Patent ID: 7544036

Claim:
A handling assembly for pipe sections for a horizontal directional drill, said handling assembly comprising: (a) a thrust frame having a thrust frame axis; (b) a drive carriage that is mounted on the thrust frame and adapted to be driven along the thrust frame axis; (c) a pipe-rotation mechanism that is mounted on the drive carriage, said pipe-rotation mechanism and thrust frame defining a pipe section transfer location; (d) a pipe handler assembly track that is attached to the thrust frame and disposed generally perpendicular to the thrust frame axis; (e) a pipe handler carrier that is mounted on the pipe handler assembly track; (f) a magazine that is mounted adjacent to the pipe handler carrier, said magazine having a plurality of columns within each of which a plurality of pipe sections may be received and stored, the magazine being adapted to discharge a pipe section from the bottom of each column; (g) means for moving the pipe handler carrier along the pipe handler assembly track to a plurality of positions in each of which a pipe section at the bottom of a column of the magazine is aligned with the transfer location; (h) a column selector guide tube that is mounted to the thrust frame in a direction perpendicular to the thrust frame axis; (i) a column selector rod that is mounted for axial movement within the column selector guide tube, said column selector rod having: (1) an outer end that is adapted to be selectively fixed with respect to the column selector guide tube at a plurality of locations, one for each column in the magazine; (2) an inner end with a stop for the pipe handler carrier; whereby the outer end and inner end stop are arranged and adapted so that selectively fixing the outer end of the column selector rod with respect to the column selector guide tube at a particular location will stop movement of the pipe handler carrier along the pipe handler assembly track at one of a plurality of positions each of which aligns a column of the magazine with the pipe section transfer location.