How badly has the job beaten you up?

[digger242j]

This isn't a saftey issue in the same way that not ending up in the hospital before the day is over might be, but in the long term, I think this is the appropriate forum to discuss it.

Has this profession taken it's toll on you physically?

Obviously the younger you are, the less wear and tear you'll have experienced. Those of us with a few more miles on us will probably be able to give a whole laundry list of complaints.

I'm curious too, as to which type of equipment is hardest on the operator over the long haul. For example, I've never run a Pan, but I've watched them. It looks like it'd really tear you up. Hydraulic Excavators, in most applications, are pretty "operator friendly".

I'm not sure either, how many of my daily aches and pains are from all those hours in the operator's seat, as opposed to all those other hours I've spent laboring.

Anybody else feeling beat up?

 

[donlang]

As a very close friend, I can say this...........you are either beat up because you are old (although, I resemble that remark), or because of a previous life.............now on a serious note:

track equipment of any kind beats you up more. More vibration and "shock" to your body, not to mention all that long step climbing up and jumping down instead of slowly climbing down in those foolish younger years..........my knees hurt just thinking about this one

 

[BKrois]

Over the summer i basically labored for an excavating contractor. Being out in the sun was enough to beat me up, let alone work out in the sun. One thing that really shook me up was the "jumping jack." The constant vibrations from that really gets to you.

After a 15 hour day working almost non-stop, even doing lighter duty tasks beat me up as my body can only take so much.

 

[digger242j]

When I posed the question, I wasn't even thinking about the sun! (If it were mid July, it would've been right at the front of my mind.) I was thinking of joints and bones, but all those long days in the summer sun sure does a job on your skin too.

Another consideration is your hearing. Lots of newer equipment is better designed noise-wise. My 310 Case hilift had nothing but a straight stack sticking up through the hood, about four feet in front of my ears. The Cat hilifts had mufflers, but they still made enough engine and drivetrain noise that my ears would ring for hours afterward. Add to that all the hours spent on a 90 pound hammer, sometimes breaking rock in the bottom of a trench. Of course, only sissies used any kind of hearing protection! These days sometimes I think the most often used word in my vocabulary is, "huh?"

 

[Arc Burn]

Originally posted by donlang
I can say this...........you are beat up because you are old

LOL!,Old man digger,yup,that's his name Oh yea,it's me buddy,i found ya over here!Now i'd better throw something into the hat or i'll get kicked outta here-I was in bridge construction for 7 years and while we all did a little bit of everything i was mainly a welder,untill,it came time for manual labor,i didn't get a whole lot of seat time in equipment,just here and there but aside from equipment the biggest pain was the 90# jackhammer,not so bad when your hammering out a concrete deck or something standing up but most of the time we were on scaffolding hammering out back walls horizontaly,one guy would hold the bit up and the other tryed to hang onto the hammer and not fall off the scaffold, I don't miss that crap one bit.

 

[digger242j]

Didn't anyone ever teach you to *respect* your elders, you snot nosed kid?

(And for the record, everybody, I'm not that old, I've just got an *awful* lot of hours on my meter...)

As for what Arc says about using those 90# hammers horizontally--on one job I did when I was in my 20's we had to hammer about 4 feet of limestone out from beneath a water main that was crossing our trench. One guy hammering, the other guy holding the hammer up for him. No hearing protection was downright stupid....

Another similar situation is when you're hammering some sort of slab and your helper is reaching in and clearing the broken concrete away by hand. It's just stupid to stick your head that close to that amount of noise without some sort of hearing protection, but we used to do it all the time. Hopefully older *is* wiser.

As far as what DonLang said about climbing up and down off equipment, when I was in my twenties I was just as likely to exit the backhoe cab through the rear window and jump down off the hoe as I was to actually use the door and steps. These days the steps are enough of a challenge...

 

[Taylortractornu]

The trip to work totalled me I had a run in with an 18 wheeler and it broke my femur just elow the hip injured my knee and broke my left hand in 3 places. I ran a scraper for dad at the landfill when he had surgery with the broken leg just easing around and also ran the dozer. When the Dr.s finally released me for work I went back to work running the 5299 for Huffman part time and running athe TD15 and a track loader. Later they gave me a new 300 Komatsu to run. The thing that hurts me the most is working on one they didnt have a site mechanic and when some thing broke it took 2 weeks to get fixed so I used my school of hardknocks education to fix most of the big things and all the maintenance. That hurt me the worse havine to climb up and down stay hunched down welding under some thing. I did a whole under carriage on the D66 Komatsu loader in on 18 hour day. It took a bit of a toll on me.

 

[Blademan]

probably the worse for me was running Cat 613's paddle scrapers . The bigger brothers , the 21's , 31's etc , although not great , they at least has cushion hitches . But the 613's . Wow , straight necks and they'd just pound you into the ground . My neck will probably always be screwed , and if I get into one now , I really feel heat at the end of a day . Dozers too if your in rocks or in frost lumps , except with the buggies you're always sitting half sideways , and your constantly turning your neck around checking the bowl, etc . Your whole posture gets wrecked because of it .
Jumping jacks , and breakers are hard too , especially if you're not using them properly . I used to shake myself numb until I was shown the proper technique for them . Thank goodness those days are done .

Rob

 

[greasemonkey]

I have worked the last 10 years as either a mechanic or running a grease truck. The winters are the worst for me. Climbing up and down, crawling under and on top of everything emaginable while dragging tools, hoses and whatever else with me. The extra weight and stiffness of my Carhartts.

 

[dozerman]

If I was to do it again, the ear muffs would be a must. It get old misunderstanding conversations, not hearing mechinery noises that should'nt be there. Comes in handy when the wife wants the garbage to go out, however.... What was that?

 

[Dirtguru]

I know this is an old thread but since I am currently recovering from surgery on 3 vertabrae between my shoulders I have a lot of time to play on the computer so I thought I would chime in. I have to agree with Blademan on this one, dozers and scrapers, even the big ones will get ya sooner or later.
I knew an old guy named Loydd Rinehardt who had 43 years exp, mostly on dozers but good on everything. The old boy just ate, slept,and breathed dozers, was stiil working every day at 67. Old Loydd had spent so many years on a dozer when he walked he looked as if he was sitting in the seat, kinda bent over, head pointing a little to the right, half sideways, left arm bent at the elbow pointing out in front, right arm seemed to be permenently grasping the blade lever, left eye pointing ahead, right eye always seemed to be looking over his shoulder. The old boy could hardly walk and was obviously in a lot of pain in his later years. You could see him wincing in pain whenever he ran anything else but never on the dozer. It was like he was molded into that seat.
Like most of us on this board he truly loved big yellow iron. So much so he lost his life in April of 2002 in a rollover while working for me. According to the coroner he suffered a stroke while operating a D6R, all of the sudden he just started spinning to the left at full throttle until the the machine upended on a large stump and went over landing on it's side.
All us young "Hayhands" as he would call us will never forget old Loydd and the things he could do, still laugh about how he looked and walked. At least he was lucky enough to be doing what he loved most when he died. The point I am trying to make is hopefully we all quite before we get that bad cause no matter what, after enough seat time any machine will beat you up.
A Chapman

 

[RonG]

I would have to say that running a small dozer in rock would have to be right up there on the discomfort scale.A big dozer is more forgiving but if your tracks are loose they can still beat you up.With the tracks loose you feel every roller riding over a rock and that can get old fast.
One thing that sticks in my mind is spreading topsoil or fine grading in general with the smaller dozers,if the tracks are not adjusted properly every time you change direction,meaning going from reverse to forward or forward to reverse you make the shift change and then have to wait until the sprocket winds up the slack in the track chain then it snaps your neck as it starts moving again.YUK!!
Those old John Deeres would run with the tracks completely collapsed without throwing a track as the adjustment cylinders lost their packing so consequently there were a lot of them out there needing repair.The older ones were not as bad for discomfort as the newer ones in my opinion,starting with the "G" models you sat much higher on the machine and the whiplash effect was worse.I remember of throwing only one track on a John Deere dozer in my 40+ years of running equipment.Now,an excavator is another story.I have thrown plenty of tracks on them over the years.You learn to be careful and recognize the danger signs but you still lose one once in a while. Ron

 

[glsahl]

As a mechanic,I don't get much seat time.Post repair or dianostic testing is the only operating time I've seen,and while scrapers are known to loosen the kidneys,with the cushion hitches and seat suspensions working,I'd put tracked excavators as being harder on a body.
I've a wrench since I graduated,1983,and when I think of some of the people I've worked with,I'll take my aches,hernias,and recently fading eyesight,anytime!I know more guys with hands like "3 fingered Joe",than I would have believed when I saw thoses safety films in vocational school.Glass eyes,prostetic legs,and these guys kept working!The things I learned from these men has kept all my parts right where the good Lord intended them to be.
The lessons they taught me in preparing for work,wheel chocks,supporting hydraulic mechanisms,rigging lifting devices,were all invaluable,but I'd have to say the most important tool they gave me is the ability to listen to my own instincts.Having been taught to trust those "bad feelings",knowing that there's a reason the hair on the back of your neck stands up,in a give situation,and trusting yourself enough to stop,and think things through,is what kept "close calls" from being tragic accidents.
Now as a shop manager,I use the skills to keep my experienced help from getting reckless,and the rookies from "learning the hardway".
Corny as it sounds,"Safety is everyone's concern!"