In an earlier post, I showed the construction of a portable lifting frame for my chain hoist.

Today’s job: Lift the 13′ dump bed back onto the truck. I don’t know
the weight on this bed, but even with it’s dual 10 ton hydraulic rams
and 6″ channel frame it must be less than 3 tons because that’s all my
chain-fall is rated for. ;)

Frame Assembly (it all just slides together)

• Stakes in front of the feet
• Upper chain and chain-fall ready
• Rope attached to top of frame and truck

Lifting the Frame Into Place

Turn the Feet 90 Degrees to Stabilize (and chase Orville out from his shady spot under the bed)

Enjoy!

Mr. Potato Head: How did I get stuck with you as a moving buddy?
Rex: Everyone else was picked.
- Toy Story 1995

It probably doesn’t look too different from a lot of the previous
posts other than paint on the front end, but there’s a lot of things
getting done that nobody will ever notice.

For instance, if you look at the front of the truck in the previous
posts, you’ll notice an ugly cut-out on each side of the radiator.
Evidently one of the previous owners were unable to get to the top of
the front body mounting bolts and had a torch that was a little too
handy.

With the grill in place, these holes were mostly hidden from plain view, but the cuts went through the front sheet metal and the radiator support. Now’s the time to fix it:

You can click the picture on the left to see it as I started to fix it. The one on the right shows the completed patches.

Each front fender also had a good size hole
rotted out in the rear from the drain holes being plugged for too many
years. No big deal, I know. But progress isn’t slowing. It’s just
somewhat more detailed.

FWIW, as you look at the pics, know that the pieces that are fully attached. No more mock-up with a bolt here and there.

Progress continues.

I needed a way to lift the 13′ dump flatbed back onto Rex the ‘58 Chevrolet Viking.
Since I already had a 3Ton chainfall, I knew I’d have future use for a
sturdy frame. After all, the garage rafters were only going to
withstand so much abuse ;)

The design of this chain hoist frame is not my own. Back in July of 2000, I read A Portable Lifting Frame Made From Pipe by Ronald Thompson and later found a revised version of the same design built by Ted Edwards in the MetalWorking.com Dropbox. Ted’s files are:

• Lifter.txt
• Lifter1.gif
• Lifter2.gif
• Lifter3.gif

Because of what I had on hand, this frame is a little beefier. It
is, however, designed to break-down into smaller, more manageable
sections. The pieces are:

Figure 1

• 8 – 2.5″ O.D. x 4′6″Long
  • (4) 2 for each upright
  • (2) Top Spreader Bar
  • (2
    ) Feet – each cut in half
• 4- 2.5″ I.D. x 12″ Long
  • (2) Upright slip joint – 1 in center of each upright
  • (2) ‘T’ – 1 on each end of top Spreader Bar | Note: The hole in these is offset 1.5″ from center to allow the upright to slip-fit into the joint a full 6″. See Figures 2&3 below.  
• 3 – 2.5″ I.D. x 15″ Long
  • 1 slip joint – center of Top Spreader Bar
  • 2 ‘T’s- base of each upright for feet to slide into

Figure 2:

Figure 2 shows how the Top Spreader Bar fits into the slip-joint for the upright leg. The ‘T’ portion of this joint gets welded (See Fig 3). This makes the spreader bar sit directly on the upright leg for increased strength. The upright leg will slide into this end view. The slip-fit of the upright does not get welded so the unit can be broken down for transport and storage.

Figure 3

Also of note, but not shown, is that I’ve welded one side of each slip joint to it applicable mate. The other side is left free to slide together for assembly/disassembly.

Figure 4

A little rust protection. You’ll notice above that the areas of the slip-joints are not painted. Looking from the outside of the saw horses working towards the center, the pieces are:

• Upright Leg – each w/ Foot and Upper slip welded
• Top Spreader Bar – each with ‘T’ & one w/ slip welded
• Upper Upright – (simple lengths of pipe) I left these with no joints welded so I can adjust the frame height with different lengths of tubing for future indoor/outdoor use.
• Resting against the lower part of the saw horses are the feet that slide into the base of each upright

Here’s a quick update:

It’s under it’s own power again (most of the time) so I can get it in and out of the garage.

The picture above is just with “a bolt here and a bolt there” to
check the fit of all the pieces. Now that I’ve got it sitting the way I
want it; I’ll pull it all back apart, do more welding, etc & then
start to put ‘er back together for good.

I took these pics about 10PM MST as I was closing up the shop for the night. Once I got everything mocked-up and working I broke it all back down. Then I stood on the front frame-rails facing rearward (straddling the engine) and flipped the cab up so I could make everything solid and paint what I won’t be able to reach later.

I should’ve clicked some pics before breaking down the mock-up, but:

• New steering column, linkage and shifter all clear
• Original through-the-floor pedals & master cyl replaced with swing style power brake with firewall mounted booster
• Firewall clearanced for V8 & HEI
• Trans tunnel added – cab originally sat high enough that floor could be almost flat
• Firewall Bulkhead fuse-block added from the ‘82 Crewcab since we’re using that harness as well
• Other minor misc, like filling of unused bulkhead holes, etc

The original (hard-as-a-rock) undercoating was doing it’s thing so I
left it on and painted over it, but the frame got a good sanding before
painting.

This time when I put it back down, it’ll get bolted together for good with the new hardward & rubber mounts ala HMMWV.