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1988 Cat 953 - Caterpillar. My First Track Loader

DMiller

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Joined
Feb 21, 2010
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16,436
Location
Hermann, Missouri
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Cheap "old" Geezer
We have Funnel Web and Wolf spiders here the Wolf units are at least half dollar size, have seen one tarantula as they are in the Ozarks too. Keep the house sprayed as have had the annoying Recluse show up from time to time.
 

Georgia Iron

Senior Member
Joined
May 6, 2012
Messages
872
Location
USA - Georgia
Occupation
Concrete building slab and grading contractor
Here are a few wall form pics from my latest job. The rear wall is 6' tall. 32" wide footing. Major pain in the rear to square a slab over an un-level area.

There is about $3000.00 retail worth of wood in this one. $250.00 worth of snap ties and 23 yards of concrete @ 190.00 a yard off a belt truck. 15 days of labor for the footing steel and wall forms.
 

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Georgia Iron

Senior Member
Joined
May 6, 2012
Messages
872
Location
USA - Georgia
Occupation
Concrete building slab and grading contractor
I was on a grading / driveway job last week and some other contractors where working on a nice long stacked blocked wall across the street. They had 5 guys working. One of them was hauling in dirt and gravel, one supervising driving back and forth and so on, one running the bobcat, and 2 ground workers.

They had placed the gravel and drainage and were placing the final fresh dirt behind the wall which was about 7' high. I did not see any geo grid, t walls or evidence of a true concrete footing. Just a long wall about 80 or so feet long.

While I was working the foreman came over to my job and sought out my customer to see if he could provide skid steer services, of course it was for less than my rate. I was wondering if I would get sent on my way. I was in an excavator working on leveling in a path into a steep sink hole so that it could be filled with a skid steer since it was on side slope that was almost 75* due to the sink hole.

And then it happened as quick as a cat can jump on a mouse. The fresh dirt decided to move and the wall decided to fall and it did it with such force that it sounded like a dump truck, dumped a load of block right on the skid steer. Both ground guys were on top of the wall right in the area where it fell and they leaned back on the slope to avoid going down with it and getting smashed.

The skid took the hit mostly on the bucket and the tracks so the driver was ok. What a mess... No one was hurt but what BIG mess to clean up and loss of money to. I am sure funding was not in the project for this. IF someone was next to the wall it would have been in the news.

They were looking at the mess thinking should I just leave and move on or should we try to clean this up. I fully expected them to haul tale...

Around here any wall over 2' must be permitted with footings inspected. They missed that step. Of course I am sure the customer just went with the cheapest price. Who thinks they will remove the rest of the wall and build a footing???
 

Georgia Iron

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872
Location
USA - Georgia
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Concrete building slab and grading contractor
Here are some photos. The two close ups I got the next morning.
 

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Tags

Senior Member
Joined
Feb 19, 2012
Messages
1,610
Location
Connecticut
In my experience, those stacked block walls will come with an engineered plan, showing Geo grid every 2 to 3 feet going back 5 to 7 feet depending on conditions, they are always set on a crushed stone compacted base, I’ve installed a lot of them and never had a failure, especially if it’s installed according to the engineered plan…obviously this one was not. Glad no one got hurt....Karmas a bitch...Maybe if he was focused on his own job instead of trying to steal yours it would’ve worked out better for him.....
 

JD8875

Senior Member
Joined
Apr 8, 2010
Messages
314
Location
Harrisonville, Missouri
Retaining walls are good money makers! Especially when someone else has screwed them up to start with. I've rebuilt several behind other "contractors" and especially homeowners. Seems lots of homeowners with some ambition will price block at the big box store and a rental mini ex for a weekend. Throw in a couple buddies and some beer and you have a future job headed your way. I straightened up one around here for our local fire department after their GC set it out of dunnage blocks. 6ft high, no gravel footing, no drainage and back filled with $×!+ dirt. The fire board and chief were none too thrilled that their new parking lot was covered in mud that was supposed to be the back yard of their station and the dirt was disappearing around their sidewalk.... Made a great couple days for me!!!

John
 

Georgia Iron

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Joined
May 6, 2012
Messages
872
Location
USA - Georgia
Occupation
Concrete building slab and grading contractor
Happy February 2023,

I have not posted too much in the last few years. I have been so busy working that I have not been around much to post. 2.5 years ago, I went to work for a company. The work was endless, we could adjust and move for weather, we could move to a different state or sometimes just 3 hours away in another direction and we could keep working because sometime rain misses an area. So less down days waiting on site conditions. I was working out of town a lot. I was led to believe that I would be helping build up an existing company that had fallen to a one man show and I was told that at some point, I would be a part of it. So, I stopped almost all my building and clearing work and went on board full time sometimes logging 80 plus hours a week.

Then as the jobs went by and we started to grow, I figured out that he had other thoughts. He found two graders and I found us another grader and we started to pick up even more. To clarify I was a sub-contractor that could be used on an as needed basis getting nothing other than pay. I was an operator that works all the time and paid with profit split based on job value. I was paid a lot more than an hourly employee, which even if I could out work 2 other men at some point more men can out work 1 man. I never missed a job or called in sick or even let an equipment failure stop me. I would fix the machine myself or go get another machine if it was not fixable on-site. My job output probably went into the record books. I graded more than 10,000,000 sq ft. and I believe I can do it better than most others. I have a lot of experience looking at grade and making it to with in a 1/2" and depending on the material a 1/4".

I noticed that I was getting sent further away and the jobs were getting harder. All the easy jobs close to home went to others that were paid less. I began to realize that I could be replaced or worked less based on the companies needs or given jobs that no one else wanted. I also come to the realization that I would on be a sub-contractor that was not building my business and that I was not appreciated. My hard work was for nothing other than money, someone else was using my skill set to build their business and I was not going to have any rewards for that other than high pay. I was told that the company came first ...

I quit with a text message, with no notice and walked away. I quit the best paying job ever and I probably should have quit sooner, I saw it coming 6 months before hand. 2 years of hard long days of work. I did walk away with new ability, I am now an expert on proof rolls, material compaction, and bringing a site to final grade weather for a road, a building pad, loading dock or parking lot. I can grade horse arenas, tennis courts, and ball fields. I can grade using a CAD file and I can make my own grade file based on curbs, drains, or slab height. I know how to use site plans to build a project which before I was using a drawing on a napkin from lunch.

I have been attempting to fix so many things that I left un-done including special time I lost with my young kids and wife. My old track loaders have been basically sitting and waiting on me to get them going again. I have brought on a new machine and now I have machine control and I am fully equipped to handle even more types of work.

I am going at it fresh this year and looking forward to what it brings..
 
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CM1995

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Jan 21, 2007
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Alabama
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Running what I brung and taking what I win
Glad to have you back GI!

So what piece of iron have you added and what GPS grade system are you running?

We bought a next gen D3 in 2021 running Trimble and love it.
 

Georgia Iron

Senior Member
Joined
May 6, 2012
Messages
872
Location
USA - Georgia
Occupation
Concrete building slab and grading contractor
I got a Volvo G80 grader up and going. It took almost 9 months to get it and everything it needed was custom made and installed. I am not using GPS, I am using LEICA with a dual slope laser. It can do 2d currently and 2d sloped. I am in the process of having a total station and 3d setup added. The machine has a very complicated mold board that makes placing a rotation sensor hard to do. The mold board can tilt, side shift left and right, rotate, and swing out from under the machine.

The machine is 17,000 lb class machine and it is running an old school 4bt Cummins.. 110 hp, sounds like it has a cam in it. It will roll a wind row and push like an 18,000 lb cat d3 with a little less traction. I can out work a D3 with it. It reminds me of my old case 440 series 3 that had the same motor but at 90 hp. You could not stall it out and you can run it on light throttle of course the slower the hydraulics pump the slower the blade is to respond to grade adjustment.
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Georgia Iron

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Joined
May 6, 2012
Messages
872
Location
USA - Georgia
Occupation
Concrete building slab and grading contractor
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Lately I am getting called in to fix wet areas that need to be poured in the small dry windows we have been getting. This was left 6 inches high and we cut off the soft top layer, got down to hard ground and any areas that failed proof roll were dug out and brought back to grade with gravel. P61, rock truck, 349 ex, roller and a front end loader where on site to help be move off the soft top layer. Think this pour is about 30,000 sq ft.

My machine control is super cool, I can adjust grade on the fly and can say switch from an 8 inch pour to a 6 inch pour without leaving the seat. Newest stuff out.
 
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Welder Dave

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Oct 11, 2014
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Canada
Leveling a pad or road the Grader would be faster but I think raw pushing like leveling big piles or on wet ground a D3 would have the advantage. Every machine has its advantages and disadvantages.
 

Georgia Iron

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May 6, 2012
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872
Location
USA - Georgia
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Concrete building slab and grading contractor
Leveling a pad or road the Grader would be faster but I think raw pushing like leveling big piles or on wet ground a D3 would have the advantage. Every machine has its advantages and disadvantages.


Welder Dave, you are 100% correct. In soft ground the motor grader does not want to move a load. Normally we don't work on pads when things are wet. We do get called in to remove water and mud sometimes, I don't like it because it is pain to get the machine cleaned up and ready to move out at the end of the day. A dozer is a very easy machine to run with machine control, more so than a grader so you can put a less trained person on one. My machine can damage electronics and the poles because the mold board can hit the cab, or front tire, or lean into the cylinder, if you hit anything your day of grading is shut down.

If I am on site when trucks start rolling, I can put down to grade somewhere near 3500 to 4250 tons. The dozer can not grade to accuracy like a grader, it does not have enough blade stabilization. I don't rough grade with it unless there are site problems, most of the time there are larger graders on site which can be used to bring it closer to grade for me. The worst is soil cement. It will push a small grader up and it wont cut if it is too hard.
 

savman

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Joined
Jul 11, 2018
Messages
48
Location
LaGrange, GA
I'm pretty sure I saw that machine at Construction Laser when it was getting fitted out......say around early last summer or late spring; I was shopping machine control and came to check out the Leica total station machine control.

I remember thinking it looked like a clean, tight machine.

Ended up going with Trimble GPS base rover w/ a d3 and machine control.
 

Georgia Iron

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May 6, 2012
Messages
872
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USA - Georgia
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Concrete building slab and grading contractor
Savman, that was the one. I picked this machine up in Texas and brought it back. It was used by a road department there. I have had a few issues with that I have had to work through. To be a 20 year old machine it still has a lot of wiring and now it has even more.

How is the D3 doing with machine control? What do you think about it? How close can you keep grade with it and do you use it to do final grade or bring in another machine for that? I see that CM got a d3 also. I know in certain instances I also wish that I had a dozer running machine control. I am on a job now that has a p61 and d5 or 6 going and the guys have a grader checker going with them. The operators are first class and you would almost think they finished graded it. Some of these guys live in those machines and they can really keep a good grade.

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savman

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Jul 11, 2018
Messages
48
Location
LaGrange, GA
CM1995 would probably be better suited to ask about his machine control (we have identical setups I believe); I've only used the machine control on one job and it was nearly completed....I bought the base/rover last summer and only recently added the d3. I can tell you there are different levels of resolution on my machine and I did not run it in the most detailed and I was pretty impressed with it's capabilities.

Sadly, the job was almost over when I got machine control; and at least half the parking lot was already covered with what amounted to giant parking sheds for garbage trucks. So I didn't have reception everywhere and where I did it was spotty in parts due to the sheds obstructing reception. When I could 'see' the satellites, it was awesome.

When I initially graded the site I did it entirely by feel on my 953c with a man walking around on the base and rover calling out grades. It was a small site (around an acre) and very detailed and odd. The GPS was invaluable. Also, I had no other points of reference anywhere close as I was essentially out in the middle of a landfill.
 

Georgia Iron

Senior Member
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May 6, 2012
Messages
872
Location
USA - Georgia
Occupation
Concrete building slab and grading contractor
CM1995 would probably be better suited to ask about his machine control (we have identical setups I believe); I've only used the machine control on one job and it was nearly completed....I bought the base/rover last summer and only recently added the d3. I can tell you there are different levels of resolution on my machine and I did not run it in the most detailed and I was pretty impressed with it's capabilities.

Sadly, the job was almost over when I got machine control; and at least half the parking lot was already covered with what amounted to giant parking sheds for garbage trucks. So I didn't have reception everywhere and where I did it was spotty in parts due to the sheds obstructing reception. When I could 'see' the satellites, it was awesome.

When I initially graded the site I did it entirely by feel on my 953c with a man walking around on the base and rover calling out grades. It was a small site (around an acre) and very detailed and odd. The GPS was invaluable. Also, I had no other points of reference anywhere close as I was essentially out in the middle of a landfill.

Hopefully you will get some more work for it soon.

All of the site graders are using rovers now it seems like. Every now and then, it causes some hurt feelings. I did 85% of the fine grading work here in north Atlanta for the new Yancy Cat off of 400. They poured there roads and areas around the buildings with 12" concrete and double rebar, 1 1/2" dowel pins and each section was poured separately from the other so every thing was pumped.

I had to set up off of surveyor control points and I use a total station with CAD file points and then check the curbs, drains and gutters.

The rovers lost grade in a few areas and I started cutting and we had to get the site guy to come back in and help remediate certain ares. Some areas we out 12 inches, which is a lot of dirt coming back up.

I set up and help cut grade to final then he matched my lead. We worked together because they have the heavy iron and muscle. I am normally there with the pouring crews to check and make it right for them. I make sure they can set forms and the grade is right.

The architects / engineers also missed a few basins and I caught it and then they had to figure out how to make it work and who was going to pay for it. Do I grade to a plan that has errors and will not drain water, (I was told to grade the plan up front) or do I fix it and then no one else will be the same. Part of the curb was not in yet, and part of it was off. Of course everyone looks at me and wonders if I am correct or how could everyone else be wrong. But no one wants it wrong so we always fix it. Then it is who covers the cost for the extra work which sometimes can take a week or more to fix and the project is not staying on schedule.

It is challenging because you don't have to many ways to double check, and then you doubt yourself. But I know how to make a grade file and check and control drainage so if they can afford me (probably not the right word, they can, most of the time they don't know they have a problem until it is too late and then it gets ripped back out) to make a program on it I can see if what they have planned will work or not...
Most of the time I find out when I set the grader up and the blade is 6 inches in the air or pushing me up to the moon...

This all 3d work with a total station. And it is by far the most challenging grading out there.
 
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Georgia Iron

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May 6, 2012
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872
Location
USA - Georgia
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Concrete building slab and grading contractor
Thought I would share a few pictures of MY TL150 stuck. It was stuck, I try really hard to not get a machine stuck, it does not pay and I dont like cleaning it up.. I went back to the shop to get an excavator. I was alone and dug it out. Tried to back up and it went down 2 more feet..

Dug it out again and then had someone come by and help pull as I backed up and it still did not want to come out.

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Georgia Iron

Senior Member
Joined
May 6, 2012
Messages
872
Location
USA - Georgia
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Concrete building slab and grading contractor
I thought I could get around the soft spot then stuck it again..

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Needless to say doing some quick drainage contouring turned out to be extra work...
 
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