Before getting into looking at how our eyes can become damaged and on how to prevent eye damage from occurring we will be looking at the story of the one eyed carpenter and what we can learn from his misfortune. The One Eyed Carpenter A carpenter asked his employer to pay for the damage done to his glass eye which was broken when a nail he had been driving flew up and struck it.  When he was asked how he lost the eye in the first place he...

Modern tires are engineered to be incredibly tough and withstand extreme temperatures and pressures.  By taking some time to understand tire care, the life of your tires can be extended. There are three things that lead to premature tire failure. (1) Tire Use How aggressively are you driving?  For some industrial vehicles, this may not be applicable; however, for automobiles, semi trailers and forklifts, the way you drive can affect your...

The coming winter season brings to mind an important topic, the maintenance of engine cooling systems. Cooling system malfunction is a leading cause of premature engine failures. A regular maintenance program is the best insurance against avoidable downtime and unnecessary repair costs. The following is a short discussion on the history, development and maintenance of the essential element of any cooling system – antifreeze. Unlike most...

Wheel loaders started their development much later than other earthmoving machines such as excavators and graders. For decades, cable operated shovels filled the earthworks niche that is today largely the domain of wheel loaders. It wasn’t until the second decade of the twentieth century that the earliest examples of what would develop into wheel loaders appeared. These were cable operated devices mounted on farm tractors, cumbersome to...

Most machinery exists today as a result of mankind’s desire to minimize labor and boost productivity. An important group of machines that has freed mankind from drudgery and bone- wearying toil are the excavators. Excavators encompass a large group of earth moving machines ranging from the colossal draglines used in strip mining to the miniature hydraulic backhoes employed in construction and landscaping. The most common excavators in...

During the 1800’s as road networks etched their way across the landscape the need grew for more and better maintenance to accommodate the swelling volume of wheeled traffic. The horse drawn vehicles of the day pocked and rutted the soft road surfaces especially during periods of inclement weather. Maintenance equipment of the time was mostly horse drawn, crude and inefficient with devices as simple as timber floats or wagon mounted blades...

The age of steam power allowed the development of traction engines for pulling agricultural implements and wagons.   Steam engine powered traction engines were equipped with wheels whose high ground pressure and limited traction were an impediment in soft ground applications.  Attempts to overcome these challenges resulted in employing ever larger wheels, both in diameter and width requiring increasingly larger machines to propel them. ...