Working in Alaska pictures

[alaskaforby4]

I kept having issues with the ol' international losing power. It was just a headache that kept reappearing. So on its last foul up I sporadically just bought the the only short wheel based truck I could find off craigslist. It is an old Food Services of America truck, not my favorite color but it ran great for me all summer, not alot of power or very heavily built. But it keeps the iron moving :thumbsup

98 International with Cummins M11

 

[nedly05]

Ive always wanted to have a tractor trailer set up like that. What GCVW can you register that set up for out there? What brand trailer is that?

 

[alaskaforby4]

nedly05
Ive always wanted to have a tractor trailer set up like that. What GCVW can you register that set up for out there? What brand trailer is that?

Its been a great trailer, the fact that I can load two pieces has cut my hauling in half. I'm not sure who makes it, it says MERC on the title. Its been modified, extended and widened, which I found out after I bought it of course But they did a good job.

I just registered the truck for tags and there is a "over 16,000 lbs" heavy tax but wasn't a place to enter GVWR or combined. So I'm not sure, truth be told the nearest scale house is in Anchorage which is 100 miles away and I've never even been through there I'll usually see the DOT guys around our area 2-3 times a year, only been pulled over once and he just gave me a few minor warnings even said "I know you guys like to be left alone up here"
The truck has 44k rear and 12k front, The trailer doesn't have any tags on it so they would do their test of 600lbs per inch of touching tire surface so at 8" tires 38400 for trailer. So 94,400 minus the weight of truck and trailer (which i don't know) I figure puts me around 25 ton of possible payload. I don't haul for anyone but myself and the heaviest thing I currently carry is the 160 with extra bucket. I would like to see how I have it loaded if its an even spread, but not curious enough to drive to the scales.

We have a couple pretty good hills in you little 30 mile radius that we work and that little Cummins M11 is tapped out of power but It still gets it from A to B which is the main thing.

 

[nedly05]

Definitely dont drive to the scale house!!!!! It sounds like a great place to make a living, do you have to pay the "heavy tax" monthly or just when you register? We have quarterly Highway Use Tax that we have to pay for anything over 18000 GVW.

What HP and trans in the Tractor? Does it have a jake?

 

[alaskaforby4]

Haha yeah, if I ever feel like giving the Man some more revenue I'll take a trip down there The Heavy tax is a yearly deal, registration for 1 year is $585 how does that compare to your area?
The motor has 330 hp and on the phone he said it didnt have a jake which I was pretty bummed about, but when I got there it didnt have a jake because the Microswitch was bad. Fixed that and everything works great!

 

[nedly05]

Ive never registered a tractor trailer, I think when I registered my single axle it was around the same though. Pretty sweet she has a jake, looks like a nice truck, some day I hope to have something like that! The 330 must be working with the 160 on!

 

[alaskaforby4]

Finally got the counter weight painted...What a learning experience that was.:Banghead I really wanted to spray it on so I could get a mirror finish but the direct to metal paint that I had was just too thick, it kept spraying like you were texturing sheetrock. I thinned it out so it would spray nice and away I went....well after 3 coats I was barely getting coverage. I was able to get 3 coats in a day, somewhere around coat 5-7 I ended up getting a run, which I then had to attempt to fix that after 10 coats the run was still visible and I had to thin it so much it was just that, thin.... So I sanded the run area back to metal and rolled it on with a foam roller. It came out better than I expected. I found decal sets for the 160 online for $180 w shipping wasn't exactly thrilled about spending that much money on stickers! So I had my local decal guy make up just one for 80 bucks and I even got it on there strait!

 

[alaskaforby4]

Ive never registered a tractor trailer, I think when I registered my single axle it was around the same though. Pretty sweet she has a jake, looks like a nice truck, some day I hope to have something like that! The 330 must be working with the 160 on!

Yeah shes pedal to the medal transporting that ol girl. The jake definitely saves some brakes, does yours have one? any word on the excavator?

 

[nedly05]

The counterweight looks great! My tandem has a jake, couldnt be without it around here. Salesguy was off for 10 days hunting, he was supposed to call yesterday but didnt. I called deere and the salesguy called back and said he would be in touch but havent heard from him either. They both know Im looking so the ball is in their court. Seems like you have to sell iron to yourself around here.

 

[clintm]

They both know Im looking so the ball is in their court. Seems like you have to sell iron to yourself around here.

I know the feeling I deal with it every time I try to buy something any more. or you tell them what you want/need then they try to sell you something totally different. like a friend of mine said today when you walk into the ford dealer tell them you want a F350 4x4 crew cab long bed don't try to sell me a TARUS

 

[alaskaforby4]

The counterweight looks great! My tandem has a jake, couldnt be without it around here. Salesguy was off for 10 days hunting, he was supposed to call yesterday but didnt. I called deere and the salesguy called back and said he would be in touch but havent heard from him either. They both know Im looking so the ball is in their court. Seems like you have to sell iron to yourself around here.

Geeze that is ridiculous. Well hopefully somebody will call you back and take your money, cant wait to see this thing.

They both know Im looking so the ball is in their court. Seems like you have to sell iron to yourself around here. I know the feeling I deal with it every time I try to buy something any more. or you tell them what you want/need then they try to sell you something totally different. like a friend of mine said today when you walk into the ford dealer tell them you want a F350 4x4 crew cab long bed don't try to sell me a TARUS

Have you seen the new Taurus' though? They will blow that f350 out of the water

 

[alaskaforby4]

Septics

We install quite a few septic systems, they are good money and fairly easy to knock out. Some replacment systems are dirtier then others.
This particular system failed after 5 years of use, they had grease traps in line but apparently they weren't doing very much.
We dug up the end of the line to install a cleanout to steam the line out. As you can see it was beyond repair, if you look close you can actually see the poo bugs in the cap The grease in this system coated the sidewalls of the trench making it unable to absorb any grey water, the bugs will eat the grease, repairing the system but it will take a few years. We ended up installing a "bull-run" valve that allows you to switch between leach fields.

 

[alaskaforby4]

We ended up adding another 2000 gallon tank in series with new 1680 sq ft. leachfield. The trench was 17' deep with Fiber marked in orange along the left, we had a representative onsite during the dig. We attempted to pothole it to find it, we then dug next to it but the location and the depth kept fluctuating. Its always sketchy when stuff like that happens, we gave it as much of berth as we could afford and continued on. We ended up putting monitor tubes and cleanouts on every end and beginning of trench to add options later down the road. It now looks like a place where PVC is grown and harvested...oh well, as long as it works

 

[Colorado Digger]

Nice work on the leach field. The client must have been eating too much bear and beaver. It must be plenty frozen up there, We have been in the 0f range and getting up in the 20's. It came so quik this year. 2 weeks ago it was 70f and now this. Keep up the good work!

Regards, CD

 

[nedly05]

Geeze that is ridiculous. Well hopefully somebody will call you back and take your money, cant wait to see this thing.

Yeah I might call him tomorrow. I am finishing up the two jobs this coming week, and week after that I had hoped to use it on so at this point if it waits till spring I guess its no biggy. Its annoying, maybe im just impatient but I like things to move along when I want them to!

 

[CBryantCo]

View attachment 127066

Is the 4" pipes at inlet and outlet for pump-outs/ cleaning of the tank?

 

[alaskaforby4]

Nice work on the leach field. The client must have been eating too much bear and beaver. It must be plenty frozen up there, We have been in the 0f range and getting up in the 20's. It came so quik this year. 2 weeks ago it was 70f and now this. Keep up the good work!

Regards, CD

Thanks CD, it is a store with a meat dept. and deli, recently they had been getting japanese tour busses through there and I think what was happening is they would just send a tidal wave into that tank and force everything out the grey water side. In the little area we had to dig up at the end of the field we found Jolly Rancher wrappers as well as a few tampons, stuff that shouldn't be passing through the tank internal baffle. Hopefully the second tank we installed inline will solve the Japanese Tsunami

Our weather this year has been really weird, to got cold at first but for the last couple weeks now its been in the 40's and raining! I'm actually going to have to come out of my winter retirement and go put in a waterline tomorrow :Banghead

This was last night

Yeah I might call him tomorrow. I am finishing up the two jobs this coming week, and week after that I had hoped to use it on so at this point if it waits till spring I guess its no biggy. Its annoying, maybe im just impatient but I like things to move along when I want them to!

That is annoying, its one thing if its a private seller but is is their job!!

 

[alaskaforby4]

Is the 4" pipes at inlet and outlet for pump-outs/ cleaning of the tank?

The vertical pipes are for pump-outs, there are two enclosed chambers with a baffle in the middle with a hole about halfway down. When the "solids" enter the inlet of the tank you heavy stuff will fall to the bottom and your fats and lighter stuff will float to the top, the non chunkey fluid will flow through the hole in the baffle. This is called "grey water" this then flows out into your absorption field which is transferred into a series of perforated horizontal pipes bedded with a 3/4 - 1 1/2 "sewer rock" that adds area for the grey water to seep into the natural ground. There are lots a differnt types of fields and ways to do. Ill try to find a schematic on our systems

 

[alaskaforby4]

This is a bed style septic system

 

[alaskaforby4]

Here is one ready for backfill, that black geotextile is laid over the sewer rock to stop any mud from pressing its way down into the rock and clogging the voids