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Lighting
Fin Installation
Since
winter weather was fast closing in on us here in Michigan, it was
imperative that we do this job as soon as possible. The job had to
be done outside because of limited ceiling height inside the
building in which we are restoring the Futurliner.
We used Paul Altman's Sky Tract to facilitate the
lift. The telescoping hydraulic boom with forks attached could
lift up to 6,000 pounds and raise its load over 40' in the air. We
also worked with Gray Bar electric in obtaining the last materials
that we needed to complete the restoration of the lighting fin.
Jerry at Gray Bar worked with COOPER LIGHTING as well as GE LIGHTING
to not only obtain all the materials as a donation to the project
but rushed them to us to get this job done on time.
First, we attached a special bracket from the
trailer hitch on my Chevrolet pickup plow truck to the front axle on
the Futurliner. Del installed the hub of the original steering wheel
and using a large pipe wrench did the steering. We slowly pulled the
Futurliner out of the building. Next, the lighting fin on its cradle
was positioned parallel to the Futurliner. Previously lifting hooks
were installed onto the lighting fin. The Sky Tract was positioned,
a chain was attached to the lifting hooks and to the forks of the
Sky Tract. The lighting fin was raised above the Futurliner with its
aluminum arms hanging vertical under the lighting fin.
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In preparation for this job one track section had
been removed in the roof, as well as the two acme worm shafts. The
front carriage was lowered, slipped into its track. This was a long
and tedious job as the clearances are very tight and the lighting
fin had to be perfectly inline in three directions, up and down,
north and south, and east and west. Next the front acme threaded
shaft was slowly turned into the carriage nut. When we started to
perform the same operation for the rear acme worm shaft we
discovered the motor and gearbox had to be moved out of the way.
Once the second carriage was in place, then the one track that had
been removed was inserted. At this point, the weight of the lighting
fin was on the Futurliner. However, we kept tension on the forks of
the Sky Tract for safety reasons.
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Next, the acme worm screws had to be timed so
that the lighting fin would be positioned in the center of the roof
opening when closed. The motor was hooked up and we first lowered
the lighting fin, using the motor, about 1/2 way down. Then we tried
it in the up direction. Everything worked perfectly. Next we lowered
it to within six inches and again ran it up and everything worked
smoothly. We finally ran it to the bottom but this time the motor
stalled when trying to lift the fin again. When GM designed the roof
for us two years ago they told us that we should add lifting assist
cylinders to lift the lighting fin for the first few inches of
travel as there was too much torque being applied to the lifting
mechanical system. Ed had already designed this assist lift system
but we needed to find out exactly the distance the lift cylinders
had to assist the drive mechanism. We determined with the assist of
the Sky Tract that once the lighting fin was 3" from bottom the
lifting drive train easily raised the lighting fin. Ed plans to
install 4" lift cylinders. We also aligned the lighting fin
front to back by disconnecting the coupling and turning the front
acme worm shaft. We had to do this two times to get the lighting fin
to drop into the roof opening.
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We completed the day by lowering the fin into the
roof. Next, using the pickup truck, we tried to push the Futurliner
back into the building. However, even in 4 wheel drive it just sat
there and buried itself in mud. Along with the truck and help using
the Sky Tract we got the Futurliner back into the building.
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A very successful day putting a major piece of
the Futurliner back together. Thanks go to all the volunteers as
well as Dennis Fuller at Kenowa Lumber, Paul and Brett Altman.
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