Topic

Thanks for the information on the orbital unit. Although I’m not familiar with what happens within this rather neat & compact cylinder of tricks, your naming of Danfoss as manufacturer kicked memories into action.
Had my thoughts still being bent towards the fitting of a “steering assistant” I would have purchased this item without hesitation.
Had we not been on the cusp of our expensive season I might have bought it & hidden it in the garage to play with at my leisure.
A cylinder cadged from my friend, my hydraulic pump driven from the lathe & some cadged pipe work, would have made for an interesting, if somewhat messy diversion.
And thanks for the Aston pictures, can I now claim to have my pseudonym linked to Aston Martin?
Probably not.
Thank you.
M

I looked a long time ago but have forgotten how they work but it’s a clever piece of kit. Provided you have oil pressure and flow you have finger tip steering. If you no oil flow then it steers manually but boy is it heavy. Until recently I drove a JCB telehandler with a twenty metre boom (66ft) and the steering was so precise that it felt like a go cart.

I have no experience of telehandlers other that an urge to have a go. They will be rear steer & as far as manoeuvring is concerned, sublime.

Actually all modern ones are front wheel steer, four wheel steer or crab steer, all selected by either a rotary switch or a lever operated valve. Although it seems complicated due to there being no mechanical connections between steering wheel and axles it is very simple plumbing. One clever trick is to deliberately get the front and rear axles out of line. It enable you to scrape with an eight foot bucket close to a wall while keeping the tail out of the way. JCB killed that practice on their machines by having them electronically synchronised. When the electronics play up you get oversteer going round bends one way and under steer when going the other way.

All you have done with this post is to make my desired to have a drive in one greater than every.
Will an expired forklift license hoodwink the owner into letting me at one for an hour or several do you think?
M