Hybrid Tractors on the way

woodlandfarms · Jan 25, 2009

Green Car Congress: DEUTZ Introduces Mild Hybrid Drive for Off-Road Construction Equipment

Posted this in PT forum as we use Deutz... Realized I should have put it here.

AKfish · Jan 25, 2009

Interesting stuff. Thanks for the info. Lookin' for the new jobs and new plants that will come out of the technology changes.

20 years ago, I operated a 40 ton Le Tourneau diesel/electric tree crusher. It had 3 - 9 ft. high x 14-16 ft. wide steel cleated wheels with a cross-member push bar that was about 12 ft. in the air. The push bar would knock the trees down and the cleated wheels would chop the trees up into kindling.

Had a 8-71 Detroit diesel powering a DC gen set which powered the 3-125hp electric motors in each wheel. Used a rotating wheel potentiometer to vary the power to the wheels; from a creep to a bone jarring run.

AKfish

woodlandfarms · Jan 25, 2009

Do you have pix? What was the purpose? create logging roads?

aczlan · Jan 25, 2009

something like this perhaps: http://www.fao.org/docrep/X5399E/x5399e0u.jpg
A book about the company: LeTourneau Earthmovers - Google Book Search

Aaron Z

AKfish · Jan 26, 2009

I checked with my wife - she thinks there's some old pics. Have to scan 'em or something to post. (That was a long time ago..)

We got the machines from an electric utility company. They used them to clear trees for power line construction jobs. You could march right off into the woods and make the straightest fairways...

Our purpose was to re-establish broad leaf tree species (birch, aspen, willow) for moose, snowshoe hare, grouse habitat. And avoid the more dangerous controlled burn methods (they have a nasty habit of getting out of control!!

)

We could lay thousands of acres down over the course of the winter months and just as Spring started, we'd hit the down "kindling" with jellied diesel and burn it. Viola! In a few years there'd be acres of good eating for all kinds of critters.

AKfish

woodlandfarms · Jan 26, 2009

AK Fish, that is way cool. Thousands of acres in that beast? I guess you have had a couple of kidney transplants.

studor · Jan 26, 2009

I worked at a few coal mines where we had LeTourneau loaders and Wabco haul trucks that were diesel electric (Cummins diesels with GE wheel motors if I remember right) and that was over 25 years ago

. Sometimes it takes a while for an idea to gain general acceptance

Rudevette · Jan 26, 2009

That technology really isn't that hot of a deal unless you have deep pockets for the repairs. And you don't get that much efficiency gain. You need to remember that on big trucks it's a matter of control accuracy more than anything. And anybody who has spent any time at all in the care and keeping of big DC motors would more than likely not like the sound of DC drives on tractors. I take care of large (500+ HP) DC motors in my line of work and would do almost anything to never see a DC motor again.

AKfish · Jan 27, 2009

Rudevette said:
That technology really isn't that hot of a deal unless you have deep pockets for the repairs. And you don't get that much efficiency gain. You need to remember that on big trucks it's a matter of control accuracy more than anything. And anybody who has spent any time at all in the care and keeping of big DC motors would more than likely not like the sound of DC drives on tractors. I take care of large (500+ HP) DC motors in my line of work and would do almost anything to never see a DC motor again.

We ran the crushers for 5-6 years (I worked on 'em for two) and the Detroits were alot more of the problem than the electric motors.

All we had to do was swap out the large carbon brushes on the armatures of the motors when they would wear out. And oil the armature bearings.

They were GE motors as well. The machine was really a model of "keep it simple", actually. No transmission. No drivelines. No tires.

'Course there was no A/C, no radio, no air-ride seat. It was as bare-bones and as uncomfortable as anything... and I came from year's of tractor jockeying on dirty, noisy farm tractors!

I'd like to believe that the computer age has made more than a few technology changes with diesel-electric or electric power in general.

AKfish