Actually I wanted one on my old excavator but when I updated and stumbled onto this site and saw the ones others made I knew I had to finally get my butt in gear and try to make one. Read all the threads, printed all the pictures from here and other sites and tried to combine all the ideas I liked on each version. It was a learning process and after it was started I figured it just had to be hydraulic so that added way more thought to the design.
I got most steel from a local scrap yard and the cylinder from a tractor salvage yard that I rebuilt. I made it to fit the larger bucket I was welding new brackets onto to fit this machine so this one looks small with the thumb on it.
I didn't take a lot of pictures while fabricating it and do not have any that show it painted so you are seeing the ugly welds, bad grinding jobs and all mistakes that you usually try to hide before showing it to anyone.
I plumbed in the two way valve to my blade control valve, it seems to work well that way but I might change it to the boom swing foot control since it's not usually used at the same time you use the rest of the controls. This excavator is a B6 Yanmar and has the side shift boom so the foot control on it might be good place for that two way valve.
I don't have the bypass valve plumbed in yet so I have to be careful when curling the bucket since it'll way overpower the thumb and bend the tube but that will be a project to do when bad weather hits and work slows down.
Topstrap
I got most steel from a local scrap yard and the cylinder from a tractor salvage yard that I rebuilt. I made it to fit the larger bucket I was welding new brackets onto to fit this machine so this one looks small with the thumb on it.
I didn't take a lot of pictures while fabricating it and do not have any that show it painted so you are seeing the ugly welds, bad grinding jobs and all mistakes that you usually try to hide before showing it to anyone.
I plumbed in the two way valve to my blade control valve, it seems to work well that way but I might change it to the boom swing foot control since it's not usually used at the same time you use the rest of the controls. This excavator is a B6 Yanmar and has the side shift boom so the foot control on it might be good place for that two way valve.
I don't have the bypass valve plumbed in yet so I have to be careful when curling the bucket since it'll way overpower the thumb and bend the tube but that will be a project to do when bad weather hits and work slows down.
Topstrap