What's the heaviest thing you've loaded by hand?

I'm the only one of my friends that can carry a keg, so I've hauled them up lots of stairs in the last 5 or 6 years. The heaviest car part I was ever stupid enough to lug was whatever crappy engine came stock in my college roommate's Ford Festiva. That car fell all to shit, and because he was an idiot he wanted to make some kind of machine using the engine. That never happened. He and two of my other idiot roommates managed to get the engine out of the car and into the street, but beyond that they were just kind of staring at it. So I picked it up moved it into the backyard, where it's probably still sitting. My back hurt after that, a lot more than after carrrying a keg up two flights of steps...plus, enough time at the keg and your back feels better.

 

A torn to shit NASCAR Craftsman truck after a bout with the wall and several other trucks at South Boston (Va.) Speedway, oh yeah and it was hot as a sonofabitch that day too!

 

Seen my dad drop a VW engine in a dune buggy by hand, by himself when I was a weeee tiny lad....hence the reason his back is FUCT.

 

One time I had to unload a cast iron transfer case from a early 70's chevy off the transmission jack at work. It was one of those gear drive types not chain drive types. Heaviest son of a bitch I ever lifted.

 

when i was 60, i found a granada with a disc brake r/e, only problem it was 150 ft, from my van. i had to crawl under the car to get one side of the brakes over the leaf spring. then i drug, carried it ,when i got to the van i was beat had to wait 15 min, before i could finish. I got a double hernia,lifting a 40 hp merc in 19 60 from one boat to another, weighed 115 lbs then. I guess stupid things like this is why I have 2 bad vertbra, and 2 bad disc.

 

I saw my brother with his retard strength lift and entire flathead excluding heads and intake, but still containg pistons and all into the back of his suv.

 

My brother bought a 55 Olds with a Rocket motor and Hydro in it. It also had another Rocket motor and Hydro in the passenger compartment. He grabbed the block by the exhaust ports and I leaned in the rear window and grabbed the Hydro by the ass end and we lifted it out of the passenger compartment. Darn near gave myself a hernia. That is a heavy combo. The motor and trans we took out we gave to a good buddy of ours that has always helped us with our cars and he has put it in a 36 Packard three window coupe!

 

I did a DANA 60 myself 25 years ago, also NEVER again......

 

Unloaded my 401 out of my ute on my own. All I had was some rope. Worked OK. No injuries

Pete

 

The heaviest thing I ever lifted in my life was a little gold band, after 29 years of bachelorhood. It was also the best thing I ever lifted!


Ohhh, you mean iron and stuff like that! I used to deal a bit in machine tools for the home shop. I lifted a lot of fully equipped 7 to 9 inch lathes with 36 -48 inch beds. I'd carry 'em out of where I bought them to my truck. Once was up some stairs out of a basement. That was hard! I can load anything into the back of my pickup if I can lift it a foot or so. I never lift the whole thing on super heavy stuff, I let leverage do it now. Being 58, I am more careful than I used to be. Visible gas pumps with all the guts are a bear, too. I did that once. Never again. It amazes folks how much can be lifted by hand if you do it right.l

Joke: My doctor told me I had to sit down to take a leak from now on. He doesn't want me lifting heavy weights.

 

Me and another guy pulled a Plymouth 260 shortblock out of the back of a Suburban and it was on a pallet. Luckily we didn't have thar far to go with it.

 

Does taking flathead blocks on and off the engine by myself without the hoist count? Sometimes in and out of the truck to. The pickers on the side of the house and im to lazy to move the trash cans to get at it.
Oh ya, got real stupid not long ago at a swap meet. Carried a complete 39 box with steel bell attached, over three blocks on my shoulder.

 

Hehe - some funny stuff here! - Mine doesn't sound so tough...But...

about two days after a vasectomy I bought a 49 merc 3 speed...went to pick it up and realized i had to "really" pick it up....dead lifted it into my pickup.... lets just say it set me back a bit.

About two years ago I got a big ol' 600 pound compressor delivered. I paid extra for them to take it off of the semi-trailer because they were delivering to a residence. The boneheads showed up on a regular semi without a lift gate. They said they could come back in 3 weeks or i could get it off the trailer myself. I backed my nissan truck up to the back of the semi. Put two aluminum rails that i use to load up the lawn mower up to the semi. slid the pallet with the compressor off into my truckbed...it was a miracle the compressor didn't go through my roof. I pulled the nissan forward and the pallet slammed down right into my bed. drove to my shop...backed up...pulled out the rails and slid the pallet down onto a furniture dolly. I was so proud of myself and feeling bullet proof.....so i unbolted the compressor from the pallet and thought i could just rotate it off the pallet onto the floor. well i learned that 600 pounds goes where it wants to go. it took my cherry picker and two other guys to get it back upright. fortunately i only broke the pressure guage. replaced it in about a week. it was stupid...stupid..stupid!

 

Damn, you beat me to it, except I loaded mine into the back of a '68 Chevy van. I'd like to know how much one of them mofos weighs - would be nice to throw that figure around when telling the "glory days" story. LOL I was about 135 lbs, soaking wet at the time. Not sure if I'd rather be young and invincible again, or just older and able to stand up straight?

-murph

 

Me and one other helper did an Auburn V12 bare block once. We only lifted it onto a cart for easy shop mobility. Holy shit was that heavy. Turns out they weigh in like a complete V-6! Boy was that stupid. But we got it. FWIW it was a replacement for the 500CID LaFrance that was in the car. The most I ever did was when I was coring BBCs. I'd buy em for like $50 as is and raid the best and sell off and scrap the remains. My "helper" that day musta been Forrest Gump. He couldn't grasp what I wanted to do to flip it up to hook the cherry picker on (it was upside down at the time). After a shit load of "...no grab it here...lift there...WTF are you doin!" I got severely pissed and threw him off the truck. I grabbed the water pump and stood the bitch on the flywheel, then spun it around and let it down easy so's not to fuck up my wood bed (77 F100 stepside). "There! How fuckin hard was that!" It's amazing what youth and anger makes the body capable of. 15yrs later I had the S1 L5 disc in my back repaired. 12yrs of just aches and pains from workin, 3yrs of limping like father time at the end of the day, and one day not able to walk, stand, sit up straight, or lay flat.

I guess we sometimes are stronger than our bones allow for. Now I don't lift over 100lbs without help. I'm having too much fun to end up disabled.

 

I deliver gun safes as a part time gig. Two guys for up to 1000 pounds, 3 guys to about 1500, any bigger and they have to do it themselves. Sometimes they go upstairs, try moving a 1000 pound 6'x3'x2' shiny metal box with no handles that cost $3000. The customers are breathing down your neck.
I bought a 350 longblock at a garage sale, my brother and I lifted it in and out of my truck.
I've bought 3 8-inch rearends at pick-n-pull the last few months, had to lift them in the trunk of my 64 Galaxie.
Me and 2 buddys swapped the body onto another chassis on my sisters 57 chevy panel truck, complete with doors and all. Lifted it a little, propped it up. Had the body sitting across 4x4 posts on top of a stack of tires on each side. That took all day.
I'd like to say I'm smarter now, but I doubt it...

 

when i was in college i happened upon a fire hydrant on the side of the road. i lifted it into the passenger seat of my bronco, then i carried it about 400 feet into my dorm. i'm not sure how heavy those things actually are, but it was the dumbest and hardest thing i think i ever did. it was so heavy that when the campus police found it and tried to remove it from the dorm, they gave up without moving it about 3 feet. it stayed there for a whole year and then it made it about 10 more feet into the woods behind the building. it's probably still there, that bitch had some weight to it.

one other time i pushed my 33? ford one ton dumptruck into my girlfriend's mother's garage on 6 flat tires. the towtruck gave up and left it in the driveway. it was too much for me, so i had to make my girlfriend help, guess i ought to marry a girl like that.

 

You're right! I'd forgotten about the Fire Hydrant I found on the side of the road! Dropped it of at the sandblasters and a friends father brought it home along with some parts he had done. Getting it out of his car trunk was harder than the original pickup. Looks great in gloss black & yellow.

 

I put my 354 Hemi short block and a set of Hemi heads in the back of my wife's Subaru Outback.

 

Once I loaded a Sportster into the back of a '77 Honda Civic by myself.I just sorta leaned it over onto my legs, moved sideways, tilted it up, and pushed it in. I put cardboard on the floor so it would slide. I could not quite close the hatch, the front wheel was hanging out. I loaded a Yamaha TZ250 factory racer that way, too, and it was much easier. I did take the fairing off of it first.

I hauled a big! forge home with that same car, it was about 4' x 4', loaded with firebrick, and a very heavy stand. I tilted it over, and let it lay down on the trailer upside down. It was so heavy it bent the trailer. Since it was on the back end of the trailer, the weight lifted the back of the Honda into the air. Being front wheel drive, it was no problem, the weight in the back was a load that kept it going straight when I hauled it home. I didn't exceed more than about 25 mph that way, though! I did get a few funny looks for some reason.

 

Straight 6 out of a 47 Plymouth Convertible into a Ford F150 4WD...me and the 2 guys that came after it....just happy that truck didn't have a lift kit!

48 Poncho

 

ive moved some fat chicks does that count ?

 

I gotta chime in..... My wife is a 5'2" ball of fire! When we moved from our last house last year, she wanted to take our koi pond with us. Mind you, the pond was 16 tons of river rock weighing in at 50 to 150 lbs each with some even larger. I was working long hours (not entirely on purpose ). She moved all but three of those rocks 100 ft to a trailer, then unloaded them in 3 days. I still don't know how she did it. Now, before you say she had people over helping while I was at work....I worked from home at the time and watched most of it from my office window.

Although I did tell her to wait till the weekend. She kindly said, "you weren't the only one in the Army, Jackass!"

Moral? Get a great wife if you are a lazy husband.

 

A truck? You picked up a fucking truck, AND SEVERAL OTHERS? Are you Mongo? How does a guy end up on a circle track picking up trucks with his bare hands in the middle of a race?

 

Me and three of my guys unloaded 39,000lbs. of household goods yesterday and delivered everything into our customers new home. Started at 8:30, and the 53 foot trailer and 24 foot straight truck were unloaded by 6:30 that night. Ain't nothing but a chicken wang thang for us. We do it every day.

 

My ex girlfriend and her crate of twinkies

 

My uncle's in the moving business. He handled my move last week. 62 years old, 150 lbs., and he could kick my 240 lb. ass any day of the week. I couldn't keep up with him. People are sometimes impressed with the things I pick up, but this fucker will throw a couchbed on his back and jog up the stairs without breaking a sweat.

I've learned that there are two professionals you never fuck with -moving men, and garbage men.

Moving men are just bad dudes with superhuman strength, and smarts about leverage and such.

Garbage men are just scary. Once I saw a neighbor pick a fight with the garbage men about some bullshit. As it happened I thought to myself "Why would anyone start shit with those guys?" Sure enough, one of them fought back by smacking the guy in the mouth. Blood and teeth everywhere. -From a bitch-slap!

I've started, and finished, shit with some scary people. I like to say I ain't scared of anyone, except moving men, and garbage men. Don't fuck with 'em.

Noteworthy people missing from my list: Karate instructors, Cops, Firemen, Jean-Claude van Damne. All not worthy of being afraid of.

 

you forgot about Stallone and Chuck Norris. LOL

 

Late one fall I followed a lead on a minty 235 out of a 56 chevy. The car was minty and the owner was making it into a street rod. Was a shame, but for 100 bucks I got the complete set up right down to the pressure plate. The motor was really clean and had 40,000 miles on it. I bought it on the spot and he loaded it on to my feeble s-10 pickup. The motor still had all the jucies in it too.. I thought my poor truck was going to split in half. As I pulled out onto the highway to start the 100+ mile treck home.. the excitement of a great deal wore off and I started to worry. As each car passed me .. I could see the look of suprise in the drivers eyes. My truck was dragging serious ass. By some miracle .. I made it home. My friend with the cherry picker was supposed to meet me the next day to take it off. I called in sick and waited.. no cherry picker. The next day I had to go to work.. the S-10 is my daily ride.. 25 miles round trip .. she was still holding .. but I feared something was going to break. I repeated the cycle a couple more times.. and then I gave up on the cherry picker. Here is the relevant part of the story... I devised a plan. I would slide the engine off the back of the truck using a couple of ramps I had.. Heavy wooden ramps. Looking back .. a very stupid plan..but I was desparate. My neighibor.. who lacks as much sense as I ..was recruited. Ramps in place .. turned the engine sideways ... and down the ramp onto a tire.. I didn't remove the tailgate and she folded like the RedSox in October.. The engine landed perfectly in the tire and we both walked away unscathed. I bought a cherry picker later that year and have helped many cherry pickerless friends in their times of need.. kind of payback for having such great luck. 235 inliners are heavy!

 

Late one fall I followed a lead on a minty 235 out of a 56 chevy. The car was minty and the owner was making it into a street rod. Was a shame, but for 100 bucks I got the complete set up right down to the pressure plate. The motor was really clean and had 40,000 miles on it. I bought it on the spot and he loaded it on to my feeble s-10 pickup. The motor still had all the jucies in it too.. I thought my poor truck was going to split in half. As I pulled out onto the highway to start the 100+ mile treck home.. the excitement of a great deal wore off and I started to worry. As each car passed me .. I could see the look of suprise in the drivers eyes. My truck was dragging serious ass. By some miracle .. I made it home. My friend with the cherry picker was supposed to meet me the next day to take it off. I called in sick and waited.. no cherry picker. The next day I had to go to work.. the S-10 is my daily ride.. 25 miles round trip .. she was still holding .. but I feared something was going to break. I repeated the cycle a couple more times.. and then I gave up on the cherry picker. Here is the relevant part of the story... I devised a plan. I would slide the engine off the back of the truck using a couple of ramps I had.. Heavy wooden ramps. Looking back .. a very stupid plan..but I was desparate. My neighibor.. who lacks as much sense as I ..was recruited. Ramps in place .. turned the engine sideways ... and down the ramp onto a tire.. I didn't remove the tailgate and she folded like the RedSox in October.. The engine landed perfectly in the tire and we both walked away unscathed. I bought a cherry picker later that year and have helped many cherry pickerless friends in their times of need.. kind of payback for having such great luck. 235 inliners are heavy!