Shaft drive conversion questions

[Rabbit929]

Just wondering about the feasibility of it. I think, if I can pick up a Max or Argo she'll that's a little hammered out, build a heavier frame, shaft drive all the axles, and run it off say, 30hp and a heavy Duty hydrostatic tranny and engine, what kindof shaft tech should I be looking into?

I'm talking about dumping the amphibious capability, and building a straight up maintainance free plow/work horse. Heavy, durable, and bulletproof. So I can install heavier accessories and rock a beast of a machine capable of more work on dry pavement.

I think it would be badass. Thoughts?

[wfo]

BUY A 4 WHEEL DRIVE BACK HOE. just saying

[john swenson]

rabbit.. i think it's possible to build a shaft drive unit. the only chains would be the ones drive the t20, then the 2 jackshaft chains to the center axle. i was going to do shaft drives on the center and front and rear axles at that point on my max 2 highboy , but the cost of 2 4 way 11/4'' inch shaft gearboxes and 4 1 1/4'' 3 way gear boxes was around $ 2500.00 . you would have to build a custom frame, etc. but i don't doubt that if money was not a factor it can be done nicely. wish i had the extra bucks to go for it . johnboy va.

[Rabbit929]

I understand the feasibility issue, but I wanna hear ideas. These machines look badass, and where I am it's prolly the only if it's kind for miles.

What I was thinking, is buy a shell, reverse engineer a heavy duty solid frame, bigger wider custom axles, shaft drive mechanism with 1 input and 3 outputs for each axle, a Truely bulletproof driveline.

Chains are high maintainance
Belts would require a shaft to be removed to be installed, and dirty sheaves would rule them out
Shafts are heavy, but durable. Without the amphibious "weight limit" a person could make a real powerful pulling beast of a machine. Has anyone ever looked into something like this? Tying all three axles together with shaft, and maybe tee off in the middle for an input?

[john swenson]

if you use a 4 way gear box for the center axle and primary power input, then from there go forward and back to the front and rear axles with drive shafts to 3 way gear boxes for those axles there are no chains involved up to that point. next is how to power the center 4 way gear box input shaft. with a hydraulic motor you can tie directly to that shaft. if a t20 was used there would need to be a sprocket and chain drive there. last option if it would work torque wise would be to tie the 4 way input drive shaft directly to the output shafts of the t20. then all there would be would be the clutch drive belt. there are gear boxes made that will receive any length shafts in most o.d. sizes. all boxes have multiple mounting holes also. my question for readers of this would be... would a t20 connected directly to a axle still have the power to drive the machine or does it need to be geared down like the jackshaft does ? if so, there are gear reduction gearboxes of various ratios available that would solve that issue. and as i said before, a custom frame would need to be fabricated to adopt this design. fun to think about..!!! johnboy

[Rabbit929]

if you use a 4 way gear box for the center axle and primary power input, then from there go forward and back to the front and rear axles with drive shafts to 3 way gear boxes for those axles there are no chains involved up to that point. next is how to power the center 4 way gear box input shaft. with a hydraulic motor you can tie directly to that shaft. if a t20 was used there would need to be a sprocket and chain drive there. last option if it would work torque wise would be to tie the 4 way input drive shaft directly to the output shafts of the t20. then all there would be would be the clutch drive belt. there are gear boxes made that will receive any length shafts in most o.d. sizes. all boxes have multiple mounting holes also. my question for readers of this would be... would a t20 connected directly to a axle still have the power to drive the machine or does it need to be geared down like the jackshaft does ? if so, there are gear reduction gearboxes of various ratios available that would solve that issue. and as i said before, a custom frame would need to be fabricated to adopt this design. fun to think about..!!! johnboy

Fun to think about, I agree entirely. I've been trying to figure out a low profile way to do this, but my knowledge of gear ratios and how to get what I want at the wheels is minuscule. But I believe it can be done. I don't think the t20 would work for this, mainly because it depends on belt slippage and snowmobile clutches. Which work great, but reliability-wise, it's another friction part to fail. I wonder if the manufacturers have ever attempted such a design, weight is the only factor I can see hurting anything.

Amphibious, not so much. But a maintainance-free skidsteer utv, opens a whole new world of opportunities. I recently used my Max ii to pull a 6000lb Durango with a 2500lb winch up any steep slope of a driveway, she was grunting and growling, riding on my front two wheels, back wheels in the air, but she did it. It really blew my mind the capability of this machine, my only concern is a machine working to the test like that on a daily basis would most surely bleed. But if it was built for this type of abuse, how would you build it, deleting the floatability, and make it a work horse?

[Noel Woods]

The T20 was the first transmissions that the original skid steer construction machinery utilized. It was only several years later that the switch to hydraulic drive was made.

[john swenson]

i think your description of what you did with your max 2 pulling a durango shows how strong the t20 is structurally wise. i don't think the clutches and belt would be a weak link either. basically with a shaft drive picture this : in place of the sprockets on the axles are heliarc gears and on the shaft running from front axle to back axle including one at the center axle are the other matching drive gears like in a transmission. now once that center shaft starts turning it turns the front and rear also obviously. the gearboxes are just the '' enclosed gears and bearings in a box'' so to speak. but hooking the t20 direct would probably not be enough gear reduction. so another gear box with lower ration reduction would need to be used as the main drive gearbox. it seems like a cool idea, but there would be no forgiveness if a problem occured with a locked up axle or maybe tracks being used. atleast chains will snap !! that kind of situation would probably destroy the gears in the gearbox unless a ''breaking under load'' type coupling was used on the shafts. i would sure love to build something like that and see the results. j.b.

[Rabbit929]

Exactly what I was thinking, but given the fact the axles are stationary, would give some leeway for the drives to be stationary as well. Say if the drive shafts to the axles were a 1:3 ratio, and the gearbox that hooked to tranny was 1:2, (no idea the result but just idea numbers) would give a wicked about of torque, quiet as a mouse, but there would need to be something like a love--joy or orange peel coupler of a type to reduce the shock transfer on the tranny. It would be a mini tugboat. If you can't pull it, add weight. No load limit with 2 inch axles and what not. It would be a monster of a machine.

[jerseybigfoot]

Way too complex and costly for a backyard solution. Probably
Cost 1k in gear boxes for a 6 wheel drive system and another 5k for some cheep hydraulics. probably a another grand in machine parts bearings etc. and not including engineering time and a prime mover.

[john swenson]

rabbit... that's the ticket. you could eliminate all the chains, just the clutch drive belt would be left. and yes, a lovejoy coupling or load limited coupling on the shaft from the t20 to the input shaft on the center '' drive'' gearbox. all that would be needed to know would be the gear reduction ratio from the t20 to that gearbox. the front and rear axle gearboxes would be 1 to 1. i'm not a engineer so i don't know how to calculate that kind of stuff. for me it would be find someone who could figure it out, or just trial and error which can be expensive. all the components are out there.. maybe sometime ! i guess that's why some machines had a hydraulic motor at each wheel... that's alot of hoses etc. to go bad,etc. j.b.

[miller_time]

The gear reduction on my max iv between the t20 and axle it drives is 2.27 to 1.

[Rabbit929]

rabbit... that's the ticket. you could eliminate all the chains, just the clutch drive belt would be left. and yes, a lovejoy coupling or load limited coupling on the shaft from the t20 to the input shaft on the center '' drive'' gearbox. all that would be needed to know would be the gear reduction ratio from the t20 to that gearbox. the front and rear axle gearboxes would be 1 to 1. i'm not a engineer so i don't know how to calculate that kind of stuff. for me it would be find someone who could figure it out, or just trial and error which can be expensive. all the components are out there.. maybe sometime ! i guess that's why some machines had a hydraulic motor at each wheel... that's alot of hoses etc. to go bad,etc. j.b.

I'm not a fan of hydraulic motor to each wheel, I figure that would be too complex. When all 3 wheels are intended to be run at the same speed, one should do it. So the next question is, how to tie all 3 axles together, even if all 3 axles are driven by 2 rs80 double chains, that would be an animal of a machine. So, how do you tie 3 drives together, without gear reduction, depend entirely on the gear reduction from transmission-gearbox-driveline.

The driveline should be one large solid piece. Slip the axles into the splines, and away you go. One for each side, all it does is transfer the power from gearbox to the axles. Which is why I think hydrostatic would be the way to go, because the gear reduction might be able to beee accomplished through the transmission itself. If not, an engineer would take much to tweak the driveline system to accommodate? A gearbox would be nice for adding a high and low range, but the benefit from the snowmobile styled clutches, I would assume would give youhw wide range most of us seek.

[allwheeldrive]

Just wondering about the feasibility of it. I think, if I can pick up a Max or Argo she'll that's a little hammered out, build a heavier frame, shaft drive all the axles, and run it off say, 30hp and a heavy Duty hydrostatic tranny and engine, what kindof shaft tech should I be looking into?

I'm talking about dumping the amphibious capability, and building a straight up maintainance free plow/work horse. Heavy, durable, and bulletproof. So I can install heavier accessories and rock a beast of a machine capable of more work on dry pavement.

I think it would be badass. Thoughts?

What your describing minus 2 wheels is pretty much a Coot.

But if I was to actually build a shaft driven 6x6 with skid steer as you desire I'd just run a small car engine to a standard transmission and low range gear box. Feed that into 3 deuce 2 1/2 ton rear diffs with little stubby axles. Than just put a disk brake on the end of each axle. Plum all the brake lines on each side together and run to hand levers.

Gas goes forward. Select gear and range, or reverse. When you want to steer apply brake on opposite side of unit. Diffs put power to other side skid steer activated. If your driving in a straight line and one side starts slipping ease the brake on the other to work as traction control.

There is a lot of industrial 8x8 machines that would make a Argo or Mud-ox look like a Ford ranger compared to a Caterpillar D9. None of these use shaft driven drive trains so there must be a reason. If I was you I'd just find something like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUJ2u4BxFvo used. It's not going to get more rugged and tough.

[miller_time]

If you want to use brakes to steer you could steal the drivetrain out of a ranger 6x6.it has a pass through center differential like a semi. Then you could add a gear ruduction box to each output of the tranny say 2:1 so it would only be 1/2 as fast but twice the power.