Shopsmith Forums

crosscreekcraig wrote:For all the time Keith spent repairing the part and the money spent by the owner I think they'd just machine a new part with all the equipment and material he had available. Just sayin':rolleyes: . And then engineered safety cages for the driveshaft. And then fire the errant driver - or at least give him a shovel and a wheel barrow or maybe a Tonka-toy dump truck and tell him to haul rock that way for a while.

Maybe the truck that part goes to is so old the part is unavailable? (Not likely, but possible). Probably the trucking company's readiness for the specific type of truck/equipment was critical and he couldn't wait for a part to be delivered.

And now I'm sitting here wondering why I spent so much time pondering the "Paul Harvey" (the rest of the story) about the affair.

I would agree with firing the truck driver but he may be the owner or owner's son. Many older diesel engine trucks last so long that parts are no longer available. This was true even in the 50s and 60s when I worked part time in some car & truck repair shops.

I had made a really nice living following the Paul Harvey end of failures after finding & fixing the problem and then determining how to prevent the failure in the future. This made each day some what different and exciting for most of my life.

skou wrote:Bill, the MythBuster guys kinda disproved the "pole vault" reaction to a broken front u-joint. It took them about 10 (that they showed) tries to get a Plymouth Fury III to drop the front of the driveshaft, and most of the time it just bounced along the ground (Alameda NAS runway.)

They ended up digging what looked like a pole vault hole, in the runway, and it still took 5 more tries to hit that pocket.

And, if popping the clutch did that, that was a POORLY designed setup. My '70 Roadrunner would just smoke the tires. (That car was amazing. The missing rubber patch, caused by the shift from 1 to 2, you could cover with a piece of 8.5X11 paper.) the guy I sold it to, replaced the 383 Magnum with a 440, and it would lift the driver's front wheel on launch. (We won't mention the mileage!)

steve

Never saw a front drive shaft U-joint break but have seen quite a few of the back U-joint or axle pinion housing break. In fact, broke a few myself launching the car out at 8,000 RPM until I was able to set the car up correctly to prevent this problem. I owned and drove a super stocker car for a few years in the early 60s so attended hundreds of drag events. I built Ford drag racing engines and my car was sponsored by Ford during that time.

billmayo wrote:Never saw a front drive shaft U-joint break but have seen quite a few of the back U-joint or axle pinion housing break. In fact, broke a few myself launching the car out at 8,000 RPM until I was able to set the car up correctly to prevent this problem. I owned and drove a super stocker car for a few years in the early 60s so attended hundreds of drag events. I built Ford drag racing engines and my car was sponsored by Ford during that time.

I saw a few drive shafts and rear ends give out in dump trucks. As a kid I worked the summer for landscaper. We tended to overload and abuse things but even being perfectly driver things still wore out.

You don't know the fun of going up a steep incline and having the rear end housing to blow off the truck about half way up. When the pumpkin let go it took the brake lines and when the truck lost it's forward momentum we only had an instant of time to aim it at the ditch and jump. Rolled back about 10 feet and stopped, didn't even drop the load. Life is good!

I wasn't driving and I'm ever thankful the driver knew what to do and told me to get out before it was too late for either of us.

If you want fun let me tell you about the time we were building a pond at the end of a brook. The pond was filling fast and we were rushing to finish when the axle on the dozier broke. We had to rush to town get another dozier load it and rush back to pull the other out before it went under water. All of this is about 26 degree weather was snow falling. About half way back to the site with the borrowed dozier in the back of a dump truck it slid on the steel bed while the truck was going around a turn. We had the truck up on three wheels on one side. Wow!!!!! Of course I was a kid and lived for moments like that. Now I would have a heart attack and never enjoy half of it.