Tractor Rollover

[dadohead]

In the first few weeks of starting at Deere... they sent me to Machine Operator Training. I was a brand new backhoe engineer.

There was 8 of us. It lasted 2 weeks and was run at the Coal Valley test site near Moline. It was an unbelievable experience. Some of the best pro operators around worked there (their real job was to demo machines for prospective customers wanting to see machines perform). For a couple weeks they taught us

8 operators/ 8 machines. You started in the morning checking/servicing the machine you were appointed. Every 2 hours you rotated to something different. End of the day you drove what you were running in and power washed it off then serviced again. They treated us like we were contractors. We filled in a huge gully in the woods and graded a road across it. Numerous machines were flipped during that 'class'! One guy snagged the outrigger cylinder on the backhoe with the bucket and blew hydraulic oil everywhere. I sank a scraper up to the axles in a soft field. Got pushed out with a 850 crawler.

I'll never forget my first experience on the scraper. We had done all the prep work and it was time to start depositing material in that valley. I'm belted in and the pro stands on the ladder showing me the controls... about 2 minutes. Then says "pickup your load over in that field." "She'll really fly down this hill so start opening the bowl before you're at the bottom." "Swing her around as you go up the other side." "Don't flip it... it will really want to flip." "Drop the cutting edge close to the ground... it should stop the flip." Holly crap... Pucker city!!! At the end of 2 weeks we were all fairly competent. We all stunk on the grader though. :<(

 

[scootr]

This quote from Ronald Reagan sums this situation up nicely.
The nine most terrifying words in the English language are "I'm from the government, and I'm here to help."
Ronald Reagan

Apparently nobody was listening. Reagan was all about restricting govt. Too bad that idea didn't include a free lunch or it could have been popular.

 

[GrandpaSmurf825]

Actually, I think this speaks to a useful instrument tractor makers could include. It'd be a meter that takes into account both static gravitational effects and dynamic inertial effects. In fact, it could even take loader height into account, and even the load itself, perhaps by watching hydraulic pressure when the loader is going up.

This is a complicated thing. For one thing it would have to be done with thorough understanding of the tractor's weight distribution. It's not something we could practically do ourselves. But if there are lawsuits out there, this might make huge economic sense for a manufacturer.

About 45 years ago I worked with some guys who designed systems with microprocessors in them. Microprocessors are common and cheap these days -- for example, they are the reason I can't understand the user interface on our goddam toaster. But back then, this was rare. These guys were working on a project to monitor the movement and forces on cranes, to prevent them tipping over. One situation they were working on concerns having the boom nearly vertical, lifting a load near the crane body, and then starting to lower the boom. It's very tricky, because stopping the boom will add tipping force from its inertia. An operator can start lowering the boom and put the crane in a condition where there is no way to avoid tipping a few seconds into the future, even though it is stable when the operator does this. If they could solve that problem back then, imagine what a manufacturer could do today.

I have never tipped. But I don't know if my worst near miss was 10% of the way to tipping, or 90%. Sure wish I knew.

They have most cranes these days equipped with LMI systems. (Load Moment Indicator) They have several sensors to protect the crane, load, and people. It doesn't prevent stupidity. I was trained on the system we used because we had both rubber tired cranes and locomotive on rail cranes. Regular operator refused a pick because he didn't feel it was safe with a Grove RTR58 crane. Another guy who had crane certification was willing to do it. So one outrigger was on some tie plates. When the plates shifted and caused a shock load it bent the boom on the crane. I wasn't there when it occurred and fortunately didn't have any involvement in the boom change out. Of course no repercussions for the operator who did it.

The system was no help here. It will or can prevent over loading the crane. Either by boom to low or load to heavy. It will normally allow certain functions to happen to "fix" the issue. Winch down to put the load at rest then boom up. Retract the boom on a telescoping boom. If the system malfunctions it cab be over ridden.

I truthfully see such a system (roll over prevention) only having minimal benefit. Most accidents happen quickly. Everything is fine until it's not. Whether it's a hole, ditch, slipped off the edge of the road or who knows what.

My Father had a very close call mowing a road ditch with a compact utility (Long 260) and a 4 foot brush hog on it. However it wasn't because of the ditch being to steep. It was pretty tame and wouldn't give one pause at all. What happened was there was a woven wire fence with at least for around here typical 2 or 3 steel posts and then a wood post. As he was going along crowding the fence he came to a wood post that was broken off at the ground and leaning towards the direction he was coming from. So it was leaning East as he traveled West. R-1 ag tires on the tractor and the rear tire caught the top of the post perfectly. Instead of shoving it to the ground it climbed the post and rolled the tractor. No ROPS of any kind on it. The tractor went completely over but rolled back to it's side. That's the only reason my Father survived with only a sore back. We know it went that far because the steering wheel was mashed down and the muffler was bent. I'm attaching a photo of a Long 260. They were made in Romania. They were a crude little tractor but still capable of doing a variety of tasks. I attached a photo of a tractor like it. I was thinking the exhaust was on right but obviously my memory was wrong. I think the exhaust had a huge role in keeping the tractor going completely over.