Replacing grouser bars

Nige · Mar 10, 2021

Rally Farm said:
When it comes to cost are you figuring in someone being paid to weld or the grouser bars are that expensive? I would be welding them on.

Not necessarily. Just commenting that the cost equation shoes vs welding grouser bar is not just the cost of the material, you would need to factor in the welding consumables and fuel for the welding machine plus any labour cost if there was one. Also don’t underestimate how long the welding will take. It’s a slow process.

Welder Dave · Mar 10, 2021

Stoody used to make automatic machines for welding new grouser bar on. Don't think it's been used since maybe the early 80's. Same with rebuilding roller shells. The consumables and labour aren't cost effective. There's the odd place rebuilding idlers on large machines but small stuff is cheaper to just replace. Pin and bushing turns are pretty rare nowadays too.

Cat977 · Mar 11, 2021

I wanted to share a story about my two 977K's. One with like new triple grouser's. Drove it out to tow a truck out of a low wet land trail. No trouble at all getting there. Hooked up and pulled, didn't move it at all. Drove that one back. Went to the one with the tall grousers walked it out going backwards uphill acted like it wasn't even hooked up. It also left notches on the nice straight hard packed driveway. Unlike the first one.

I was reading last night and thought you might want to hear some folks back in 2008 talking tracks.

Be sure to expand the quote box.

977 K Vs 973

Construct'O said:
As far as grouser i would go with some 2" bar stock and just weld on one pair per pad.Thats all most dozers use or have.

swampdog said:

The grouser pads are probably the last thing I would replace, unless they are badly busted up. If you want to increase the traction without changing the grouser pads, you can weld on pieces that are about 1/3 of the width of the grouser on top of the worn grousers. Stagger them, with some in the middle and some on both sides of the pads. That saves material and welding time and provides an aggressive footprint.

Click to expand...

Triple row pads really stink if you work on something else than pavement, single or double are a lot better for pushing power and grip! the 977 will have no reliability problems, but turning is a little bit affected, the machine turns better with less traction.

Before welding the groussers I would check first the thickness of the pads, if they are worn in the edges or bent, then I would rather replace the pad(s).

also using hi quality materials when welding is suggested, using rebar or some other low quality steel will wear of quite fast.

Willie B · Mar 11, 2021

You have a loader. Loaders don't have grousers because:
A, they turn so much, they'd wear a hole in the ground turning to load trucks.
B, they'd wear out the final drive if they had grousers.
C, they'd break something pushing into a hill to get a bucket.

In the day IH built your tractor, they took a finished TD 7, or is it 8? They removed the blade, C frame & tracks. They added bucket, lift frame, three bar shoes, and a counter weight.

If you have your heart set on grousers, don't get carried away. Use 1 per shoe, and stay at 1-1/4" tall. Consider "corking" (caulking). Add two short pieces one shoe, One in center next.

Willie B · Mar 11, 2021

Mine is TD7G. My service manual covers TD7 & 8 G, and 100 &125 loaders. Only a little changes. My rails will likely last as long as I do. Shoes, I bet are original to the tractor, could be freshened

Welder Dave · Mar 13, 2021

Cat977 said:
I wanted to share a story about my two 977K's. One with like new triple grouser's. Drove it out to tow a truck out of a low wet land trail. No trouble at all getting there. Hooked up and pulled, didn't move it at all. Drove that one back. Went to the one with the tall grousers walked it out going backwards uphill acted like it wasn't even hooked up. It also left notches on the nice straight hard packed driveway. Unlike the first one.

I was reading last night and thought you might want to hear some folks back in 2008 talking tracks.

Be sure to expand the quote box.

What do you mean by "wouldn't move", the tracks spun but wouldn't pull the truck or the machine just wouldn't move when throttled up? If the latter sounds like a torque convertor or other drive issue. There's more than one way to pull things out too. You've got some pretty powerful hyd's. on the bucket. You can drive forward up to the vehicle to be pulled and have the bucket tilted down about 30 deg's. or so. Not all the way down. Hook the chain or tow strap over the top of the bucket and attach on the back side near the top of the bucket. Lots of buckets have hooks here or a gusset. Now back up until the chain is tight and then roll the bucket up. Might have to do a couple times but can add some extra pull. I can't see a 977 not being able to pull a truck out even with totally flat shoes unless it was loaded dump truck or similar.

I had a JD355D that got stuck in a soupy mess with nothing else around to pull it out. I grabbed all the chains and load binders I had and hooked on a big tree about 25ft. away. Tightened the chains as tight as I could. Lifting the loader boom made them a little tighter and rolling the bucket back got me out. Had to reset the chains 3 times but got it out. It was in the middle of nowhere grooming trails for bikes and quads on legal crown land that was a couple hundred acres of sand.

977 K Vs 973

Welder Dave · Mar 13, 2021

Must have missed the bottom line when copying the link. Click to expand above has a reply.

Cat977 · Mar 13, 2021

It was a big truck not running. I wanted to get it back to the house to work on it. Should of brought the 977K dozer loader on the first trip. Jerked it with the plain 977K couldn't keep it moving without spinning the tracks, the nice and fresh square corned tracks. It was all up hill to the driveway and I didn't want to mess up the trail with spinning tracks.

charles walton · Mar 13, 2021

I don't know what kind of work you will be doing but if you are mostly clearing one bar per pad will work nicely from my experience.

Cat977 · Mar 13, 2021

In its place I have found it very handy. I'm a little spoiled to have a choice or two. Out of all the many Vices I guess,
Old Iron isn't so Bad!

ih100 · Mar 28, 2021

A few things to think about before you do this. The groupers aren’t badly worn, and if you’re going to use it on any hard ground get ready for a hard ride, as you’ll not get them all the same height without cutting the originals to the same exact height first. Also, if you do this, make sure you have a good supplier of final drive and running getter parts as you’ll shorten the life of all these components.

IH knew what they were doing with small tracked loaders and as stated, triples were designed to slip to save strain on the driveline. Unless you’re planning on working in a swamp, I’d stick with what’s on there. In 45 years I’ve never wanted anything other than standard shoes on any tracked machine, there’s always a way round things. However, Your machine and money, your call.

Tinkerer · Mar 28, 2021

I know you asked for ideas for jacking and blocking the machine to weld on the pads.
But, you got a lot of advice besides that. Which is a good thing.
After reading all this I'm curious as to how much higher you want to extend the ones on it ?
I don't think they look all that bad. IMHO !

Nige · Mar 28, 2021

ih100 said:
A few things to think about before you do this. The groupers aren’t badly worn, and if you’re going to use it on any hard ground get ready for a hard ride, as you’ll not get them all the same height without cutting the originals to the same exact height first. Also, if you do this, make sure you have a good supplier of final drive and running gear parts as you’ll shorten the life of all these components.

IH knew what they were doing with small tracked loaders and as stated, triples were designed to slip to save strain on the driveline. Unless you’re planning on working in a swamp, I’d stick with what’s on there. In 45 years I’ve never wanted anything other than standard shoes on any tracked machine, there’s always a way round things. However, Your machine and money, your call.

Wise words and gives you something to think about.

Cat977 · Mar 31, 2021

This 977L is up in Grande Prairie, Alberta, Canada for sale on IronPlanet. Has a winch on it. Must work in the woods but doesn't have a log grapple though. Doesn't look like a quick tach either. About 1700 miles from me. If it was close and cheap and had 8" pitch tracks I'd buy this one and the one with a busted track could be my parts machine. The one with the busted rails has like new triple grousers go figure that the guy put new segments on it too that quickly busted up the bushing. I was running on the pins for quite awhile.

Some of the Big Dozers on the Gold Rush show have 2 little tabs on top of their grousers. I was puzzling why?

Nige · Mar 31, 2021

Cat977 said:
Some of the Big Dozers on the Gold Rush show have 2 little tabs on top of their grousers. I was puzzling why?

Ice lugs.?

Cat977 · Mar 31, 2021

That would make some sense. Better penetration.

Willie B · Mar 31, 2021

"Some of the Big Dozers on the Gold Rush show have 2 little tabs on top of their grousers. I was puzzling why?"

A big scale logger nearby used to have a large fleet. Most of his tracts were Federal land. The feds specified the bulldozers he was allowed to use. Specifications were word for word taken from John Deere 350.
Larry once bought 10 of them at once.
SOP was new crawlers got "corked" (caulked) before they went up the mountain. They used a 1-1/4" tall piece of grouser stock. On top of a new grouser, a piece of stock 1/4 as long as the track width. One got two pieces outboard with a gap between. Next shoe got one piece in center. All of this was welded with 7018.

A few machines went to log jobs without being caulked. The crew had a running joke, you need a seat belt & new pants.
They were going to have battery acid & $hit after rolling one cartwheeling down a mountain on ice.

Dave Neubert · Mar 31, 2021

The tabs are for operating on ice it keeps them from sliding sideways

Cat977 · Mar 31, 2021

Willie B said:
A few machines went to log jobs without being caulked. The crew had a running joke, you need a seat belt & new pants.
They were going to have battery acid & $hit after rolling one cartwheeling down a mountain on ice.

LOL! LOL! LOL!!! Reminds me of my First Winter Here with a track loader with trippel grousers a heavy deep wet snow on frozen ground. Plowing up a side hill I had cleared the trees and bush off that summer. I get that 8' bucket nice and full so I pick it up and turn to the downhill side to dump it, instant Bobsled. I'm like frozen in place, don't even think to drop the bucket and turn the teeth to the ground! 70 fast yards to a Blessed Fresh Pile of Snow! Didn't have time to $hit myself but I was scared as Hell.!!!!!

Dave Neubert said:
The tabs are for operating on ice it keeps them from sliding sideways

One of the 977K's got here with 1 1/2" grouser stock welded to the front bar of like new triple grousers. That baby runs great in the woody hills when things get snowy. Good in loose rock if you're not planning to turn much!

I was thinking maybe just a single 1/4 to 1/3 of track width added to the front tab of a triple grouser. Might give a good boost of traction and not make it much harder to steer.

Welder Dave · Mar 31, 2021

A lot of people refer to welding the ice lugs on as corking. It's done on excavators too so they stay in place and you don't go tobogganing sideways on even a slight icy slope. They also help hold the machine in place when digging. Not much different that having regular pads packed with snow loading on a steel trailer.

Replacing grouser bars

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