That is interesting Duffy, the reason I asked, was because we purchased a 2005 WA 380-5H that had done 3,000 hours, out of Germany last year. To date, we are very happy with it, so I guess time will tell. Komatsu have been building wheel loaders in the Hanover factory since 1992, so one would hope that by now, they have got the problems sorted out.
http://www.komatsueurope.com/corporate/eo_hanomag.cfm?lang_id=en
Getting back to the original question, we have three WA 380's, -1, -3 and a -5. The -1 has 11,500 hours on it and has had no problems at all. We have had an excellent run out of all of them so far, they are relatively easy to work on, perform well and they are very nice machines to operate. The one thing I have noticed with Komatsu machines compared to other machines, is the amount of room in the engine bay and around the transmission, it just makes them so much easier to work on. I would have no hesitation in buying the WA 470.
I can not comment on the Cat machines, because I have not operated any of their late model equipment.
RnR.