Altec Industries, Inc.
Roanoke Division
Daleville, VA

PUN2018C

Product Update Notice
Date: August 15, 2018
Units Affected: AC18, AC23, AC26, AC28, AC30, AC35, AC38, AC40, AC45

Boom Disasssemly Service Interval
Altec is committed to providing our customers with safe and reliable products from initial
delivery throughout the useful life of the machine.
The Preventive Maintenance and Inspection Checklist in the maintenance manual for the
affected units currently requires the boom to be disassembled every five years. The disassembly allows for the inspection of the boom internal components. These components include
extend and retract cables, sheaves, pins, slide pads, extension cylinder, hydraulic hoses and
fittings, and the structural boom components.
Altec has determined the five year disassembly interval can be extended to ten years. As a
result, the maintenance manuals for the affected units have been updated to require the boom
disassembly every ten years.
The boom disassembly interval change is the result of inspecting the internal components after
the five year period. The inspections led to the following conclusions after five years:
• Slide pads did not show enough wear to require replacement
• The sheaves, pins, and bearings did not show signs of damage or wear to
require replacement
• Extend cables did not show signs of stretching or wire damage
• Severe corrosion of the boom cables did not appear, if properly lubricated
The combination of the boom disassembly inspections and internal testing resulted in Altec
changing the boom disassembly interval from five to ten years. Boom disassembly is required
every ten years, regardless of PTO hours, because a unit can still suffer from corrosion while
not in use.
Cable Inspection Expansion
Altec is also adding three items to the inspection of boom cables in the maintenance manual
to better inspect the wire rope for failure.
• Kinking, bird caging, crushing, twisting, or other damage that results in permanent
distortion of the rope structure

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PUN2018C

• One broken outer wire at the point of contact with the rope core causing the wire to
protrude or loop out from the rope structure (further investigation of core damage is
required)
• Any abnormal wear or damage that results in a discernible loss of wire strength
Instructions have been provided for how to inspect internal boom cables without disassembling
the boom. These checks should be performed every 6 Months/500 PTO Hours. The instructions
have been added to the wire rope inspection portion of the unit maintenance manual.
Future Inspections
Any affected units can have the boom inspection in one of two periods.
• Units with booms that have not had the boom disassembled, and are currently scheduled
to have a five year disassembly, can be rescheduled to comply with the new ten year
interval.
• Units that have had a five year disassembly already performed, prior to this PUN, can have
their next boom disassembly scheduled ten years from the date of their last boom
disassembly

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