The Tool The Shop Made Tool Was Used On

I recently made a post in the Fabrication and Techniques section about a tool that I made to remove a brake line from an old road grader I own. One member asked for photos of the grader, so I am making this post to share.

Photo #1 is of the whole machine. It is a 1955 Austin Western Super 88, with a GMC (Detroit) 3-71 three-cylinder diesel engine that puts out about 100 hp. It has a three speed (no syncros) manual transmission with high and low ranges. It has an 8 foot wide blade that turns 360 degrees and shifts left and right. The circle will shift so far to the right that I can cut a bank at more than a 45 degree angle! The blade also slides left and right about three feet. Notice the olive drab paint peeking out from under the yellow repaint. It was built in 1955 on contract for the Navy, so it probably was run by Seabees.

Photo #2 is the front quarter view of the machine. Notice the differential and driveline that drives the front wheels. The steering knuckles are like an early Jeep, only much bigger. Tires are 13.00x24. The hydraulic cylinder just in front of the cab is the one that shifts the circle from side to side. The two vertical cylinders lift the blade and circle up and down.

Photo #3 shows some stenciled lettering on the olive drab paint peeking out from under the yellow repaint, showing that it was a military machine.

Photos #4 and #5 show the mechanism that turns the circle and to the rear of those hydraulic cylinders is the transfer collar for getting hydraulic power to the blade side shift. There are valves in the two circle turning cylinders that time the push and pull forces to crank the blade pinion gear around. There are teeth on the inside of the circle that the pinion engages to turn the circle.

More photos in the next post.

More grader photos:

Photo #6 is the turntable that steers the rear axle. It is positioned by two hydraulic cylinders that rotate it about twenty degrees each direction. The tandem wheels are driven by chains in a hollow box that pivots on the rear axle stubs and holds the spindles and sprockets that mount and drive the rear wheels.

Photo #7 is the 3-cylinder GMC diesel engine. It is two-cycle and the blower pushes the fresh air into the cylinder, displacing the exhaust gases.

The last photo is of the data plate from the Navy. Pretty interesting!

I wish you'd uploaded bigger pictures so details could be better seen, but it looks like an awesome machine.

Link to slideshow of full size photos of the grader on Photobucket:

http://s854.photobucket.com/user/Jock_OR/slideshow/Austin%20Western%20Road%20Grader

Enjoy!

Cool old piece of machinery. Thanks for sharing.

jhn9840
John

That things awesome! In my neck of the woods a machine such as that would have been used up and scrapped in the 70s lol. The mines would have kept that critter running night and day. Great to see that it exists

Modern tech has made graders so much easier to run. I worked at a gravel pit during the summer when I was in college and it was one of the most difficult machines to use correctly. The guy that trained me was amazing.

I'm not real good at running it, but by going slow and not trying to get it all done at once I can get a decent result. A good grader operator is truly an artist!