Transit for arb work

[Graham 777]

Hi guy's I've bought a Transit twin wheel 3.5 tipper for tree work I'd like to put a chipper body on the back at the moment it's got a steel body complete with a tail lift my question is should i remove the dropsides and fabricate a new arb body and keep the tail lift or should i sell or swop the body and start again ? my mate has already doubled the number of leaf spring's on the back so it carry's a lot more weight which do you lad's think is the cheapest option and could all the transit owners put some photo's up of their truck's to give me an idea on how to go about converting my tranny !! thank's in advance

[kentjames]

Hi Graham,

 

There's lots of threads on here about transits and more specifically the members arbtrucks thread in the arbtruck forum.

 

http://arbtalk.co.uk/forum/arb-trucks/7896-arbtalkers-arbtrucks.html

 

I am however interested to hear peoples thoughts on the tail lift as I was looking at one the other day and had the same thoughts. Since I do garden maintenance and landscaping along side the arb work it would be very useful and labour saving for some jobs. Also if I bought a pedestrian stump grinder then loading it would be easier too. However its also extra weight.

[testcricket01]

In a ideal world you would want to take the body off and build a full ali tipper chip box every little helps with increasing the painfully low payload on any 3.5t truck.

[benedmonds]

I bet you will have no legal payload on a transit with a tail lift.

 

We have a tail lift on our 6 ton iveco. Originally we planned to remove it but it has proved very useful. It did however break today and we therefore had a day without the truck! The tail lift guys managed to get it going again for now but think it is going to need some major repairs (£1,600 + VAT) soon.

 

I don't think we'll be replacing it if it breaks again.

[alex_m]

my mate has already doubled the number of leaf spring's on the back so it carry's a lot more weight

 

Well, it doesn't. It just looks like it's carrying less weight.

With tail lift you'll be lucky to get half a ton in the back with tools, workers etc.

 

What's the payload according to the plate? Does the plate take into consideration the tail lift?

[kentjames]

Another thought also, going of the back of bens post about breaking down, I assume wood chips getting in the lift mechanism might be an issue?

[IsaacRob]

One of the transit's at work has a tail lift. I haven't used it yet, but from what I hear, it causes more problems than its worth.

It seems that someone hit it when they were reversing and knocked the whole thing out of line. So it now only goes down half way and doesn't close properly.

[treedweller]

Take the tail lift off, buy some 2" box section, 1mm galv sheet and some far east 18mm ply then set to with the welder and pop rivets. It's the cheapest servicable option of building a chipbox that looks the part. I put put a chipbox on the back of my single cab l200 for £80.

[tree monkey]

keep the tail lift its easier to get heavy logs on the van imo

if you get some plywood and fabricate a box using the metal sides it helps stopping the sides pushing out

[Sussex Groundie]

Here's a picture of my old D90, ex B.T. Chassis Cab, had the body constructed by T G S Truck Bodies Bristol, together with a DEL Slim Jim Tail-lift with a "plant gate" useful for scraping the mud of your boots, 500kgs payload. I used this for garden maintenance , getting ride ons, 1 ton bags of grass clippings on and off etc the tail gate is on pins top and bottom, drops down as a tail lift or leave top pins secured and remove bottom pins to tip.