1987 JCB 3CX Sitemaster 2WD

[Slooby]

Between rain showers yesterday I found myself refitting the right side clam shell bucket hinge pin that had worked itself loose. There was no bolt/pin locking it in place. I gave it a good clean and lube then refitted it and founda suitable UNF bolt and nut to secure it in place.

I thought as a precaution that I would repeat the process for the left hand pin, only it was going nowhere, nicely stuck fast in the bushing, even giving it a beasting with a seldge hammer had no effect. So it is currently rotating about the bucket and clam shell seats which aren't lubed while stuck fast in the hinge lever which it should be rotating in. I pulled removed the grease nippled cleaned out what I could and sprayed in some Plus Gas in the vain hope that it will work its way in eventually. What I really need is some serious heat...maybe it's time to resurect my dad's old oxy set here afterall.

[Jeremy Rowland]

The 'hot spanner' usually works fine and helps to free off most things.

Jeremy

[Slooby]

Indeed...maybe even the propane blow torch could be enough, as the oxy set is only of the fine welding and brazing type not the full gas axe

[Slooby]

Today I realised that I should've waited till a 4x4 came up for sale in my price bracket.

I ventured out with the intention of moving some of the brush from the felled trees, but spent most of the time dragging myself out of slippery mud with the excavator arm when the front wheels got trapped in ruts and then the most unladen rear wheel started to spin...shame there's no locking rear diff either really, but at least it is possible to do a fair bit of self recovery

[essexpete]

You may find fitting different wheel/tyre combo to the front might help. If you have plenty of space use the rear arm as extended counter weight. Unlatch the brakes and, with care, squeeze the brake on the spinning wheel. If the ground is level then, again with care raise the loader arm to shift weight backwards. (the latter not to be tried on slopes or heavily rutted land.

[Slooby]

I am wondering if I should have narrower three rib 2wd tractor type tyres on the front, but have a pair of nearly new BKT treaded tyres to replace the bald ones on it.

I tried using fiddle braking today but it didn't help, I fear the tyre that I fitted to the offside rear is just too bald to get any traction and the nearside is only marginally better. It's the offside that seems to be the one spinning up first. The only way I have been able to extract myself has been to use the excavator arm to pull me out, raising the loader has so far only got me more stuck unfortunately.

[Slooby]

Bit of an update, no pics at the moment though.

I've replaced the bald front tyres with some really very good BKT part warns that clearly have hardly been used. I tried to get the tyres off myself, because I'm like that, and failed. After getting a puncture on or MF65 a couple of months back and paying 80 quid for a mobile tyre guy to fix it, the job looked easy enough so I bought a couple of long tyre levers and waited for an excuse to try them. When I got a puncture on the JCB rear wheel I was going to have a crack myself, but thought the inner tube had failed around the valve, so needed a new tube. Ringing around for a new one led me to a different mobile fitter who quoted me 40 quid for the tube and 40 quid to swap it out and pop on a less damaged tyre (which turned out to be pretty once inflated). He had more of a battle getting the bead to break than the chap did with the MF65...I should have taken that as a sign...

So I got the front wheels off and got to work with the levers on the front bead, nope not budging needed a proper bead breaker to do the job...or a bottle jack and the weight of the JCB which got the front bead broken in no time and then I was able to use my levers to work the front of the tyre off the rim. Speant about 15 minutes in all figuring that out and popping the front side off. Moving to the back bead and things got a lot harder...4 hours later I gave up, rang a local tyre shop, who does commercials as well, and was quoted 20 quid to change both tyres out and dispose of the old ones...so threw the wheels and tyres into the van and took them over...It took them an hour! The back beads fought them all the way even with the right tools and special lube. General consensus the fronts must have been on for 20 years plus. Still, only cost me 20 quid to get it done and some banter

Next job; new door. Got lucky and found a new glass door for £250 delivered, it's a pattern part and not the greatest quality because there are tooling marks on one edge (hidden behind the seal) that I'm guessing are from the grab used to hold it during the tempering process, and the top is a little bit bowed. But it was available off the shelf, rather than having to wait to be made. Fitting it was a bit of a pain, as I've become somewhat nervous of tightening the hinge bolts. I made a replacement rubber gasket for the missing one on the bottom hinge and had quite a ding-dong getting it aligned and the hinge raised again because this door sits lower than the original did, again pattern parts for you.

So, new tyres and door repalced I thought I'd put a patch on the roof to stop a water leak around the rotted section beneath the beacon. Cut a square of 1.5mm aluminium sheet drilled holes to suit the beacon bolts and cable, cleaned the inside of the roof around the rusted section then lathered one side of the patch in CT1 adheasive, threaded the beacon cable through the central hole and bolted it up. Will do for now, and certainly will stop it leaking. I might get round to making a proper repair one day once I have my MIG back, if I can be bothered.

While I had the Beacon cable detached I thought I'd investigate why it and the interior light don't work. The was a bit of a birdsnest of botched wiring behind the trim which was quite questionable and the earth wasn't attached to the interior light. I tidied things up and then tested everything with a multimeter. There doesn't appear to be any power to the purple feed wire used for the interior light and to supply power to the beacon (Hella) pull switch. Thing is there are no blown fuses either, from what I can see the purple feed wire is shared with the hazard warning light switch, and that I know works (I fixed it), so there must be a break somewhere else. The number plate lights also don't work and were disconnected until I got to them today, but they only have a single wire going to each of them, so I'm guessing the earth is back to the body and could be suspect, I'll have to take a closer look when I have more time.

[essexpete]

It will be a very tidy machine when you are done. (actually like a famous Scottish bridge.........)

[Slooby]

Thanks Pete, I would like to think so. I'll keep plugging away at it in between trips to the field clearing trees and undergrowth with it.

I think the next job will be to add a load of LED work lamps and a pair of LED headlights. At some point a pair of rectangular Hella spot lamps were fitted to replace the original headlight and they only work on main beam. Ideally I want to find a cheap pair of 5 3/4" round headlight housings, like the originals, to fit my LED headlights in. They're going to need either moving outboard a bit more or up though because at the moment the headlights illuminate the back of the pallet forks really well, but not much else

[gecko.cx]

I haven't tried it yet, but I'm hoping the stabilisers can be used an an effective bead breaker. Will need a mirror or second operator to make sure the rim doesn't get damaged.

Just a thought about the interior light; it doesn't need the headlights on does it?