REFLECTOR: 6.3 G's on my Engine mount

[Scott Derrick]

Finally had a some good weather on my weekend and I was ready to load up 
the engine mount.

I finally decided on mounting it upside down and using a lever to put 
the 3000+ lbs where I wanted it. I bolted the mount to a wooden frame 
and chained/strapped the  frame to the front bucket of my backhoe.  I 
built a wooden cradle that bolts up to where the engine rubber mounts 
attach and the lever pushes on the cradle. The lever is 2x2 inch 1/4 
inch wall steel tubing, its 7'4"" long with a ration of 6 to 1 for 
weight.  Its hefty! With the lever empty and setting in place it was 
pressing 130 lbs up on the mount.

I used various weighed bags of sand to verify the 6 to 1 ratio, you can 
see a bag labeled 23 lbs on the far right of the wide view picture.  It 
seemed to be within 3 to 4% using a  new digital scale. I was just 
weighed for a CDL license and the scale got my weight right on.

Here's a picture with one 115 lb battery on the long end of the lever,  
which comes out to 130 + 690 == 820 lbs

http://tnstaafl.net/canards/wide.JPG

Here's a close up

http://tnstaafl.net/canards/close.JPG

I would add a battery, measure the stretch of the mount, remove the 
battery(s) and measure the mount to verify it was returning to its 
original shape.

I got up to 4 batteries on the lever for a total of 2890 lbs pushing on 
the mount.  I was crawling around measuring the mount when I heard a 
screeeechhhhhh!!!  Oh shit, I thought some piece on the mount had let 
go, it was definitely stretching but it had always returned to its 
normal(unloaded) shape.  I could see that the end of the lever that the 
batteries were on was sitting on the ground.  The mount looked ok. I 
stepped back and realized the lever had bent at the pivot point!

Oh well.  I was very close to 6.6 G's, I think I'll call it good to go.

Scott