Where else but the internet would you find the Mover's Mag and news on the Forearm Forklift?

I stumbled across it while googling for tips and techniques on using leverage to lift and move things. I've had Sciatica for the past four months (it sucks!) and haven't been able to do much around the yard and house.

Today I wanted to remove the big fiberglass bed cap on our truck. I didn't have sufficient pulleys or strength to lift it by myself. While I was casting about for ideas I remembered a trick from over five years ago that some guy used on a woodstove he bought from us. He showed up with a big 1/2 ton truck with a flatbed at least three foot off the ground. No way was I going to help lift a woodstove into that! He had us help to slide the stove next to the truck and then he did this little bit of magic. First he'd lift one side of the stove and place a board underneath, then the other side, and back and forth like that until the middle of the stove was even with the truck bed. At that point we could just give a might heave and tip the stove right into the truck.

So today I pried up each corner of the truck cap, put something underneath and repeated until I had the whole thing about half a foot high. Then I looped the rope, with one end tied to the top of the cap, a couple times around an overhead tree branch and tied it off. Drive the truck away, then slowly ease out the rope to lower the cap.

Now if I can just figure out a way to move these boulders in the front yard...perhaps I can turn to Taku Skan Skan, the moving god.

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