and I luckily decided to just let it go backwards quickly and get the heck off the bridge cause my rears were still on the ground at the beginning of the ramps anyway.

GW

My sentiments presactly.


Something else I've just concluded that you all probably know:
When your kingpin bushings have given up the ghost and the uppers are next to non existent, the tractor becomes seriously more unstable in any such situation!!!

Wish I had a definitive answer on how fast cedar rots.
I have cedar fence posts I buried here somewhere between '76 and '80.
They're still doing the job, but they're not holding up tractors.
Will they rot faster buried in soil than they will buried in snow?
Probably not in winter, but maybe in spring? Really don't know.
Not sure how big your trailer is either. Looks like you have a corner
right behind the tractor in the picture, that could be a challenge to
get the trailer lined up every time.
Guess you could hook it to the front ball and push it so you can see
it well. Might help hold the front end down too! :lol:

Your tractor looks good!

They should have come from the factory with a log
chain wrapped around that front bumper.

No telling at the hours I have driven my old tractor
with a chain wrapped on the front bumper or wrapped
over the top link behind the seat.

If I did not have a log chain on the tractor
somewhere, it would be like not having a front tire,
something would be missing.

. . . that could be a challenge to
get the trailer lined up every time.
Guess you could hook it to the front ball and push it so you can see it well. Might help hold the front end down too! :lol:[/quote]r they would have been much longer.[/b:15124e0993]
Should have used these two heavy steel ones I have . . . but they are 14.5 wide with a 2" high (inner or outer?) edge and my tires are 13.6. I could slice some water hose and put lengths over the edges for the tires' sake. I don't know what they were used for prior to my finding them.

Anyway . . . lots of throttle like needed in DW's saga!

Here's the waterway I live on. It fills and empties with the tide. I'm two bays along on the left.

ya do what you have to.

couple things I would add,
I'd nail some wood as side bumpers on the shorter ramps, especially the downhill side where gravity will try to push the tractor if you lose traction.(wish I had a pile of those curved wide boards the tractor is sitting on!)
On all my wood ramps, I nail some old shingles. Doesn't last forever but helps with the slippery issue.
On the permanent wood ramp into my motorcycle shed, I used an old horse trailer no slip rubber mat.

I wouldn't do it on a big tractor with expensive tires, or my bike,
but on wood ramps for little machines, I screw in lots of deck screws and leave the heads sticking up a little. Looks like a medieval torture thing, but no slipping...

It's always tough when you don't own the land.
at my camp with a lot of washouts, I cut the edge of the banks down some, drop some big logs in the ditch, and drive right thru it. tractors will go thru a surprisingly deep ditch.
And sometimes, I just have to cut a trail uphill until the ditch isn't so deep, and cross there.....

Thanks Maxwell,

You wrote:
"They should have come from the factory with a log
chain wrapped around that front bumper."

Does seem kinda natural doesn't it.

"If I did not have a log chain on the tractor
somewhere, it would be like not having a front tire,
something would be missing.""

Good to hear!
I've always loved my chains and the tractor came with 4 more!

When I was mapping out how to position the heavy beams I picked up a chain that came with the tractor that I hadn't used yet and what do you know . . . a heavy duty swivel between two 5' lengths of chain that I hadn't quite figured out, and that had no hooks. After burning off one worn end link, I quickly remedied the missing hooks and learned something about what a swivel was all about.

Cheers,
Terry

Hi NNP,

You wrote:
"I'd nail some wood as side bumpers on the shorter ramps, especially the downhill side where gravity will try to push the tractor if you lose traction.(wish I had a pile of those curved wide boards the tractor is sitting on!)"

Side bumpers . . . deluxe suggestion!
Would a 2X2 be enough?

The curved "wide boards" are steel panels with support channel underneath. I used them in a testing fashion to cross another small ditch that I had laid a culvert pipe and two fat logs into . . . and the tractor made the curves. I like the curve too.
The metal panels have longitudinal but not much lateral strength. Right now they are laying on four 2X12's. I'm still deciding how to fasten them down and maintain the curve.
Concave steel straps across the tops is what I think I'll do.

You wrote:
"On all my wood ramps, I nail some old shingles. Doesn't last forever but helps with the slippery issue. On the permanent wood ramp into my motorcycle shed, I used an old horse trailer no slip rubber mat."

GREAT IDEAS! I know a horse breeder with trailers that look like mobile horse apartment buildings . . . I'll ask him if he has any old throw-away mats. I was looking around for some expanded metal I had but can't find it.

You wrote:
"I wouldn't do it on a big tractor with expensive tires, or my bike, but on wood ramps for little machines, I screw in lots of deck screws and leave the heads sticking up a little. Looks like a medieval torture thing, but no slipping... "

Glad you brought all this up because I like to creep slowly up onto the bridge and I have to do it just right to not get any slippage. Are the deck screws round headed?

You wrote:
"It's always tough when you don't own the land.
at my camp with a lot of washouts, I cut the edge of the banks down some, drop some big logs in the ditch, and drive right thru it. tractors will go thru a surprisingly deep ditch.
And sometimes, I just have to cut a trail uphill until the ditch isn't so deep, and cross there..... "

Funny you should mention this. Just after I had already begun the bridge I realized that two huge 4' lengths of tree buried in the blackberry vines right there were probably used in the ditch by the excavator guy when he crossed over there to do some "parking out" of the shoreline. But if I used them I'd have to remove them afterwards. I figured that the doctor who gave me the go-ahead to cross over to the log pile would be happy with the bridge. I'm pretty sure they didn't have vehicle access down to their shoreline. She's back east and will be for 4 years -- tenants are in her house.

Thanks much,
Terry

Looks like fun. And will probably hold for many years.
If it doesn't hold you'll call it the Remagen or 35W instead of the Jube.

Seems to me I've tried to solve the 35W tractor riddle once before and I'm still battin' zero.

Thanks,
T