Vote for D11R or a Komatsu 475

[Gavin84w]

I have heard all the for and against arguments and that will always be the case, the one thing that as a Cat fan is that we should be greatful Komatsu makes such a decent dozer because if they did not then the current Cats would not be as good as they are. Good old competition is a great thing and the benefits are for all.

That said it is hard to deny the facts and figures out there but when it comes to availability numbers you really need to back them up with the methodology behind how you come up with them.

[surfer-joe]

Gavin84w,

Your comment below made me think of an incedent at the Houston CONEXPO in 1980 or 81, can't remember the year for sure. Anyway, I was visiting with some pals over to the Cat exhibit and one said, "hey Joe, you want to see something really funny?" "Well sure," I replied. He said, "take a look at those guys by the D10, what do you think they are doing and where do you think they are from?"

So I wandered over closer to the nice new shiny D10, and there were about ten or more Japanese engineers from Komatsu all around, under, over, and in it. One would be taking measurements with a little ruler or tape measure, and another would be jotting down the dimensions and making notes in a little notepad. A third fella was taking pictures with a pretty sophisticated camera and his assistant was taking notes as well. They made no bother to hide their name tags, which identified them as all being from the Komatsu Factory in Japan, and sure didn't show any embarrassment at what they were up to.

I went back over to my pals and asked if they weren't just a little bit upset by what those fellas were doing. They said, "oh no, they weren't concerned." "The D10 in the show was an early prototype," one told me, "and would be changed in several ways before production." So I asked if they had gone over to the Komatsu exhibit and measured and took photos of all their equipment. You wouldn't believe the dumbstruck expressions the boys from Cat got on their faces. One finally said, "what for?"

Further discussion reveled that Cat figured Komatsu was 10-15 years behind them in technology at the time. The way they saw it, there was no use going over the Komatsu's in the show very closely. Oh, they had all been over there, but they hadn't seen anything that worried or amazed them, and were really amused and more than a little flattered by the Komatsu engineers flocking around the Cat equipment.

I've heard that Komatsu tried building a high sprocket tractor after that show and that after some testing and evaluating, decided against production as they did not see any great benefit to it. But this is just a footnote to the competition between the two, if you could call it that. It looked more like industrial espionage to me.

[biggixxerjim]

Gavin84w,

Your comment below made me think of an incedent at the Houston CONEXPO in 1980 or 81, can't remember the year for sure. Anyway, I was visiting with some pals over to the Cat exhibit and one said, "hey Joe, you want to see something really funny?" "Well sure," I replied. He said, "take a look at those guys by the D10, what do you think they are doing and where do you think they are from?"

So I wandered over closer to the nice new shiny D10, and there were about ten or more Japanese engineers from Komatsu all around, under, over, and in it. One would be taking measurements with a little ruler or tape measure, and another would be jotting down the dimensions and making notes in a little notepad. A third fella was taking pictures with a pretty sophisticated camera and his assistant was taking notes as well. They made no bother to hide their name tags, which identified them as all being from the Komatsu Factory in Japan, and sure didn't show any embarrassment at what they were up to.

I went back over to my pals and asked if they weren't just a little bit upset by what those fellas were doing. They said, "oh no, they weren't concerned." "The D10 in the show was an early prototype," one told me, "and would be changed in several ways before production." So I asked if they had gone over to the Komatsu exhibit and measured and took photos of all their equipment. You wouldn't believe the dumbstruck expressions the boys from Cat got on their faces. One finally said, "what for?"

Further discussion reveled that Cat figured Komatsu was 10-15 years behind them in technology at the time. The way they saw it, there was no use going over the Komatsu's in the show very closely. Oh, they had all been over there, but they hadn't seen anything that worried or amazed them, and were really amused and more than a little flattered by the Komatsu engineers flocking around the Cat equipment.

I've heard that Komatsu tried building a high sprocket tractor after that show and that after some testing and evaluating, decided against production as they did not see any great benefit to it. But this is just a footnote to the competition between the two, if you could call it that. It looked more like industrial espionage to me.

Thats a funny story!!!!

I could just picture it now.... hahahaha!!!!!!

[Neilus]

I have some extensive dealings with D11R, D11RCD, Komatsu 475 and the 575
I was a service manage for a Komatsu dealer in the US then became the Training Manager/Technical Coordinator. I have spent the last 8 1/2 years working as the Maintenance Coordinator for a surface mining company where we have a 4 D11R's and a D11RCD. When I was at the Komatsu dealer I was in charge of the first D575CD to be built. We also had more D575's than any other dealer in the world. We had more D475's than all the other dealers combined at one time.
I think which one is better is truly determined by what YOU want to make of it. We had 475's out on jobs that ran 97% availablity and above day in and day out. And I am talking about tractors that were running with 20,000 hours and above. We had tractors on jobs where the mechanics or operators felt like "this is Japanese Junk" and they are taking our jobs. On those jobs, they did not perform as well. They would run the machine till it wouldn't move before telling anyone about a problem. But, given an equal opportunity, the differences between the D11R and the D475-5 will be in your personal perception.
I have read where people expect to rebuild engines at 12,000 hours. Either Tractor has the ability to make that number. I am running 5 D11's now. I have one that has 43,000 hours on it. The engine has been rebuild once, at 27,940 hours. The transmission was built at 20,000 hours. I normally see more than 20,000 hours out of our D11 engines, WITHOUT losing the core.
I have 777's running with 43,000 plus on the engines and still having great oil samples and running great.
My point is, with proper maintenance and care CAT will perform. But, with the same attention Komatsu is their equal.
Also something to think about, Komatsu is offering some impressive warranties on new mining equipment right now. And equally impressive exchange components. When you look at the cost per hour, and Komatsu will put it in writing, they will guarantee it to be less than Cat. Not something that can be done if their product doesn't perform.

Hello, Just wondering if you could help me with a problem with my friends 475 up at one of the Brisbane mines. The have had techs working on it for two weeks and haven't come up with a solution yet. I thought some one of your experience might know where to start looking.

Basically the problem is the machine starts fine etc but has problems selecting gears, goes into reverse by itself etc.......

Temperature seems to be ok with the transmission....
The common thought at the moment is the computer might be cooked... The vehicle is only 2 or three months old.......
When the vehicle restarts the transmission resets itself and is ok for a very short time and then reverts back to selection wrong gears etc.

I know its not much to go on, just thought I would run it by you to see if you have herd of it before...
There is an error code 3 visible ....... I don't have access to what the error codes contain.

Thanks very much for your time, andy hints you could give me I will pass on directly.

Cheers

Neil.

[Bluetop Man]

A six-year-old thread springs back to life? Somebody needs to clean the tracks:
http://www.mining-power.de/d475/d475_11_p.html

Impressive dozers to say the least. Here, back filling The Grand Canyon???
http://www.mining-power.de/d475/d475_10_p.html

How is that elevated sprocket thing working out:
http://www.mining-power.de/d11r/d11r_22_p.html

[diggerop]

Brisbane is the capital city of Queensland, Australia. What are the Brisbane mines?. If the vehicle? (dozer?) is only 2 or 3 months old ,what happened with the warranty?