641b?

[637slayer]

has anyone ever run one of these?ive got pictures but cant post them.

[alan627b]

"dig deep dump short and haul ass"
And then another guy will come along and make it look good....LOL!:D
Biggest I've been on is a 631D, looking on machinerytrader, seems most of them are now water wagons....but here's some for sale....
http://www.machinerytrader.com/listings/list.aspx?ETID=1&Manu=CATERPILLAR&MDLGrp=641&GUID=A354D68C7C904446BABF85444C1C4328
If all else fails, email them to me and I'll get them on here for you.
alan627b@hotmail.com
Happy New Year!

[RollOver Pete]

Oh yeah!
Yeager had a few they used as spares.
Some were stiff necks and one or two actually had really loose cushion hitches.
I remember that it seemed like you had to be a midget to fit inside the thing.
The ROP's on these machines were massive.
And the engine looked like a flat head Ford V-8 with a straight pipe.
Running these old machines seemed like some sort of punishment for breaking your regular machine.
Kind of like being sat down in the corner and having to wear a dunce cap.

The dinosaur I ran had an early 3 sp. transmission.
2nd gear didn't work either.....
1st to 3rd was always an adventure....
You made sure that you were at least headed down hill otherwise the flat head V8 would lug down to nothing....
And the smoke!
That machine would turn day into night shifting from 1st to 3rd.
Now going from 3rd to 1st was another story.
Brace yourself for some rapid deceleration......
Followed by reaching down and resetting the tach.
It over tached.....peged into the red every time.
I've never laughed so hard in all my life when I piloted one of these mighty timeless machines.
What amazes me about these old 641's...
As primitive as they were, they just kept on running and running and running.
I don't care what you tried to do to break or lessen your time your time behind the wheel of this time capsule, they just kept on hauling dirt!
Most of them ended up as water pulls, but the cream of the crop 641's remained as spares.
Kind of a reality check to remind us of how things once used to be.
:cool:

[637slayer]

ya you 27 guys are always makin it look pretty,lol, i always forget about machinetrader,i dont know why but i cant post pics,most of my pics were taken before digital cameras so i will have to scan first,the pics i have now are all of newer stuff, the ones i really want to share are of older iron, old to me is the b and c, i know thats new to some,im 36 not too old but not too young.

[637slayer]

ahh the old three speeds,the only three speed we had was on a waterwagon,what a screamin treat that was. but we also had some later 41s they told me they were the last ones they made back in the early 70s,they had good cushion hitches and eight speed tranys rode like cadillacs took awhile for the smoke to clear after you put your foot into it but if you kept them rapped up they ran great.

[637slayer]

627b i noticed you are from omaha, i worked for a company out of grande island called platte valley construction.

[alan627b]

637, I can't say I've heard of them, but I don't stray too far from here. As you might deduce from my handle, I run the old stuff every day. And probably will as long as parts are available.
We had 6 627E's at one time, but they all went when 1) the warranties were about to expire, which would have required our mechanics to get training in the more advanced electronics, which I assume the owners didn't want to pay for, and
2) the F models came out, driving the resale prices up enough that I heard they sold them at a good profit, even after working them for 5 or 6 years!
When a new 627G costs $700K, I guess a bunch of paid for B's looks pretty good....I still wish they'd buy some newer iron, I get tired of building my own cab out of plywood and cardboard!
I got to run a 300 or less hour 621G auger scraper in Arizona, that was a real treat!
Then I came back here....
MY experiences on our 631D's left me with a poor opinion of them, and single engine scrapers in general. They ride too damn rough and I hate just dirt hogging anyway. I think I'd need arms like Arnold to really like that bowl lever effort and higher steering effort.
I should have known what was up when I saw how long those levers were....give me a twin engine any day!
Good thread. let's keep it going!
alan627b

[alan627b]

Pete, the 641 and 651 shared the same tractor, just a different bowl, didn't they?
alan627b

[alan627b]

Pics of that 621G. Aaah, the memories.....
Also, a link to the post that explains my avatar, and why they call me Flip sometimes....
http://www.heavyequipmentforums.com/Forum/showthread.php?p=23882#post23882

[637slayer]

how did you like the auger? i know exactly how the plywood doors work, i use to wd40 my fan blades all summer so when winter came i could flip them in minutes. that g was pretty operator friendly?i run our 37 once in awhile aside from the rough ride i like it alot.

[637slayer]

beside the one controler for your can lip trany hold bell crowd,the 37g you can isolate your gauges to your rear engine,rpms,temp,you can even start it from the drivers seat. if i remember right the 41 can was 1 foot narrower and two foot shorter but yes it had the same tractor, is that right pete?

[surfer-joe]

Yep, the 41 used the exact same tractor as the 51. Early models (A) like Pete remembers used the D346 60 degree V8, set to 550 HP. Real clangors and smokers! The "B" models used the D346 60 degree model, still set to 550 HP. Not much better I'm afraid.

The big difference between the 41 and 51 was the bowl size. 51's had a wider bowl with extended draft arms and generally speaking had to be taken apart to be hauled on a lo-boy. 41's could be hauled legal without a permit in most places.

The differences in transmissions from early models to later ones (B's) was a huge improvement. 641's ran just like the 651's, only they were quicker as, with the smaller bowl, they loaded faster and got up to speed quicker.

I had eight or ten of them Green bought from some contractor in upstate New York on the Stewartsville Dam project in New Jersey. They were early B's and very tired. We spent a fortune on them, rarely having more than half in operation at any given time. At the end of the job, I sold the lot of them to some outfit in California. I also sold all the 651B's and E's off that job to California contractors, as well as all the 631E's we had there. These were the only 641's I was ever around, tho I've seen one or two occasionally in various locations or at an auction.

Platte Valley was a big competitor to Green and Kiewit in Nebraska, Kansas, and Iowa. They also may have joint-ventured some jobs. I had an offer to go to work for them after my uranium job was done in Wyoming, but I never did like Nebraska. I don't know if they are still in business.

[637slayer]

they are still going strong picked up some winter work reclaiming some uranium mines here in wyo, still running the 41s

[Countryboy]

ive got pictures but cant post them.

Check out the second red link in my signature for help with posting pictures. :)

[72V]

Alan, that 641B you found for sale online looks suspiciously like one I saw near here. It had just finished raising a 1 acre pond 6 feet... tight job for a big scraper! I see it's gone now... maybe sold.

[637slayer]

wrong link[

[637slayer]

Road Runner 2001

[637slayer]

Road Runner 2001

[637slayer]

http:/Road Runner 2001

[637slayer]

well i give up sorry not smart enough, the attachment i was trying to attach was a few pictyres and an interesting article about a job we did in scottsbluff neb. the article is under Road Runner 2001 click on that if you clik on one of the pictures they enlarge, we dug up a place where a river dumped 30 foot of sand preserving 100s of fossiles, the scraper is a 41.

[Steve Frazier]

637slayer, try again. The new server is up and I opened the pictures up again. Thanks for your patience

[stretch]

637slayer, I think I found the article you were trying to link:

http://www-museum.unl.edu/research/vertpaleo/road_runner_2001.htm

[RolyD8k]

i filmed several 641Bs couple years ago they were running well and
doing load for load with the 657s and 637s,they must be cheaper
to run with only one engine to look after:drinkup

[Dug Overburden]

Roly,

Great looking scraper job, not a Artic truck in site! Nice cut & fill.. I assume this is an older photo, if this was current would they be using excavators & artics?

i filmed several 641Bs couple years ago they were running well and
doing load for load with the 657s and 637s,they must be cheaper
to run with only one engine to look after:drinkup

[Dug Overburden]

On a road construction project. Working around fossill's

627b i noticed you are from omaha, i worked for a company out of grande island called platte valley construction.

[TS14B]

Those 641B's once belonged to Morshan's of Wigan(UK).they had both 641's and 641B's.Becher bought a 657B and the 641B's off him.The 657B had been a power station machine.Levack's of East Kilbride had some 641's too but found thy were underpowered???.I believe they said they were an ideal pit heap leveling scraper but not too clever for muck.

[mockman]

Never ran them 41's but have seen them in action years ago. Commercial from lincoln had a 41 and 2 51's doing some highway work next to a terrace job I was doing, very wet spring. it dumped 7 inches in like 3 hours, my terraces were dam near silted full right after building. Somewhere back then up the road about 10 miles Negus & Sweeney had some of those old 38 yard six wheeled 632 scrapers made by Cat from 62 to 66

[dozerbill57]

Never ran them 41's but have seen them in action years ago. Commercial from lincoln had a 41 and 2 51's doing some highway work next to a terrace job I was doing, very wet spring. it dumped 7 inches in like 3 hours, my terraces were dam near silted full right after building. Somewhere back then up the road about 10 miles Negus & Sweeney had some of those old 38 yard six wheeled 632 scrapers made by Cat from 62 to 66

Here are two 641's sitting for about two years with nothing to do in Kentucky . yes they are in operating condition and ready to chew on some mountain . Thought you would like to see what they look like sitting . :usa

[frase]

has anyone ever run one of these?ive got pictures but cant post them.

Back before Abi Group when they were still a private family owned turn out, Abigano, they used to run a mixed fleet of 51 & 41B's but we always treated th 41's as the punishment tool because they tend to nose dive so much. As someone else has already said they were the same tractor as the 51's but the bowl was a little smaller, ( you could still heap 'em up and carry the same loads at the 51's but they were a bugger in tight fill areas...