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  1. Hokiesmokes

    Finding qualified help

    Only downside on renting is the cost of machine time. It's the way I go but you have to watch the hour meter sometimes you don't have the room to pay another day on a piece of equipment. It adds a bit of complexity to managing jobs sometimes too if a machine has to be back or you can't get it...
  2. Hokiesmokes

    Moving over from excavator. Got advice on best backhoes?

    I find the Case 3 stick style easiest to run of the backhoe controls. I'm used to Cat pattern in an excavator; if you're used to Deere going to a 2 stick backhoe won't be too bad. I can run them but it takes me a minute to think it through and I look like a goof doing it. I've never been on a...
  3. Hokiesmokes

    Job bid I lost

    There are guys around here that will clear lots for a minimal cost to get the wood, which makes it hard to bid and make any money on doing the work. They'll haul in a skidsteer or backhoe behind a pickup, cut the trees, load out the logs and chip the brush and just leave the chips on site...
  4. Hokiesmokes

    General questions about the trade

    The local here lets you choose a crane training track as an apprentice. Most people I know, wherever they end up working is what they do.
  5. Hokiesmokes

    Dyed diesel....not just for farmers??

    Some stations around here won't put off road on the pumps. One told me it is not legal to do so, but other stations do have it at pumps, so they are clearly wrong. The ones that won't put it on pumps you have to catch the tanker man at about 5am to fill up your drums. If you use enough fuel...
  6. Hokiesmokes

    Learning the trade

    Good luck with the coal job. Mining is a good way to get on some large machinery. Even if they have you tending pumps or something, they typically give you a small loader to run around on. I worked around the coal in southeast Ohio for a while, I really enjoyed it. I was there as an...
  7. Hokiesmokes

    Questions On Starting a Backhoe business

    Well this is an old thread but I'll somewhat relate my experiences. I haven't really found enough work to make it profitable enough to quit my day job. I get some dumptrucking work here and there, but trucking just doesn't pay all that well for what it costs to do. Dumping of debris from jobs...
  8. Hokiesmokes

    how to price a job using a harly rake

    I'm bidding a job now for a guy that I'm considering either a harley rake or a rock hound. The builder spread the subgrade material to finish elevation, left me no room to cover up the debris. There are chunks of concrete, rock and bricks. I'm wondering if the harley rake would work on this...
  9. Hokiesmokes

    Fan belt Change on L9000 with 290 cummins

    Update: Got em all done. After one day of getting the bolts loose, it took another to get everything apart and then chase down the belts since I couldn't get numbers off mine. NAPA has to order the fan ones. I found some gates belts that fit at OReilley's. I did use a flare wrench on the...
  10. Hokiesmokes

    Fan belt Change on L9000 with 290 cummins

    Thanks for that guy, I owe you a beer. You are spot on with the bolt sizes. I couldn't figure any other way of doing it. It was a bear getting those loose, had to use the impact and almost a whole can of kroil. Info for anybody stumbling across this, the top 2 nuts are 13/16" but you don't...
  11. Hokiesmokes

    Fan belt Change on L9000 with 290 cummins

    Need a few hints on getting the belts changed on my truck. It looks like the only way is to totally drop the fan bracket off to get the belts off. I tried taking them over the fan, no go. There also looks like a little air line going to the bracket, I guess for the fan clutch. Any advice to...
  12. Hokiesmokes

    Starting Out On My Own

    Hey gang, surprised to see the thread still going. I've been fairly busy with the day job and a bunch of side projects lately (not the excavating kind tho). A little background on myself, I have been working landscaping off and on and sideways since 96, I've got about a year of actual heavy...
  13. Hokiesmokes

    Peat

    How did you ever get USACE to let you take that out? At any rate, wholesale it to a company that sells the bags of peat. It's expensive, and apparently from what I hear from the corps hippies, hard to get a permit to remove.
  14. Hokiesmokes

    New O.S.H.A. regulations ??

    I've had to get all my stuff pretty much on my own, even DOT physicals, which the company is supposed to pay for, but when they don't send you and it's expired, oh well. Have to renew the rough terrain card soon. Just had my MSHA training (you know they have a different fall protection...
  15. Hokiesmokes

    Starting Out On My Own

    The more I look into this the more it seems I should stay landscaping...hourly rates are roughly the same and equipment is 10s of thousands cheaper. Of course I don't really want to work like that forever. Maybe I'll just take my money and go to diesel 'chanic school, since it seems everybody...
  16. Hokiesmokes

    Don't dump when you're not level..

    345kV is common on the high voltage transmission lines. Some out west are in the 700 range i've heard, but here in the east 345 is about the highest you'll see. If I remember right, the safe distance is 20 feet.
  17. Hokiesmokes

    Questions On Starting a Backhoe business

    Hey GMC, what kind of hauling work are you finding for that single axle?
  18. Hokiesmokes

    Mini or not?

    I consider anything with the rubber tracks to be a mini. I consider the 312 class to be the smallest of the "full size" machines.
  19. Hokiesmokes

    Well, it was going to happen soon or later

    I've cut TV cable edging landscape beds by hand. I think they roll the sod over em and call it good. Even the dog fences are deeper. What I've always wondered is how they get the sprinkler lines under those big old tree stumps for the grinder to find. Those little plastic lines flow a lot of...
  20. Hokiesmokes

    Questions On Starting a Backhoe business

    Insurance is a high cost for sure, it's more if you want to truck for hire. I'm going through the same things right now, the transportation side is much higher than the contractor liability. Right now the majority of work is maintenance - like sewer lines, downspout drains, concrete and other...
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