Been working on the blade hydraulics set up.
The two blade lift cylinders are mounted, supported by a pair of fabricated trunnion bearings at the main frame. These allow the cylinder supports to pivot at the frame while the cylinder collars allow the cylinder to pivot within the support bracket. These two degrees of freedom, along with the fact the cylinder piston rod can rotate within the cylinder gives the necessary 3 axes of rotation.
The rod end brackets at the traction frame rotate on thrust bearings, have pivot pins and, for the third degree of freedom, depend on the piston rod rotation.
The next two pictures show the skew cylinder set in place, not fully installed. The skew cylinder support frame will get welded to the main frame (just clamped here) and the rod end bracket goes through the traction frame near that corner. Again, each attachment point pivots, rotates and relies on the piston rod rotation for the necessary three degrees of freedom.
Since the traction frame is connected at the front through the ball hitch, movement of the blade up/down and left/right results in all the traction frame attachment points moving in arcs. The frame itself moves, relative to the ball hitch, in roll, pitch and yaw. So each attachment point has to move in all three axes to avoid binding.
The skew cylinder end point brackets will take shear loads but only have thrust bearings. The thrust bearings do take some of the shear loads as there is a small moment arm through the attachment point, transferring some of the shear load to the thrust bearings. The shear loads will primarily be taken up by the 3/4 inch threaded shafts. I'm not totally happy with this set up so I need to revisit this, with more robust ball bearings, or, perhaps, bushings welded to or within the traction frame member. Not sure how long they will last the way they are right now.
Next task is to start measuring for the hydraulic lines and getting them made up. I'll post pictures of the valves once I've started to run the hydraulic lines and am happy with the set up.
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