Peterbilt 379 Lowboy project

Fastdirt

Well-known member
Well the welder has been working on the trailer to get everything fixed, replaced, straightened or just stronger. Lot of thin metal on the Witzco. He put in about 55 hours on the trailer..OUCH! but it had to be done. We bought a 1/2" 4'x8' sheet of steel and some other various metal stock. About 600 lbs. of steel total. He started by removing the rear cover that was thin. Replaced with 1/2" and under supports. That should hold the excavator boom/bucket without denting. I'll only need to rest it there when pulling both machines. He created a toolbox in the rear section by putting in a floor and a hinged door. Replaced the rear piece that was mangled with 1/2". He put a floor in the entire neck to create more storage and he also put flooring in two sections between the beams on the deck. Good bit of storage now. He had to do a lot of work up front where it connects because of abuse. We also did away with the flip ramps and he used 1/2" to steel to create a ramp extension with inner gussets. The side beams and main parts of the trailer were perfectly straight so after all his work it's very straight all around. He fixed it all and I'm really impressed with his work and I have definitely found a new welder.
 

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Steve Frazier

Founder
Staff member
Looks great! I've never seen a cutter like that, looks pretty slick! It looks self propelled, what is the power source for the movement?
 

Fastdirt

Well-known member
First time I had ever seen a track torch. I was extremely happy to see it though because that thing made some really nice cuts. It was plugged in to a power source so like Mitch said it's electric. It just crawls along at slow creep.
 

Steve Frazier

Founder
Staff member
It looked like it might have been old, but I've never been around one before either. I always like to learn about things I haven't seen before, drove my ex nuts.
 

Steve Frazier

Founder
Staff member
Thanks for the video! I'm surprised he didn't support the piece being cut, that was quite a jolt to the whole setup when it broke loose. He probably wouldn't have had to reverse the torch either. It sure does make a slick cut though!
 

Fastdirt

Well-known member
Thanks for the video! I'm surprised he didn't support the piece being cut, that was quite a jolt to the whole setup when it broke loose. He probably wouldn't have had to reverse the torch either. It sure does make a slick cut though!
Steve, I was thinking the same thing on that. I just thought ok that's how he does it, he was just smiling away when it happened.. I asked him to take a couple pics when I was at work and sent he me this.
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Went to hook back up to the trailer and the brakes were not working right. So we thought we hooked the air tank back up wrong, but we labled them. Swapped the lines back and forth. Me and the welder were stunned. Called the mechanic he said it sounded like a brake chamber. He came over for the tune of $85/hr. He brought a chamber with him but couldn't figure it out. He actually put my lines back on backwards making my troubleshooting a nightmare. Long story short it was a miserable ordeal with the worst space to work in. Locked up in the gravel with rain. I spent hours under there. Called the trailer manufacturer etc..etc. I replaced the spring brake valve. Nope. I bit the bullet and bought a ABS service brake valve. Nope. Hooked my tag along up to the Peterbilt and the tractor functioned correctly. I finally found the problem. It ended up being a brake chamber. I changed it myself. Caged the spring and cut the shaft and put it in. Finally, it worked.
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Took the boards off and had him come back and put 3/4" grouser bars on the ramps he made. Then I drove it to this good ole boy that I found six months ago before even having a trailer. He said him and his Dad have been sandblasting for 20 years and painting dump trucks, log trailers , lowboys and such. He sent me these pictures today and said he is almost done.
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Truck 505

Well-known member
That Witzco is gonna look good when You are done with it.

I have pulled three different Witzco trailers in my day so if You don't mind I would like to give You some tips.

First of all from my experience just because You have those two safety pins in in the bottom of the gooseneck that are supposed to keep the trailer from coming apart while going down the road don't trust them. I have had two of the three come apart on me with the pins in. I was not driving down the road when it happened, but I was making a turn into a driveway that had a hump in it both times and yes they were two different driveways:). While turning the trailer drug over the hump and the front of the trailer raised up and it pulled apart. From my experience as long as you go over a hump straight with these trailers they won't come apart, at least they never did on me. One time I was lucky and caught it as it was coming apart, the other time I didn't. That leads to my second bit of advice. Make sure you either have a new set of air hoses and a spare pigtail with you or all the necessary fittings to splice your air lines back together after you pull them apart and also keep a spare set of plugs for your pigtail and some butt splice connecters with you and all the tools you would need to fix those items. Its not a good thing to be stuck half in the road and half in the driveway waiting on the parts to fix the mishap, and also which is the way it works for me, if I have what I need to fix a screw up with me I usually don't ever need it.

Next on my list is the bolsters. If you plan on setting a machine on them I suggest you reinforce them. They are weak. We use to haul TS 14 scrapers on ours and the back tires sat on the bolsters. You could watch them bend down when the weight of the machine was on them. What we did was cut them off and put an I beam inside them which was welded to the top and the side of the trailer frame and then welded the bolster back to the trailer. Made it much stronger.

The last thing I can think of right now is the plates that you had welded inside the I beams of the trailer. We did the same thing. You have to keep an eye on them. What happens is as the trailer flexes it will break the welds holding the plates in and eventually the plate falls out and bye bye chains and binders. You are better off to lay the plate on the main beam and only weld it on one side that way when the trailer flexes the plate is free to move back and forth. After that get some plastic milk crates and set them on the plate and put your chains in them and also you can hook the hooks of the chains on the side of the crate and you will always know what chain you are grabbing and it makes it a lot easier to keep track of them also. I have the hooks on my chains painted different colors so I know what each one is according to length.

Just thought of something else. For some reason the brake pads love to rust and freeze to the drums on these trailers. I know it happens on other trailers also, but just seems worse on Witzco's for some reason. Make sure when you take off in the morning that the tires are all turning. I always put a rock on top of the tires then pulled up a little then walked back there to see if the rocks were gone or not. If the rock was still there that meant it was time to get the hammer out. Never did this, but I often thought about laying a piece of plywood or something over the wheels to cover the gap between the beam to keep the rain and snow out.

I hope this information is useful to You. It is all based on past experience and headaches.
 

Fastdirt

Well-known member
Ah you just broke my heart with the brake freezing up topic. That has to be what happened to that trailer while it sat for a week. That might have been the problem all along.

I can't thank you enough for the Witzco knowledge. I know it's an entry level trailer but there sure is a lot of them out there and if treated right it will stay straight. The safety pins are an unusual way to accomplish their goal of securing a break away. I can see your point turning over a hump and lifting the front up. That could go bad real quick. I fear high siding big time. I've already seen how much dirt and gravel rests on the I beams after turning through an off road turn with a hump and grading the ground with the I beams. I've been around grading forever and most of the companies I worked for had top of the line lowboy rigs. You can look at them a million times but you don't learn it till you start detaching/unloading in crazy places, making impossible turns, etc. LOL on the hose repairs. I pinched my lines in a col-de-sac once and had to un hook in a bind and go get hose clamps/connectors. I bought some extras for the next time and they just sit there like you said. It's good karma maybe to have spare line repair parts.

I can easily see how those bolsters would bend down. I've been looking at lowboy prospects all year and quickly saw the differences in the steel thickness amongst manufacturers. Luckily I don't use them and even more so the previous owner didn't use them. Thanks for sharing the experience on the storage floors. He set the panel on the I beams so they won't fall through unless they come completely free. Like the milk crate idea. The first day I wasn't happy with how muddy the chains and bucks were. I assume you are talking about the low profile crates like 10"s or less. Good idea. Also like the color coding.

Thanks again for the advice and experience. When I pick the trailer up I have to drag over some RxR tracks getting to the place so I might put the GoPro on the neck to see if it separates. The trailer will be empty. When I dropped it off I pulled over at the small town RxR crossing and thought "NO WAY". I braved it and put it in 4th and just went and it dragged. I had some blocks made that I can adjust the ride height in a bad situation.

The reason I was so curious about your impression on the wheel base differences was because I am seriously considering shorting the frame by 24"s or so. It's a 252" WB right now which is short for the 379 sleeper trucks but still long.
 

Truck 505

Well-known member
Brakes freezing or rusting to the drums is not the end of the world. All you have to do is release the brakes on the trailer and make sure the tractor brakes are set and reach down there and beat the snot out of the shoe. It will pop when it breaks free. To be honest I would rather have the brake shoes rust or freeze to the drum then have all those extra air valves back there like my trailer has that controls the air ride. For example today I went down to my shop to clean all the freaking snow off of it (thanks Gramps) and it would roll but the suspension would not air up. Now it's time to get the torch out and start heating valves until you find the right one and btw they were all buried in the snow (again thanks Gramps). Air ride is nice don't get me wrong but it has its issues as well.

With a trailer that is ground bearing like yours you have to think ahead. What I mean is if you know there are humps or RR tracks to cross on your route you may as well just put your blocks in when you hook up that way you don't have to stop when you get to the obstacle and raise it up.

I see where you said you do a lot of side loading. I am sure you know that is very hard on the side of the trailer. Eventually you will have the top of the outside rail bent down and that makes it hard and sometimes impossible to get the outriggers to turn out plus it doesn't look very good or you could actually bend the trailer. I have done my fair share of side loading as well, just try to be as easy on the trailer as you can and always make sure you set it down on the ground before you do. BTW the trailer I have now has not had a load go over the side yet. I will not allow it on my trailer under any circumstance. Thats what old worn out tires are for. Put them on the road and drive on them. Yeah it may be more work for the customer but it will save my trailer.

You said that a Witzco is an entry level trailer which is kinda true, but if you take care of it which it looks like you take care of your stuff very well it will do the same job as the high dollar trailers. To prove my point. When the bossman started out he bought two of them. He needed a couple lowboy's and as we all know when you start a business funds are usually tight. He still has one of them and this trailer has hauled some big loads. He has had both of my big excavators on it, a PC 400 and a SK400 as whole machines. Did not take the bucket or counterweight off of them. Those machines weigh between 90,000 & 100,000 pounds each when they are fully dressed. The one i use to own was just like yours.

A few pics. First one is of the Etnyre lowboy I pulled before the one I have now that I have raised as high as it will go. The one I have now goes just as high. The last two are of the Witzco that is still in the fleet. It doesn't run everyday anymore even though it could if we needed it to, but is used as a spare or when we need all five lowboys to go make a big move that has a lot of machines and we want to do it in only a couple rounds. BTW I have put many many miles on both of the Bossman's Witzco's before He upgraded me to the Etnyre trailers. The trailer I have now has only been pulled by me and the Bossman. He pulled it home from the factory and its been behind me ever since.
 

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Fastdirt

Well-known member
WoW! is right. That's how you do it.. No fear of what I saw about two weeks ago going to lunch. The driver of this lowboy was looking for a grocery store parking lot to pull into and get lunch. When I saw him he had the 963 sitting over the rear wheels. Good idea I thought but he had it boomed way up to clear the monster ramps. Looked sketchy but he didn't have any other option. They had the service truck chained up to it when I first saw it. I wasn't fast enough to take a picture but they smoked some tires and then unhooked. He then pulled the 963 back to the front of the trailer and still couldn't pull off and then I thought I saw him put a board under the drives because I was grabbing a block and headed their way but he pulled it off. I then talked to them and had a laugh. I really felt the driver's pain though.
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Tiny

Well-known member
Old company that I worked for had two Blackhawk trailers . I can promise you this without any reservations . If you upgrade to a self supporting detach you will never go back to a ground bearing .
 
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