Greetings everyone. Glad to be a member of this great community.

My name is Jason Deckard from Ellettsville, Indiana.

I've recently acquired a 1955 Bucyrus Erie 15B crawler crane. Transported it 650 miles from Reading Pennsylvania to here in Ellettsville Indiana
I grew up in a junkyard that was ran by my grandfather, and we had a crane similar to this 1955 only it was gas powered. I wanted to get back into my child hood so I bought this one. I am a union electrician but worked on things my whole life.
It is powered by a Cat D315 (Serial number 9S10902) with a pony but has the place for an electric starter also. I need a lot of help with this. The pony is in need of a total rebuild. The exhaust pipe broke off years ago and the rain got into it. It does turn over and feels like its building compression. The magneto (Bosch) looks ok other than the cap having a snapped off electrode.
The diesel engine I think is locked up. I would think I would be able to turn the engine over with a bar on the flywheel through the hole in the bell housing. I believe I had the compression release on but not sure. Going to need some guidance for parts and procedures. I posted some pictures for your viewing pleasure. That's me in green safety shirt checking height after I winched the little dude up on the trailer. Will be waiting for the questions to start rolling in. Thanks again everyone!

Welcome Jason . That looks like a fun machine to play with, and hopefully a whole lot of good memoirs.

A paid membership gets you into the library, with the serviceman's books as well as parts and operator's books. Cat still has a lot of the parts you would need, just some modern parts persons don't want to do the digging. So having a part number transferred into the modern system with enough zeros added helps. But excuse me for not remembering the whole process.

Jason - Congrats on the 15-B purchase. That is a very nice straight machine! I purchased one last fall and mine has the Caterpillar engine too.

Regarding the potential stuck diesel. You will want to put the decompression lever in the "Start" position as that will be true decompression. Another option for attempting to turn the diesel over would be to engage the pony motor pinion and put a large socket on the pony flywheel nut and see if you can rotate the diesel.

Jeremy

Thanks for the reply. Would like to see some pictures of your machine also.

On the decompression lever, is pulling it away from the engine put it in decompression mode or pushing it in towards the engine? Also, need some direction on the start handle too

Here is mine:
 

Here is a good video explaining the starting sequence. This is a D2 shown but the procedure will be the same for your D315.

Great video, thank you. Where would be a source for pony motor parts? I need a magneto cap for the Bosch Magneto

I have not had to purchase a cap yet so don't know the best place but here is what I found with a quick search. I know Brillman is known as a good vintage wire source and looks like they carry caps too:

brillman.com/product/american-bosch-mjk-...rpillar-pony-motors/

OK...update. I was hoping that the main crane clutch was engaged, keeping the diesel from turning over but no such luck. I believe the pinion is already engaged (red circle). If I Push the bigger handle towards the radiator while turning the pony over, it severely drags the pony down but the diesel still doesn't move. I also have the decompression release pulled away from the motor. Am i doing this right?

Yes it appears you are doing things correctly. Good call on verifying the main clutch is disengaged too. These cranes are a little more difficult as you cant just pull it like you could do with a crawler to confirm the engine rotates.

What does the diesel exhaust pipe look like on the roof, Does it have a good flap on it? Might help to determine if water possibly made its way into the engine. Any history from the previous owner on how long it was sitting or condition when last ran?