Used Unified Jacking Machine For Sale

Buckingham Structural Moving Equipment, LLC has a Used Unified Jacking Machine for sale. This nine hole Modern Hydraulics Unified Jacking Machine was manufactured in the late 1950s or the early 1960s. This is a single acting unified jacking machine with needle valves and the smaller gauges. The panel is not set up with a free return to tank. This unit is not necessarily the most up-to-date, but is a very good system for someone looking for an economical option for their first jack machine, or just a second unified to have on hand. 

SmartSteer Automated Dolly Steering System

Buckingham Structural Moving Equipment, LLC has just released SmartSteer, a fully automated dolly steering system for rigging companies and house moving companies.  If you've ever moved something on hydraulic dollies, you can appreciate the advantages of a system that allows all steering functions to be controlled from a touchscreen controller and a wireless radio remote.  The SmartSteer system has multiple steering modes, including front end steer, rear end steer, crab steer, and rotation modes. SmartSteer offers the unprecedented ability to drive a dolly transporter around a corner in reverse, eliminating the need to rotate the transport dollies when changing direction. This video demonstrates some of the SmartSteer System capabilities in action. SmartSteer is certainly a revolutionary concept.  Call or email Buckingham Structural Moving Equipment today for a demonstration.

Used House Moving Dollies For Sale

Used House Moving Dollies can be a very worthwhile investment for an individual just getting started in the house moving business.  A new house moving coaster dolly is quite likely to be priced in the low twenty thousand dollar range, while used dollies can often be purchased for significantly less.  Used House Moving Dollies can often be purchased from companies that manufacture new dollies.  Companies upgrading to new dollies will often trade in their used dollies, and companies like Buckingham Structural Moving Equipment are glad to oblige. You don't typically find dealers that only specialize in used equipment.  Most times, used crib jacks, used unified jacking systems, or used power packs are available only at going-out-of-business sales or from house moving equipment companies like Buckingham.
Right now, for example, Buckingham Structural Moving Equipment is offering a pair of used Vogel Coaster Dollies for sale.  The dollies appear to be in excellent condition, and they're priced at Eleven Thousand Five Hundred per each, which is only slightly more than half of what new dollies would cost.

Using Heavy Duty Ground Protection Mats In House Moving

AlturnaMATS® Ground Cover Mats can be a very worthwhile investment for a serious house mover.  Ground Cover Mats have many uses, from creating a temporary roadway over delicate turf, to creating a stable working area over seemingly bottomless mud. Ground Cover Mats can also be used to firm up loose stone fill, to prevent house moving dollies from sinking into the stone and allow easier maneuvering. AlturnaMATS are tough enough to support 60 tons, yet light enough to be easily handled by hand.  No skidloader or forklift needed.

This video demonstrates the toughness and durability of AlturnaMATS, showing a mat being folded in half by a forklift, but it springs right back into shape!

Moving Tugboats and Barges with Power Dollies

Buckingham Power Dollies are an excellent option for moving tugboats, barges, yachts, and almost any other type of vessel.  They can be used to move a newly built vessel into a dry dock for the initial launch, or to move a barge or tug out of a dry dock into a shop for repair.  Using dollies to move a vessel out of the dry dock for repair not only allows the repair work to take place under roof, but it also frees the dry dock for other repair jobs that might come up, particularly emergency jobs.  The additional income from having the dry dock available for use can easily pay for the cost of the dollies.

This video shows Wolfe House Movers moving a barge out of a dry dock in Kingston, NY using Power Dollies and a Buckingham BU173 Remote Controlled Power Unit.

Use & Operation of Common Pressure Power Pack

A common low cost method of house elevation in New York is using what is known as a "Power Pack".  A power pack is simply a compact, lightweight, common pressure hydraulic pump that is used to operate crib jacks to lift a structure.  The use of a power pack to lift structures requires a bit more skill compared to using a unified hydraulic jacking system.  With a unified system, all the jacks extend at the same rate and extend the same distance.  However, with a common pressure system, a jack which is lifting more weight would tend to extend more slowly than a jack lifting less weight.  More judgement is necessary in the placement of the crib jacks under the building, and a slightly different lifting procedure is used.
The theory behind building lifting with a power pack is somewhat the same as is behind the use of hydraulic transport dollies.  If four crib jacks are used, they are tied together into three zones.  In our example of a house elevation using a power pack, we will number the jacks 1, 2, 3, and 4.  First, each of the jacks is extended slightly so that the entire weight of the house is resting on the jacks.  We then take the pressure readings off of the jacks and find them as follows:

• Jack 1 - 3,500 psi
• Jack 2 - 3,800 psi
• Jack 3 - 3,645 psi
• Jack 4 - 3,655 psi

Now, because Jack 3 and Jack 4 are the closest in pressure, we will zone them together so they have common pressure.  Therefore, we will have three zones; Jack 1 = Zone 1, Jack 2 = Zone 2, Jacks 3&4 = Zone 3.
We will begin our lift by opening the zone valve that controls Zone 3 and moving the power pack control toward raise.  Jacks 3 & 4 will begin to extend.  Once they have extended approximately 8" (halfway extended), we will close the zone valve for zone 3, but leave the individual jack valves open so that fluid can flow between the two jacks. We then open the zone valve for Zone 1.  Jack 1 will begin to extend, rocking that corner of the house upward.  Jacks 3 & 4 will compensate for this rocking motion so that the house does not rack.  At the same time, we can also open the zone valve for Zone 2, adjusting the valves for Zone 1 and Zone 2 so that the two jacks travel at approximately the same speed.  Because jacks 3 & 4 are common pressure on the same zone, they will compensate for any difference in the speed at which jacks 1 & 2 extend.  After jacks 1 & 2 are fully extended, they can be blocked off with cribbing and jacks 3 & 4 extended the rest of the way.
Buckingham Structural Moving Equipment offers a customized Enerpac Power Pack with a zone package standard, as well as various used power packs.  Buckingham's used house moving equipment page currently shows a Modern Hydraulics jack pump for sale.

Hydraulic Transport Dollies

Hydraulic Transport Dollies are used extensively in house moving, barge moving, over-the-road heavy haul applications, and in many other applications.  House movers use hydraulic dollies extensively because of their ability to carry tremendous amounts of weight and still compensate for the unevenness of the terrain over which they are being driven.  The need for hydraulic house moving dollies varies somewhat with the size and weight of the house being moved.  If a house is small, perhaps weighing under 100 tons, and is being moved over fairly level ground, hydraulic dollies may be unnecessary.  However, if a house is quite large, heavy, or is being moved over uneven terrain, hydraulic dollies can make the move quite a bit easier.

Hydraulic dollies can have their hydraulics tied together to produce what is know as the "tripod effect."  A three-legged stool is always stable, because three points define a plane. If one leg is lower than the other two, the tips of the legs still define a single plane, and therefore the tripod is stable.  Hydraulic dollies being used under a house have a similar effect.

Let's take a situation where four hydraulic dollies are being used to move a building.  Each dolly has a hydraulic cylinder in the center which carries the load.  When placing the dollies under the house, care is taken to ensure that each dolly carries an approximately equal amount of weight (this procedure would be a whole other topic). The cylinders on the two dollies at the front of the building (dollies 1 & 2) would be plumbed together to create a common pressure situation. The cylinders on the two dollies at the rear of the building (dollies 3 & 4) would be isolated from each other and the front dollies.  Now picture what happens when dolly number 1 drives over a curb.  As the dolly begins to drive over the curb, it begins to rise.  As it begins to rise, it starts to try to take more of the weight of the house; but, because the cylinder is common pressure with dolly number two, instead of the corner of the building lifting, instead hydraulic fluid flows from the cylinder in dolly one into the cylinder in dolly two.  The entire front of the building rises evenly a distance equal to half the height of the curb that dolly number one is driving over.  The building is not racked, just rocked back slightly toward the rear. If one of the rear dollies were to drive over a bump, the building being moved would rock away from that corner, and the front dollies would again compensate.