It's BIG, Yellow and digs holes! JCB 3CX Project 8 is joining the Tractor Shed

[tom osselton]

Looks good

[awemawson]

Thanks Tom.

The Decals arrived in  the post this morning - so after a bit of trimming (glad I bought a 'roller guillotine' a few years back!) I went to fit them.

The ones either side of the bonnet went on fine as per pictures below, however the 'Keep it Original' sticker has the adhesive on the wrong side - OK for mounting inside a windscreen for instance but no good going on the underside of an opaque metal bonnet 

Anyhoo . . . it's progress and hopefully my chap can find the correct 'Keep it Original ' sticker in the days to come.

[hermetic]

I tried to get a Decal set for my Big Bee topper, no luck!!
Phil

[awemawson]

The black & white ones are obviously just printed on a vinyl printer - he must have the artwork, but the 'Keep it Original' one is the real McCoy - just intended for a windscreen not bodywork !

Given a decent copy of the art work there are loads of places that can print reproduction logos etc

[hermetic]

Hmmm, now you have me thinking, I will see what I can find!
Phil

[djc]

'Keep it Original' one is the real McCoy - just intended for a windscreen not bodywork

Cover the sticky side with standard sticky-back transparent film and put double-sided sticky tape on the back. It will be three times its original thickness but that might not matter.

[awemawson]

Good idea as the JCB chap hasn't come up with the goods yet.

[awemawson]

Thanks to DJC's cunning suggestion I got round to fixing the final decal of this painting session - the 'Keep It Genuine' sticker under the bonnet.

I stuck the label to a piece of laminating film, trimmed it to size, then stuck it on with double sided tape. Not sure how long the materials will last under a hot bonnet, but it looks good at the moment !

Many thanks for that suggestion.

[tom osselton]

There’s always Crazy Glue if it comes off.

[Sea.dog]

Just the rams and arms to paint now, Andrew 

[awemawson]

I'd love to Graham, but to do a proper job they need to come off and be stripped back to bare metal - nothing worse than a tarted up bit of plant that's '10 yards pretty' and I barely have the lifting tackle for the job.

No pun intended but it's not a task to take lightly,.

[Pete W.]

SNIP - nothing worse than a tarted up bit of plant that's '10 yards pretty' - SNIP

Someone whose YouTube video I was watching recently used the expression 'Dulux overhaul'!

(I previously thought 'Dulux' was an ICI brand-name - I didn't realise it was known in the USA as well as in the UK.)

But still, as the famous quote has it: 'Fog in channel - Continent isolated'.          

[awemawson]

So today's job - replace the fan belts on the 3CX - originally it had twin belts, but only one remains and that's a bit frayed.

Simple enough job in theory EXCEPT that the main hydraulic oil pump is driven by a propshaft whose drive flange is bolted to the main crankshaft pulley, and is in the most confoundedly inaccessible position. Prop  shaft has to come off to fit the belts. Relatively easy to see but there is barely any room for fingers never mind hands. I've been putting this job off for a few weeks knowing that it would be knuckle challenging but today was the day 

Once the engine side panels were off and the front arms and bucket fully raised with the safely stop installed it was 'just' a case of undoing four bolts (5/8" hex head) to release the flange from the crank pulley. I could get a small 5/8th ring spanner on any two of the bolts but the engine needed 'barring' to get at the others. Anyway a short ring spanner is no good at all. These bolts are torqued just beyond 'murder tight'. No room to put a longer spanner on - could I encourage the shorter one with a baulk of timber and a lump hammer? No ! Timber always slips off and there are delicate things like expensive radiators in the area - exercise caution!

Then I thought - OK the timber slips off - bolt the spanner to a bit of flat bar in such a way that they are approximately 90 degrees to each other and apply the heavy persuader to the end of the bar - to my great surprise it worked a charm, but by heck those bolts were tight.

So with the propshaft disconnected I could remove the frayed belt and feed the new matched pair in through the blades of the radiator fan hanging them on the water pump double  sheaved pulley.

The alternator was rather stubborn but moved in the end and it was at this point I noticed that IT ONLY HAD ONE SHEAVE  This was why there was only one fan belt - some one has replaced the alternator with one with a single sheave - it's probably been like that for years.

What to do Well I COULD have ordered up a double sheave pulley but I need to move the machine tonight. OK Fix the extra belt somewhere round the shaft so in the future the prop shaft doesn't have to come off to fit the belt. A good theory but I could find nowhere that I considered safe to fix it - grave danger of catching in the fan and destroying an expensive radiator. So off it came again.

Propshaft back on using the bolted on spanner in reverse and the machine is back together but it took a full day just to change a fan belt !

[tom osselton]

OMG! Struck down in the prime of life!
 

 

[Spurry]

Bolting a spanner to a bar is a rather cunning idea. Nice one! 

[awemawson]

A very curious cable tracing problem

For some time - in fact since I got this machine, I've been trying to solve a wiring issue in the cab. Obvious symptom - interior light not working but in fact nor are the various sockets for beacons. Circuit shows that unswitched 12v is supplied to fuse A7 and the output of this fuse goes into the loom as cable 303 then splits as 300A, 300B etc  to feed 12v to the cab items. The loom goes by a very contorted route which I've only just found !

It turns out that it emerges on the RH chassis leg behind the rear wheel. Rear wheel off (oh boy they are heavy!) and clipping my trusty 'Tempo' tone tracer to fuse A7 output shows that there is a break in this run behind the wheel - excellent - sorted  or so I thought 

Picking the very tough woven sheath apart I revealed a place in cable 300 where the copper had corroded and broken - no external damage to the sheath (before I wrecked it!) 

So carefully cutting the cable back to non corroded copper I crimped in an extra length and thought things would be sorted - oh no !

[awemawson]

A quick test of the light - no power 

Clipping my tone tester to the light power input in the cab and testing to the output of Fuse A7 a very strong signal - VERY peculiar. Testing with my Fluke multimeter absolutely NO continuity what so ever even in the 10's of meg ohms range.

The wire is supposedly isolated at the cab light and and at the fuse A7 output end (no fuse inserted) - has absolutely no conductivity using a multi-meter but gives a very strong tone on the tone tester - both with the source at the fuse and the source at the light. No shorts to earth - so how this can happen is a complete mystery to me .

I have cut my crimped repair and fed 12v directly from the battery to the end that goes up into the cab and sure enough the cab light can be switched on, proving that the fault is in the run from the break behind the rear wheel up through the side console and on to the fuse block. I've been trying unsuccessfully to unscrew the fuse block to get behind for and inspection - retained by four long screws into thin (1.5 mm) sheet metal - two have come out but two just turn - threads stripped I suspect. Access is far from ideal being beside and to the right of the drivers seat. Another likely place for problems is where the sheath goes though the cab floor but access is even worse !


 I would welcome any suggestions.
 

[russ57]

I've never used a tone tracer, but since it basically sends an ac signal(? ), could capacitive coupling at a break cause that?
If there is one 'mystery' break, there could be more.


-russ

[awemawson]

Yes Russ it injects a signal of about 1khz - warbling to make it more distinctive - and the detector picks up this signal amplifies it and drives a small speaker. The detector has a threshold detector that if it reckons it's 'On Target' brings on a red light.

[awemawson]

Russ I'm sure that you are right about capacitive coupling (cross talk in telecoms). I grounded the fuse A7 output terminal, fed the signal into the break where I cut my crimp and can follow the signal as far as where the loom goes up into the cab.

Any further tracing is going to need me to open up the side console where the fuse box is which I really didn't want to do it was a pain last time and no reason for it to be better now !

(post #30 here https://www.madmodder.net/index.php/topic,13429.msg161541/topicseen.html#msg161541 )

[hermetic]

It is passing signal, but not current, once the deadly green has got into this era of wiring harness it is toast, you are going to have to replace the wire from the fusebox to the cab.  Problem is, if you bend another area of the cable, if it is internally corroded, it will fault again!I am usually an avoider of replacing cable runs as opposed to repairing them, but in this case I think you will have to!
Phil (recovering slowly)

[Sea.dog]

That cable looks as though it's been shorted at some stage causing to overheat and burst the insulation, allowing water ingress.

[awemawson]

That wire in the loom is the only one in the wet area (ie under the floor and exposed) that is permanently powered up.

Anyway a bit more progress - I chased further up the loom, found another swollen bit of cable with green ooze, went to try and strip back to uncoroded copper and it broke off - fully sulphated and horrible. it's now far too short and near the hole in the floor that it will need completely replacing.

So the hunt is on to find how it gets to the fuse box. It turns out that the hole that it initially passes though in the floor is actually within a space round the hand brake and hydraulic controls for the front shovel, adjacent and butting up to the actual side console. Taking the rubber boot off the hand brake (an operation requiring Hellerman Oil!) within I can spy what appears to be two circular connectors joining the loom.

The cover is retained by four screws - three came off and the fourth one so far has defeated me. It fixes into a captive nut in the floor that is turning, and needless to say it's upper side is between the cover itself and the seat and needed three extension bars on my 3/8" socket set to even get a socket on! I have managed to get a snipe nosed Mole Wrench to grip the plastic housing of the captive nut but it still turns. When I can borrow another pair of eyes to confirm that I've got the right captive nut while I turn it from above I'll make up a long cold chisel and chop the nut off.

I did take pictures inside the cover with my endoscope camera, but it puts it's photos on a micro SD card and it turns out I don't have a reader  (One on order now !

enough for today - play resumes tomorrow.

[russ57]

How do you feel about a wifi controlled light?

-russ

[vtsteam]

Capillary movement of electrolyte from moisture and dirt through an opening or insulation crack down the length of stranded wire, creating galvanic corrosion in a continuously powered circuit, which happens to be in close proximity to a surrounding wetted mesh ground (earth - .Br.).

Or,

what hermetic said.....

time for a new wire.