Brothers building diesel beast
Pictou County giant machine will haul home mechanical conundrums
It means staying home.
And for Eliza, who’ll be two in June, and her two older siblings, not having their father head back to the camp job in Nunavut is a big deal.
“It” is a giant machine her 29-year-old father is building from three other giant machines, two of which are older than he is, with his brother Colin in their Loch Broom, Pictou County, back yard.
“It should be able to drive in and out of the shop in another week or two,” said Chris Fraser.
“It” is a tandem flat deck tow-truck with a 40,000-lb. deck and 20,000-lb. wheel lift.
It’s “front half” came from a 1988 International Eagle and boasts a 400-horsepower Cummins diesel.
It’s “back half” is a 2006 Freightliner with four-way locking differentials.
The cab is off a 1980 Kenworth W900.
When the Fraser brothers breath life into this Mary Shellyian Beast, it’ll take to the road to haul home the biggest, heaviest steel conundrums.
That’s what they’re after. “Dad was a cook actually,” said Chris when asked if they’d grown up in a garage.
MYSTERIES OF MACHINES
In the world of heavy-duty mechanics, it is special breed who venture beyond diagnosing machine illness and part replacement.
There are a few, like the Fraser brothers, who will tear down engines and transmissions and differentials to find the mystery in their secretive moving parts.
Who’ll take torches to old steel and rearrange frames.
Who’ll extend drive trains through a language of motion whose punctuation is built of
ruxels, torque converters and hubs.
The type of stuff that would take teams of engineers.
Or a man laying in the dark working it out at 2 a.m. after Eliza has finally gone back to sleep.
CHJ Mechanicals yard is already akin to the Joggins Fossil Cliffs, filled as it is with the
bones of the last half century of heavy equipment.
Where some would see rusty metal, those who have learned how to look see opportunity to repair, rearrange and create.
“We take the jobs normal garages wouldn’t,” said Fraser.
“The oddball stuff. Instead of replacing a part, if we can
fix it or fabricate something. Or if someone wants something built, we’ll try and do it.”
CHILDHOOD PASSION
They started early.
“Just with toys as kids you know, tearing them apart, adding lights, trying to make them move by themselves,” said Fraser.
Then it was suping up bicycles they got as grading presents.
Then came the 1980s-era worn out Gilsen lawn tractor with an 11-horsepower Briggs and Straten engine their dad donated to their fledgling machinal interests.
They swapped pulleys, tinkering with gear ratios and made it fly around the yard.
On a subsequent former lawnmower belching black smoke as it carried him at speeds humans are not meant to move around backyards, Chris noticed its’ steering mechanism drop before it rolled and sent him flying into a ditch.
“Yeah, dad didn’t like that one too much,” he remembered on Sunday.
FAMILY TO SUPPORT
It’s not easy to stay home.
It’s harder yet when you’ve got a family to support and are compelled to work for yourself.
But the Fraser brothers are making it happen at CHJ Mechanicals.
“Through thick and thin,” said Chris.
Odds are, you’ll hear that 400-horsepower Cummins coming around the bend before you see it.