Replacing differential housing J5

[pixie]

People are rough on these machines.

My diffferential housing had a long rip in it that had been peened over and it was also rusty on the inside. It was only 1/16 metal to start with.

I took it to a local welder who did some frame work on my Imp a couple years ago. He is replacing the sides and bottom with 1/4 steel.The rest of the tub had already been covered with 5/16 steel before I got it and there is a 1/4" front belly plate that has the plow brackets on it.

First he cut out the front bogey axle which was shorter than the rear bogey axle. The new one will be the longer length. Then he got a pattern from the sides of the diff. Then he cut the sides out.
He has also cut the inner support beams free of the bottom but not from the front edge.

 

[Critter]

Cool pics there Pixie, Definately a big job isn't it. It's awefully funny how they used thinner material instead of doing it right the first time. I guess in all to keep the weight issue under control.

 

[pixie]

This has been moving along slowly.
We have turned a corner ( I hope ) and are getting things back together.

The welder has added some steel to the diff carrier to make it easier to get in and out and replaced all the nuts on the carrier and in the diff because some were stripped out and some were the next larger size.
We also switched from rebuilding the diff that was in this machine to using the diff out of the 'junk' machine I had. The ring gear was in better shape as were the brake drum bushings.

I also had the drive axles resurfaced. They used some kind of epoxy. Hope it works. It cost $125/axle; the same as it did to have the pinion yoke resurfaced with steel.

 

[pixie]

Some more pics.
First, at the bottom of the ring gear, you can see the holes that made us nervous.

The diff in the junker. Someone put a Chevy engine in this. Mounted to wooden blocks !!!!! Looks like it might be a little uncomfortable to drive

The new corners and nuts on the carrier.

 

[Snowcat Operations]

VERY nice work! Looks 100 X stronger than stock.

 

[pixie]

The J5 is home from the welders.

We ended up removing the bent rear bogie axle, shortening the new front one an inch and making the rear one that same width.

Put a new doubling plate on the front and will add the plow ears before the final paint job.

This is what it was all about...having the sprockets and wheels line up !

 

[pixie]

How come pictures don't show up in the posts anymore ?

 

[mtntopper]

Great job Pixie.

I will try to attach one of your pics and see what happens. I think Doc is doing some upgrades that might be changing the way you will need to upload pics. I am using Internet Explorer and it works ok for me.

 

[pixie]

Thanks, Bill ! The pictures are all visible this afternoon

 

[Bulldog1401]

Pixie, you mentioned that the Imp would not pull logs very well. Nearly all J-5"s I have seen have been modified for logging with arches and winches. Most people are happy with this setup. I would rather travel in an Imp, and work in a J-5.

 

[pixie]

Bulldog, I agree completely !

I bought the Imp thinking it could be a multi purpose machine and I would be very happy with the compromise if the Imp had another few inches of ground clearance or a few more horsepower.

My plan was to drag dump trailers full of fill and smooth up my trails but I don't think the Imp has the power for that and I haven't found any good fill on the land.

I really like the Imp and don't want to injure it

Having dumped a ton of money into the J5, I'm trying to give it a decent paint job, now. I'll post some more pictures when it looks a little better.

 

[Lyndon]

Good job! I noticed that some J5's had an additional piece of 3/8 or 1/2 plate under the Differential housing that starts at the bumper and runs all the way back to beyond the housing. I thought it was 'Stock', I guess not, or at least on your year. I vaguely remember seeing it in some service manual. I would speculate that it was added to later models making them somewhat bullet proof. Nice job! Good picts too!

 

[pixie]

Thanks, Lyndon !

This is an early, light body/frame J5. The whole body/tub was about 1/16" steel originally. Someone had already added the 5/16 plate to the easy areas on the sides and on the bottom but the differential area was still the thin metal and very beat up.Originally, there was no front plate. Later models were heavier metal and I believe the "Forestry" models came with the plate.
They also added some small rails like railroad tracks on top of the side decks. These support the winch at the rear and add stiffness and support to the decks. Whoever did these mods was a little crude. I can't imagine what they were thinking would happen with one axle 2+" longer than the other !!!!
J5s seem to have done a good bit of evolving during the time they were produced. There are 2 different widths, different axle diameters, different body thicknesses, different bumpers and on and on.

 

[Critter]

Nice work PIX. You might just get it finished in time for next winter eh????

 

[Snowcat Operations]

Pixie,
Who did the work? Looks like they new what they were doing!

 

[cranman]

Nice work. As a person who used different J-5 models in the 1960's and 70's I can tell you that they are one of the toughest machines I have seen in the bush. Even the earlier models that were kind of "light skinned" could withstand an awful pounding. In bush country we used to just go anywhere. If you can't knock a tree down to get through you can always go around it. I have seen the "Red Ram" brochures for forestry use as a skidder and I once saw a brochure for a 2 wheel skidder Arch that attached to the back like a trailer. I think it would be ideal as the trees could be winched up so the Arch would carry the butt ends and still leave enough weight for traction. One of the pitfalls of these machines is the pitching front and back while underway. We used to call them "nodding donkeys" . This was not nearly so prevalent in the J7 and M7 because of the longer frame and 2 sets of boggies, But the trade off is in the fact that a short machine is so much more maneuvarable in the forest. Good luck on this. Nice work to date.

 

[pixie]

Thanks for the compliments, Critter and Mike. The welder worked for GE for years. He's good at it !

Cranman; it's great to hear from someone who has used a J5 in the woods I can understand how it might hobbyhorse. I hope my log arch or what ever I'm dragging will stabilize it ? I never go very fast. Thanks for the good wishes !

I have most of it primed and the old (strange) plow cylinder bracket cut off. Working on a new , more sensible bracket and plow mounts and some other minor repairs and mods

 

[cranman]

The log arch pamphlet I saw was likely about the width of the machine with 2 tires on the outside of the arch. I'd say about 10.00x20's or maybe 9.00x20 if you are familiar with truck wheels. It had a pulley at the top of the arch similar to a conventional treefarmer cable skidder so it could use the back mounted winch cable as the main line with a few ckokers off that. The main difference I remember was that the arch assembly when attached to the J-5 was leaning forward from the wheels instead of back like a regular skidder. This was likely so it would transfer a portion of the weight of the butt ends of the logs to the J5. Do you have an arch already? If so this info probably won't do you much good.

 

[pixie]

Cranman, this is a scan of the J5 ' logging sulkey'. Is this what you saw ?

I would love to find one of these, otherwise I'll use my log arch but it is only 32" between the wheels and limits the number of logs one can tow.

 

[pixie]

The J5 rolled out of the garage under it's own power, yesterday

New water pump, alternator, voltmeter, rewired ( a couple of times ... ), tracks ..... need to tighten them somemore.

I'm pretty thrilled to have it in one running piece again. The guys at the auto parts store will miss me

 

[mtntopper]

Great job Pixie. It looks like a new one and should be ready for the next 40 years of work life. Now, don't go out get it all muddy right of way...

 

[MNoutdoors RIP]

excellent job, Pixie, when will you use it? summer or wait till freeze up?

 

[pixie]

Thanks, guys.

Looks much smarter today,with the tracks tight !

I'm hoping to use it year-round. It will be used to tow a wheeled trailer -- either a dump trailer to move dirt or a log loading trailer. How far the trailer wheels sink in will be the limiting factor.

I would like to fix up the J5 trailer that has tracks but thier special way of attaching has been screwed up on this machine so I'll have to build something else.

MUD ! I have to take it in MUD ???

 

[cranman]

Very nice job indeed. I see you went for the receiver type hitch on the back. I'm all for that and have it on the front and back of all my trucks and my bombardier. I built a pedestal for my 8000 lb electric winch attached to the 2"inch receiver at the bottom and this allows me to use the winch on the front and rear of all my vehicles and also on my bombardier trailer that tows behind the truck. I just welded a piece of 2" i/d heavy wall as a mount on the hitch of the trailer. This may be the answer to winching logs on the arch you plan on. In my case I even use the winch on the front of my 4x4 to lift the snow plow with the remote attached near the wheel. I just have to pull the pin and carry the winch over to any of my applications and this can be accomplished in less than a minute. I was stuck too many times with the winch mounted at the wrong end so I had to think of something!!!

 

[Snowcat Operations]

Use a Warn battery quick disconnect front and rear to supply the winch with power front and rear.

 

[Snowcat Operations]

Here is one installed on my Super Imp.

 

[cranman]

That is exactly the set up I use too, both front and back and I have about 20 feet of remote control that is normally attached near the steering wheel but also reaches from the winch (when mounted at the back) out to the back ramps of my 18 foot flat deck should I have to manually guide some object up on to the trailer while the winch does the work. I wouldn't be without a Warn winch.

 

[pixie]

The winch on the J5 is rather well attached ! In the future I may change to a hydraulic winch but I'll try this one first.
I have an electric boat winch ( 6000 lbs ) mounted on a plate and a big shackle on the plate that I can attach to most anything.

One of the big reasons for getting the J5 is to have a real winch with some line speed that actually works. I've broken 4 winches on my ATV.

 

[MNoutdoors RIP]

Pixie, In the application you are doing the pto or hydraulic winch is far superior than the electric. the electric winches do great for the ocasinal pull but if you doing. high frequency pulls as you would be for skiding the pto and hydraulic winchs have more speed and generaly more cable capacity.

You can over tax your transmission with a pto winch. sometime back when we were called to do a recovery of a brush spraying track rig that was spaying highline right away they had buried a rig pretty good about 4 miles from the nearest road we went in with a Go-tract GT800 with a front mounted pto winch after looking at the stuck vehicle which weighed about 20,000 pounds and they were in the mud about 9 feet deep we double lined a snatch block with 3/4 inch cable and tied of the back of the rig to another rig. a we proceeeded to winch it was apparent that it was going to be a very hard pull. as the winch now pulling 60,000 pounds groaned and groaned and then all at once the side of the transmission case gave way and blew right off. at that point the rig was far enough out that it came out with the anchor rigs help and we proceeded to drive the GT800 out of the swamp. without the side of the transmission case in tact. after tear done the only thing we had to do was install all the guts into another case and put a new pto output on the tranny it was a New Process 435 (good tranny)

 

[Snowcat Operations]

PTO or hydraulic and USE a roller fairlead. Much easier on your wire rope and you can get some pretty good angles without damaging the wire rope.