n8in8or
I never met a project I didn’t like
This is a project I purchased and started working on in 2011. We had purchased a house with some land and a pole barn and I figured a skid steer would be a handy tool to have around. I wanted one that had a capacity of 2000 pounds and wasn't too expensive (like I mean cheap). I shopped and shopped and finally found a cheap one that wasn't too far away. The hydraulics all worked but it was pretty rusty. Also the guy wanted to keep the engine out of it because it ran well and he had a use for it. That actually was fine with me because it was not the original engine and was smaller than what was supposed to be in it. So we struck a deal for $1400 and I brought it home. I started tearing it down to begin repairs and scraped a ton of gunk off of it. I also started accumulating parts for it - I grabbed a Wisconsin VG4D V4 engine (which is the correct engine for the machine) that was completely disassembled for dirt cheap. Then I got a VG4D that was from a military generator for a couple hundred bucks, but the problem was that it was setup for 24 volts. I also found an old power unit with a VG4D for cheap - it ended up being seized up, but it had a good starter on it which was worth the price of the unit alone. So now I had enough pieces-parts to make 1 good engine for the unit. Not long after that other things got in the way and it was pushed into the back of the barn.
Fast forward to this winter.....I need to do a new retaining wall next to our driveway and the skid steer would obviously be super handy for that job. I also finished up some remodeling in the barn so I finally had the space to take the project on again. So I dug it out of its hole and I am now resuming progress on this project. So far I've pressure washed it and started reviewing what the project needs again. It needs some work....oh yeah, it needs work. There isn't a visible serial number anywhere (I think the tag rusted off), but based on features it has or doesn't have I was able to narrow the serial number down to somewhere between 229,000 and 465,000. They made these between 1971 and 1980, but I have no idea where that number would fall in, but needless to say it must be in the 1970s sometime.....and it looks every bit its age.
So when I looked at the unit, the guy showed me all of the hydraulics worked since it had a running engine in it at that time.....in fact, it worked so well that it blew a hydraulic hose while tilting the bucket! So yeah, it needs one hose...and now that I'm looking at it much closer and degreased I'm seeing it needs a lot more hoses and lines. So that will be a lot of the initial work that will need to be done to get it running again, but there are other general fixes and rust repairs needing to be done, so as I do those I will document them here. It could get ugly, but hey, what's the fun in a project going smoothly??
I will start posting some pics from various phases and update this as I get things done to the unit. Hopefully in not too long it will be running and working in just a couple months.
Fast forward to this winter.....I need to do a new retaining wall next to our driveway and the skid steer would obviously be super handy for that job. I also finished up some remodeling in the barn so I finally had the space to take the project on again. So I dug it out of its hole and I am now resuming progress on this project. So far I've pressure washed it and started reviewing what the project needs again. It needs some work....oh yeah, it needs work. There isn't a visible serial number anywhere (I think the tag rusted off), but based on features it has or doesn't have I was able to narrow the serial number down to somewhere between 229,000 and 465,000. They made these between 1971 and 1980, but I have no idea where that number would fall in, but needless to say it must be in the 1970s sometime.....and it looks every bit its age.
So when I looked at the unit, the guy showed me all of the hydraulics worked since it had a running engine in it at that time.....in fact, it worked so well that it blew a hydraulic hose while tilting the bucket! So yeah, it needs one hose...and now that I'm looking at it much closer and degreased I'm seeing it needs a lot more hoses and lines. So that will be a lot of the initial work that will need to be done to get it running again, but there are other general fixes and rust repairs needing to be done, so as I do those I will document them here. It could get ugly, but hey, what's the fun in a project going smoothly??
I will start posting some pics from various phases and update this as I get things done to the unit. Hopefully in not too long it will be running and working in just a couple months.
