So yesterday morning I met D&L to unload a pallet of alfalfa pellets for their horses. We have this down to a science by now; D and I do the hauling while L pulls the sacks off the pallet and brings them to the edge of the flatbed. But when I got there L said she had pulled something very painful in one of her legs and wouldn’t be participating in the festivities. So the two gimpy old men took turns up on the trailer and hauling sacks to the hayroom, and we both decided that the sacks seemed noticeably heavier this time than last.
Stopping for a breather, L told me about a joke birthday card he’d seen at the feed store: “There was this cartoon old man dressed like a cowboy, right? And a saddle was on the ground beside him. And the caption said, “I can’t remember if I lost a horse or found a saddle.” And I said, “I guess you’re not completely gone if you remember what that big leather thing is.”
The adventure scored me probably the last pallet of the season…
…which I brought to the Lair because I’d already brought my tools home.
I cut it up this morning, just before mothballing the generator – hopefully for the whole winter this time.
And it didn’t make much of an addition to the woodshed. Takes a lot of pallets to make a tier.
They make tools offloading pallets from trucks. They’re not cheap, but cheaper than a bad back. https://www.toolots.com/manual-pallet-stacker-2200lbs-capacity-63-lift-height-8-8-28-7-w-fork.html?cid=9952931480&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI4Yy9gNrJ7AIVGWyGCh1DsAKlEAQYAyABEgKu5PD_BwE
Oh ho that thing would sink to its frame in the sand *immediately.*
Doesn’t work all that well on hard-packed gravel either, if memory serves me, definitely a hard surface, gizmo.
Do D&L have a tractor? If it has a front bucket, there are pallet fork attachments available.
RE: “sinking into the sand,” many years ago we Redneck Engineered a “sort of” solution: A pair of 8X8 posts were set 24″ apart and about 42″ in, an earth anchor screwed in a few feet behind them, a pair of well used forklift forks were mated to some steel with the welder, and some scavenged roller bearings were used to position the fork “assembly” and allow it to roll up and down the 8X8 posts and a very stout pulley added to the crossbeam atop the posts (a winch snatch block works well).
Back the truck up near the posts, attach a comealong to the earth anchor and the fork “assembly” to raise it, back up some more to get the forks under the pallet, raise it a few inches with the comealong and drive out from under the pallet.
Moving the pallet from there becomes the New Challenge, but it gets it off the truck, which is especially useful when stuff gets delivered via truck freight and you have no other means to get it off the truck.
With good implications for both your fuel supply and your back, a warm “La Nina” winter is predicted this year. You might have some extra time to collect a new supply of pallets.
https://www.noaa.gov/media-release/us-winter-outlook-cooler-north-warmer-south-with-ongoing-la-nina
That would be okay with me, Ben, as long as it brings some rain. It has rained exactly once here since winter, discounting some sprinkles barely enough to settle the dust. I see from the article, that they’re predicting more of the same.