Patracy's "SEMTT"

I mentioned this to Soni and just putting it out there again for you. Have you thought about making it a tilt cab? You can get the pump and ram from an old cab over semi (or just make one from available parts). When I drove HEMMT's there were certain points under the cab that were a PITA to get to and having a tilt capability would have made it easier.

Honestly, there's not much to gain from it on this setup. There's no powertrain parts under the "doghouse" in these setups. Just the electrical and plumbing. All should be reachable through the opening that will be left there or crawling under the frame. I'll make a sort of skidplate for the frame, but it will be detachable.

And I thought Crew Cabbing a Duece was an undertaking. WOW! Good Luck and keep us posted!

Ok, well things have not progressed at all like I had hoped. It seems the 931 radiator isn't going to work unless I get very creative with the hose routing. (180* into a 90* into a straight pipe into a 45* into a straight pipe into a 45* for the lower hose) But I have found a set of frame extensions for the 939 series locally. Hopefully I'll pick them up tomorrow. I think I'll scope out a 809 series radiator tomorrow as well. That would alleviate all my crazy hose issues if it will fit in place.

Crazy hose issues were fun on the samurai. Had a similar situation where I had to piece together several hoses to make one. I'm not as keen to try my luck on a 22K lb truck.

patracy said:

Crazy hose issues were fun on the samurai. Had a similar situation where I had to piece together several hoses to make one. I'm not as keen to try my luck on a 22K lb truck.

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Does it have to be military? My friend has a 1985 359 "Pete" that has a tall narrow radiator....should not be to hard to find one of those at a truck salvage yard. If you like I can try to take a picture this weekend, so you can get an idea what it looks like.

M920 said:

Does it have to be military? My friend has a 1985 359 "Pete" that has a tall narrow radiator....should not be to hard to find one of those at a truck salvage yard. If you like I can try to take a picture this weekend, so you can get an idea what it looks like.

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I was just trying to stay military if possible. I picked up a radiator today from a 809 series truck. It's a 4 core just like the 939 series. BUT it is smaller in total volume. I didn't think about the automatic transmission being another factor. So I'm going to keep on this path with the 809 radiator, but I'm going to add an additional oil cooler inline with the trans cooler to help dissipate heat. That'll be something I'll address once I get the old cab off. I'm thinking something on the tail end of the doghouse or even on the passenger side like this uparmored HEMTT.

http://www.arl.army.mil/www/pages/905/image.2.large.jpg

Anyhow, here's a mockup of one frame extension and the 809 radiator. I've got to work tomorrow night from 9pm till 9am so it's screwed up my weekend. I'm planning on at least getting the radiator pressure washed, painted, and mounted/plumbed in tomorrow. I've gotta pick up more bolts for the frame extensions. It appears that the extensions with them setup like I have in the pic will be perfect for the cab setup and the bumper I have planned. I will be bolting the frame together at first. But I'll be welding everything in for extra insurance as well.

Try finding an FMTV oil cooler set-up off a wreck or parts truck if you can find one. I used them on a repower (ordered new) I did for the NGB a couple years back and they work SWEET!

Oh yea, and while I'm thinking about it, we used a Marine Corps MTVR Radiator package with integrated trans cooler, we just used the remote fan off the FMTV. Its a wide booger but height comparable with M939 radiator. I'll dig into my drawings when I get a chance and post later.

patracy said:

I was just trying to stay military if possible. I picked up a radiator today from a 809 series truck. It's a 4 core just like the 939 series. BUT it is smaller in total volume. I didn't think about the automatic transmission being another factor. So I'm going to keep on this path with the 809 radiator, but I'm going to add an additional oil cooler inline with the trans cooler to help dissipate heat. That'll be something I'll address once I get the old cab off. I'm thinking something on the tail end of the doghouse or even on the passenger side like this uparmored HEMTT.

http://www.arl.army.mil/www/pages/905/image.2.large.jpg

Anyhow, here's a mockup of one frame extension and the 809 radiator. I've got to work tomorrow night from 9pm till 9am so it's screwed up my weekend. I'm planning on at least getting the radiator pressure washed, painted, and mounted/plumbed in tomorrow. I've gotta pick up more bolts for the frame extensions. It appears that the extensions with them setup like I have in the pic will be perfect for the cab setup and the bumper I have planned. I will be bolting the frame together at first. But I'll be welding everything in for extra insurance as well.

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Looks like that radiator will work great as far as the size goes! The frame extensions for the winch are a great idea and should work perfect!!
Can't wait to see it with the cab on.....

BrushMaster Builder said:

Try finding an FMTV oil cooler set-up off a wreck or parts truck if you can find one. I used them on a repower (ordered new) I did for the NGB a couple years back and they work SWEET!

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I think I've found one that'll work even better. It's a oil cooler from a nascar race car. -12 fittings already on it. I'll have to go check the fittings on the 931. Hopefully it'll be just a matter of making two more hoses and using a cooler like that. It's radiator sized!

M920 said:

Looks like that radiator will work great as far as the size goes! The frame extensions for the winch are a great idea and should work perfect!!
Can't wait to see it with the cab on.....

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I was bored and since I need to stay up tonight and sleep during the day tomorrow, I went ahead and took the radiator to the car wash and cleaned it out. Glad I did, there was a bunch of crud in it. Tomorrow I'll hit it with a coat of flat black. I know you kinda offered up using a civy radiator. But I'm kinda going for as much "off the shelf" parts as possible to help speed things along. The real fab work will be the cab mounts, front bumper (I'm going to use a Buffalo bumper to base off of though), steering, wiring, and air plumbing.

I'm kinda looking at the dash of the MK48 and looking at the M931. I'm pretty tempted to just unhook everything in the MK48 cab for the most part (except for lighting) and extend the 931's harness into the cab. Also thinking about just cleaning up my 931 gauges (minus tach and speedo) and transferring them into the MK48 dash. I know it'll be a bit of work to extend the harness, but if I disconnect everything one and a time and label it. I should be able to simply cut the harness one wire at a time, solder in a predetermined length of wire, heat shrink, rinse, repeat.

Things I've gotta figure out/current working ideas:

Transmission shifter - I'm thinking I can just use the MK48 shifter. I need to take apart both shifters and check the ends. I've found that Summit Racing has universal shift cables up to 12ft in length. I think that'll be plenty long enough.

Parking brake - I think there's enough room in the cab to mount the parking brake lever. I can move the associated hoses up there as well I guess. Although the MK48 cab has a parking brake. Haven't decided the route to take on that one.

Air brakes/air system - I'm at a loss on what to do here honestly. I guess while I'm doing the harness transplant. I could just have everything exposed and reverse engineer everything one part at a time.

Transfer case - I'm honestly not sure how I'll tackle this one. Linkages won't work simply because of the drivetrain being in the way. A single cable wont work either I don't believe. Perhaps another set of those universal shifter cables in a pull-pull configuration. I do know that I'll be disabling the airlock safety crap the 939 series uses to prevent shifting while moving. (I know not to, I'm just going after K.I.S.S.)

Fuel tank - I'm honestly probably going to leave the stock tank setup. I'm however considering a pair of 3 way electromechanical valves. I can leave the plumbing all in place where it is, but swap the manual valve out for an "electronic" setup. I can swap the standard tank selector switch for a DPDT switch and have the same switch change gauge readings and activate the valves as needed.

Steering - I'm going to take a page from Soni's book and duplicate his setup.

Batteries - I've decided I'll just give up my passenger side toolbox and use it to store two batteries in. Living in the south, it never gets cold enough to need 4 batteries.

ROPS - Again, I'm going to take Soni's lead on this as well. The doghouse will be a ROPS setup as well.

Left overs - My main goal as of right now is to get the truck converted and functional over form. I will have to address the spare tire rack but it'll remain in place as is for now. They'll also be a "hole" where the stock cab is/will have been. I haven't decided what I want to do with that real estate yet. I'd love to have a knuckleboom there, but I'd have to wait and luck up on one. I know where a large winch is though, that is more likely to end up there. And I do have a wrecker already, but a knuckleboom would be awesome to load/unload the M871.

As far as your control cables for your shifter and transfer case control, these may help. Disclaimer: I am not financially involved this company except as a past customer.........http://www.controlsandcables.com/buy-online/control-cables/

When I converted my International CO to 4x4, I had to keep the tilt cab to access everything underneath it. I used cables for the dual handle transfer case shifter and tranny shifter, they work great.

I'll take a look at cables I guess. Honestly, that'll be on down the list as I only used low range once to test it. I've got to work tonight from 11pm till 7am. So I'm done with working I guess for now. Maybe tomorrow I'll get the radiator mounted. I do have to pick up some hardware on the way into work tonight.

Anyhow, amazing what $10 of car wash and rust converting spray paint can do... It's kinda hard to see, but you can see the green grass through the radiator now. At least in one part of the pic where I had the camera aimed you can see it.

I'm absolutely beat down from work. (Went in Sat night at 7pm and came home today at 11:30am) I did manage to get a few things done today though. I can't not work on something. So today I installed the frame extensions. I was going to extend them an extra space, but I don't like how "wobbly" they feel like that. So I installed them as intended. I think after viewing Soni's truck a little more, the bumper will need to sit below the cab anyhow. Also I removed the side straps on the 818 radiator and fabbed up some brackets that will be welded into the frame. I'll also be securing it up top as well. My welder is in the back of my shop, so that was another mini project on it's own. I made a drop I can pass out the front door from the breaker box with some cable I had and a outlet plug I picked up. I've gotta move my welder around front tomorrow. I'll get the plates welded in tomorrow as well as the radiator. Hopefully I'll also get it plumbed in as well. As they gave me the stock 818 lower hose as well that I believe I can easily adapt to work. Once all that is squared away, it'll be time to start moving the cab!

Made a little more progress this afternoon. I've gotta say with the crap I'm dealing with at work, this project is a welcome relief to unwind on. The radiator is in place and welded in. Repurposed the top bracket and tweaked it to work. The lower hose is just the stock 818 hose with a 2" section cut out of the middle of it. I used the stock coupler that the 931 has to feed up to the top neck just loosened the 1.5" hose fitting to allow it to rotate. The lower neck out of the 818 radiator goes into the hose that has been turned hard right. Then I made the cut there, installed the stock 931 tee, then used the remainder of the 818 hose to connect back to the oil cooler.

I've got to pick up a different hose for the upper line as it needs to be more of a lazy S design. I'm also going to just top off the truck with water for now to check for leaks. Also I'll be pouring some acid in there to help clean out crud as a flush.

I'm also going to try to pick up some steel as well in order to start with the cab mounts hopefully tomorrow.

M920 said:

Oh, I forgot to mention the most important part: you can't just flip the existing box! It will result in the wrong rotation and the vehicle will go left when you turn the wheel to the right!!!! You have to have a box of a HEMTT or LVS for this to work.

So I don't think the cab over box will work, since it does not have a reversed rotation input....

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edited for more info

you don't want to 'flip' the box, only rotate it 90 to 180 anti clockwise on the frame. remove the pitman arm first as it has to stay in the orientation it is now. then rotate the box around the shaft to where it best conforms to the MK48 shaft. everything will turn the correct direction. just have to fab the cab mount around the box. if it was me i would move the front axle back at least 2 feet, this would give you frame to mount the cab and make the ride much better than it is going to be as is. seems like the simplest way to me.

tom

ryan77 said:

Is that green chair your using as a step latter osha approved??? LOL

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No it most certainly is not osha approved. Any osha officials that might step foot on my yard will also get a demonstration of a 5.56mm remote hole puncher.

I did get some time to work on it today. Fabed up the cab mounts and braced everything in. Also painted everything in etching primer. Thanks to my wife I was able to get the cab mounted as well. I think the next order of business will be steering. I've got to order some keyed shaft and pillow blocks for that. Since the factory joints are useless to me for the most part I believe I can repurpose them. I'm going to mill the splines out of them and open up the split to accommodate a keyway. The path I'm going to take will mean that the setup will use one less joint than Soni's setup.

I'm going to pick up some 14ga wire tonight. I'm just going to extend the stock 931 harness into the MK48 cab and reconfigure where needed. I'll probably at least get the dash of the 931 taken apart this weekend and the wiring labeled up. The same approach will be taken with the air system for the most part.

It appears as though I can use the universal cables I saw at summit for the transmission shifter. I believe I can also use a cable setup like that for the t-case as well. I know Soni is using the air throttle setup. But I'm not that keen on it. I believe I'll create a manual linkage/cable/pedal setup instead. (I don't like interdependence amongst systems/controls)

I'm just not sure now at this point on the bumper/skidplate. I was thinking I'd use a MRAP bumper to base it off of. But I'm not sure how that would "tuck" in. Sure would be nice to find a stock HEMTT/LVS skidplate instead...