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Posted by Keith in Washington on Wednesday, November 19, 2008 at 15:39:25 :
In Reply to: Angles of Approach and Departure posted by Dave Horvath on Wednesday, November 19, 2008 at 12:53:14 :
Angle of approach and departure are not really worth much. They are measured on flat ground and assume the truck is level and that the slope is a perfectly flat ramp and that the truck is approaching the ramp straight on. Not true in the real world. No surface is flat there are such things as ruts, rocks, humps and etc. out there. The load in the truck and attachments will have a significant impact on these angles. If you approach the hill at 10, 20 or 30 degrees from straight on you can effectively increase these angles.
These angles are used by the manufacture to give you a general idea of front and rear clearance are when approaching or leaving a hill. They are good for relative comparison between vehicles and determining if the vehicle is generally suitable for the driving planned.
This is a good example of where book "knowledge" and the real world differ. Yea, the book says the max hill I can approach is 30 degrees. But in the real world the terrain, load and driver can significantly alter the approach or departure angle.
I said it before "book knowledge" and a college degree do not make you smart or intellignet. It is the application of the basic principles that those books contain that makes a person smart or dumb. How many of us have cursed the engineer that designed something that we are working on. Remember that that guy has a degree and is paid to design things. It is quite clear that the engineer often did not intelligently design what we are working on. Often this is because the engineer has never had any practical experience. Let's talk about that engineer at GM who put a V8 in the Monza. You had to pull the engine to replace the rear spark plugs. Bad design evne worse they let him get away with it and put the car into production.
My son started work at Genie industries (the lift people) as an engineer. The first month or so they put new hire engineers on the production floor to give them some insight. They were really surprised when my son could use impact wrenches, grinders, welders and many other tools. They commented that most of the engineers coming out of college have no tool knowledge or experience. Which is a really sad.
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