BODY-CARGO PIPELINE CONSTRUCTION

[cranetruck]

Spent an hour today cleaning up the M756 truck bed.
Some of the wood in the decking was still solid and turned out to be red oak painted OD.
Some other data:
The cargo body for this 2-1/2 ton variant was manufactured as a unit and was supposed to be used with the M45 chassis truck.
This particular one was mfd by Metro Engineering & Manufacturing Co.
The date of manufacture is Feb 1960 and the serial number is 35.

I'll be posting pictures as this project progresses.

 

[M1075]

Bjorn-

Nice find on the bed. The pics of your cranetruck continue to amaze me! That is an awesome conversion. I have a heavy duty (did I mention heavy duty?) set of outriggers if you know of anyone else embarking on such a conversion.

 

[cranetruck]

Recovry4x4, you posted a set of images of your pipeline truck a couple of weeks ago. I can't find them! Where did you put them? Thanks.

 

[Recovry4x4]

[color=green>Heck]http://photobucket.com/albums/v460/Recovry4x4/[/color]
[color=green>Click][/b]open the M756A2 album.[/color]

<FONT face="Comic Sans MS" color=green>If you don't see the pic you want let me know and I'll email it or post it.

 

[1ton]

Hey Bjorn i was wondering if you need any of they planks rebulit. I have all the stuff to do including wood. I am a just a bit far away tho... [^] But i would be happy to do it for a number very close to 0. Just a thought. BTW i love your knuckleboom.

 

[cranetruck]

Thanks for the offer, 1ton, but the wood has been ordered and should be ready later this week. I'm used to working with rough sawed lumber and have a thickness planer in the yard. Two sets will be made, one for Kenny (recovry4x4) and one for yours truly. The boards are all slightly different in width and the edges are routed for 1-1/2 x 3/16 flat stock.
The original was made of red oak, we'll be using yellow locust. The finished deck was painted OD, mine will be 3-color camo.

 

[1ton]

Bjorn, BTW my name is Brock Bailey. I am just a gluton for pain. [^] I am going to try saw some osage orange this winter and see if i can make anything out of that. That stuff would make a H@(( of a bed deck.

 

[cranetruck]

Brock, I'm not familiar with osage orange, but it sounds interesting, maybe even tougher than locust!
Here is the M756 bed as of this afternoon.

 

[Desert Rat]

Bjorn,

I'm really happy to see that bed going to good use and not laying sadly in a bunch of prickers in KY. I was aprehensive if it would fit your needs not really understanding what you were looking for exactly. It's a really awesome feeling knowing I was able to help and see the results of my hunting pay off for someone else! Thanks for the trust!

 

[rdixiemiller]

Osage orange makes nice re-curve bows for archers. The wood also makes nice pistol grips and knife handles. An interesting note: Osage orange was planted all over the SE USA during WW2. The fruit is a source of natural latex rubber, which was in short supply. By the time the trees were grown, synthetic rubber had taken over. There are still a lot of them growing all over Fla, Al. and Ga. fencerows.

 

[Longhunter7]

Cranetruck,

Osage Orange is a tree that was planted as a hedgerow by farmers in the 30's, 40's, and 50's, and is also know as a Hedge Apple! It grows at right angles and has thorns! It was used as a living fence, as cattle can't walk through it!

It has a green fruit, about the size of a grapefruit. The wood is very heavy and gnarly, and is difficult to work with! The Native American tribes made bows out of it, and that is the only thing that I know of that it is good for!

Stay with the Locust! []

 

[rdixiemiller]

You're right about being gnarly to work with! I made a set of grips for a S&W .357 out of some. Beautiful, but very hard to work. I ended up doing most of the shaping with coarse sandpaper, as it is difficult to carve smoothly.
I actually heard of someone trying to make jelly from the fruit! They heard the word "orange" and assumed they could eat it!
Seriously, locust or red oak would make an excellent bed.

 

[1ton]

Osage Orange is one of the most gnarly woods around, It's all over NE kanas and farmers use the limbs for posts and they never rot... ever. [^] Me and my dad are going to do an expirment to see if you can saw and mil it when it's wet and then dry it after they are planks. Chances are it's a waste of time and blades. But if it works we're going to make a hard wood floor. I could drop anvils on it and never find the dent.

 

[Recovry4x4]

Yup, hedgeapple, osage orange is tough stuff. hey Bjorn, way cool data plates. My bed doesn't have any data plates. Also, the 3 pockets for the sheaves, I see the clevises sticking out. Are those actually part of the bed or can they be removed? Inquiring minds want to know.

 

[cranetruck]

The three clevises you see drop down into pockets with a 1/4 turn. Some pictures show two, mine has three. It seems that two should be enough with the center one going either way (to the sides), when the gin poles are set up on the sides.
The "cargo-body pipeline construction" was made as a unit to fit any M45 chassis truck and had its own set of data plates for that reason, I presume. At least initially...
The mounts on the frame are slightly different from the standard in that the dual spring bolts are further back to make place for the tool box. There are also plates in the far rear to stabilize the frame for use with the A-frame. Don't know yet what has to be done to accomodate those.
Thanks for the info on osage orange.
Desert Rat, great job finding this bed! Wonder what Howard's place look like in the summer time with 3 feet of weed and grass all over. Somebody should help him get his stuff on ebay before it's all lost. He's got tons of small stuff, just look at his front yard!

 

[cranetruck]

This is the image that should have gone with the previous post (Howard's front yard).

 

[cranetruck]

To keep going on the 3 vs 2 block "anchors" in the deck, there is a right and wrong method to reave the blocks when there are only two. Both are used when A-frame is over the side and to make it simpler, the newer versions (I guess) are separeted with a space in the center of the deck to clear the wire rope from the winch, which first goes to the rear block and then to one of the center ones.
Below is an image showing the deck with the sheave block anchors hidden in their pockets.

 

[1ton]

Does anybody know the rated capacity of the A-frame. I Know that the M756 had a 20K garwood but I am just curious about they lifting capicty of they truck.

 

[Recovry4x4]

Yep, tests of the original M756 gasser were ceased at 10,000#. I've got a chart that shows the capacity at rated angles.

 

[steelsoldiers]

This is the image that should have gone with the previous post (Howard's front yard).

Wow that is about 50 times worse than the way it looked when I was there 3 years ago. :freaked: