What is the oddest machine you have worked on or operated

[Dennis Mohn]

A number of years ago I worked for a John Deere dealer in central Pa. It was on the commercial equipment side and I worked with a lot of forestry equipment. One of the units was a Bell feller buncher. It was three wheeled , hydrostatic drive, and looked like the body for an old helicopter. It was made in South Africa and even with correct part numbers you were never sure what you might receive. And when it came to operating , if the linkage was out of adjustment which they always were , it was like trying to control the wildest animal you could think of. I had one parked between to new JD machines and when I went to move the Bell it almost ran into the two new machines, I was a busy somebody for a few seconds.

 

[sea2summit]

Not sure if it counts but I used a reconstructed fish wheel, used it in '96(?) but not sure when it was originally built sometime early 1900's.

 

[Dennis Mohn]

Not sure if it counts but I used a reconstructed fish wheel, used it in '96(?) but not sure when it was originally built sometime early 1900's.

whats a fishweel?

 

[sea2summit]

whats a fishweel?

 

[grsthegreat]

I had to wire in a early 1930’s era coffee roaster that was made in germany. All controls were disassembled and tossed into box. Everything printed in german. Actually had nazi cross symbols forged into steel, though thew were mostly ground off. Absolutely no instructions existed. Everyone, including 3 state electrical inspectors were stumped. We finally got it going thru trial and error.

but it was eary working on that machine due to its history.

 

[prairiegirl]

so what do they do with the fish? Eat them? Count and weigh them? Move them somewhere else?

 

[sea2summit]

so what do they do with the fish? Eat them? Count and weigh them? Move them somewhere else?

I was eating them, it was a community subsistence permit for use. They are commonly used to count and/or tag though.

 

[MossRoad]

A self propelled rail car ramp for loading autos onto rail cars.

It looked like any other ramp, except there was a hatch between the ramps that you opened up, hopped in, and drove a little tractor-like machine. You'd raise up the legs, lower the ramp, and you looked like a parade float driving through town to get to another siding.

You'd pull onto the tracks at a road crossing, and drive up to the car, raise the ramps with some cable system I forget how it operated, locked it down, set the feet, hopped out and closed the hatch.

 

[ArlyA]

I worked on one of these GE engines. I thought it was built in the 40s.

 

[jjeff]

travel lift. It's like a mobile gantry crane for lifting boats in slings out of the water. The one I occasionally operated was much older, smaller, and imagine more quirky than the one I found off the googler.