jcb rubber track

[Digdeep]

My experience is different than what you are saying here. I have rented ASVs, in the past, and have had derailment issues. I demoed a Cat 257 (has the ASV undercarriage) for about 40 hours. The machine was used for dirt grading, pipeline bedding (with sand), and spreading/grading road base. When I decided I did not want to buy the machine they took it back. A week later the dealer called and said that I owed them $5,600. One of the front idlers (plastic) had a hole in it. According to them both tracks were ruined so they wanted me to buy those too. I don't abuse machines. I have high hour machines (even VERY high hour) as evidence. I used this machine in the manner I would have any other. This undercarriage has serious limitations (just look in the manual) that would be a deal killer if I was looking for a tracked machine. Restrictions like no driving across slopes, or no turning on grade transitions. This would be a great machine for mowing lawns I guess but I digress. How can $5,600 in 40 hours be concidered anything but VERY high maintenance costs? BTW that money is exclusively an undercarriage cost. That's $140 per hour plus purchase price, normal PM costs of the machine, operator, overhead, and, if you dare, profit. It's unfortunate. I really liked the way the machine worked. It had a very smooth ride especially when you consider that it's a tracked unit.

That sounds to me like your CAT dealer was trying to put the screws to you and needs to have their head examined. I've always contended that CAT had no business puting a 257 on that undercarriage anyway because it'sa ton heavier than ASVs machines. I have the same undercarriage on my RC50 and I couldn't dream of incurring that much cost in that short of time and I've done a lot of the same types of work you have done. I have well over 2,000 hours on the machine and I know it hasn't cost me that much, and I've puchased new tracks and a few rollers. Typical CAT.

As far as not being able to operate on a slope...my machine has a slope indicator that came standard on the gauge console and the ASV manual even rates it for slope work. It must just be a CAT thing.

 

[cat943]

Hi all I love a good debate on equipment ok I have a cat 247b and it has the ASV track system on it. When I got the machine it had 2303 hours on it I have put 50 hours on it as at the moment I only work it part time. In that 50 hours I have operated it on side slops run it up on stockpiles done sharp turns on concrete drives and asphalt roads ran it on crushed rock as well. As far as wear goes I would estimate the tracks would need replacing in around 800 hours and I will change all the rollers as well when I fit new tracks.
The cost to replace all the rollers and the tracks from cat is $12000 now the cost per hour taking into account the tracks lasting 800 hours will be $15 a hour that’s not to much of a cost for a smooth ride. A tire bobcat would be cheaper per hour but its not suited to the work that I do. If I did most of my work on the roads then yer I would have a tire machine

the asv is a high maintenance, smooth riding machine. If u got time and money, get one. i would never own one because i do not tolerate machines that need maintenance more than once a year.

As for machines not needing maintenance thought out the year yer right I like to see that. All machines when they work need money spent on them that’s just a fact of life

Ok now all track machines will wear regardless of wether its rubber and fibreglass as in ASV tracks or steel as in bobcat and the like it all depends on what the machine works in and how its operated. Just run a D6 in sand and see how long steel tracks will last” I can tell you it won’t last long “.

Here is a pic of the tracks as they are at the moment the rollers have some chips on them and the tracks have a few nicks but it all works ok…

 

[dave esterns]

$15 per hour just for track repair!!!! thats outrageous!! you landscaping types need to hang around us farmers more often. people talk about maintenance and how important it is and stuff...i am here to tell you it is overrated. but i also own sweet machines that are awesome. for example, we have a 95 hp john deere 1997 7210 farm tractor. we do the work normal people would have a 150 hp tractor on. we put 1000 hours a year on in rough conditions and abuse this machine like you would not believe. i run it through the shop every spring and put all new filters on it and change the engine oil; the coolant and tranny fluid have never been changed (9000 hours on it). i guess i do change the engine oil again in the fall (so every 500 hours). otherwise this machine gets absolutely no attention the rest of the year. the tractor runs and drives like new yet. our total cost of ownership per hour for this farm tractor is less than $4 an hour!! oh, and i am currently in the process of turning up the fuel pump to get another 15 hp out of it, and im not concerned this is going to cause any problems even with 9000 hours on it. oh and the tractor has never been to the shop its entire life. thats what im talking about. not to mention our 1968 international 856 with 11,000 hours still has the original engine that runs like new, and original tranny and rear end, cost of ownership on that machine would be hardly anything.

 

[cat943]

Ok well I’m not a landscaping type at all as I said I only work the 247 part time on the weekends I will use it full time in the next few (hope) weeks as soon as my boss gets a replacement operator for me.

My normal job is at the moment is working in a quarry operating a 35t excavator a D6 dozer and a 966 wheel loader most days I spent 10 hours a day 5 ½ days a week swapping between all of the machines.
But that said I spend about 70% of the time on the excavator my operating hours for a year are about 2200 hours a year.


Now the machines at the quarry have to be maintained the oil is change with the filters every 500 hours and the loader and the excavator are serviced between 3 to 4 times a year. The dozer maybe gets 2 services a year just depends on how many times we use it.

With my own equipment it won’t work in the conditions that the bigger equipment that I work with do but that’s no excuse not to maintain it.

Now on some farms you can get away with minimal maintenance but try that with a $300.000 excavator hm I don’t think so…

 

[Digdeep]

$15 per hour just for track repair!!!! thats outrageous!! you landscaping types need to hang around us farmers more often. people talk about maintenance and how important it is and stuff...i am here to tell you it is overrated. but i also own sweet machines that are awesome. for example, we have a 95 hp john deere 1997 7210 farm tractor. we do the work normal people would have a 150 hp tractor on. we put 1000 hours a year on in rough conditions and abuse this machine like you would not believe. i run it through the shop every spring and put all new filters on it and change the engine oil; the coolant and tranny fluid have never been changed (9000 hours on it). i guess i do change the engine oil again in the fall (so every 500 hours). otherwise this machine gets absolutely no attention the rest of the year. the tractor runs and drives like new yet. our total cost of ownership per hour for this farm tractor is less than $4 an hour!! oh, and i am currently in the process of turning up the fuel pump to get another 15 hp out of it, and im not concerned this is going to cause any problems even with 9000 hours on it. oh and the tractor has never been to the shop its entire life. thats what im talking about. not to mention our 1968 international 856 with 11,000 hours still has the original engine that runs like new, and original tranny and rear end, cost of ownership on that machine would be hardly anything.

Must be good to be you. If everyone else in the equipment world was lucky enough to have your experience there would be no need for dealers....the factories would sell direct and since machines never breakdown, experience idiots operating and abusing them on a daily daily basis, need engine oil changes, hydraulic adjustments, etc. all the mechanics would have to go to medical school. It would be like ordering from the Cabelas magazine.

 

[dave esterns]

ah yes, well, my strategies are somewhat warranted based on my life experiences.

first of all you have to find out what the good machines are out there and get those, even if they are the older model without all the bells and whistles.

i always said farmers are the only people who are willing to pay a premium for the older model over a new model.

i usually buy all my machines slightly used with only a few hundred hours on them. i always buy local and generally know the history of the machine.

i have always liked getting the smallest of the biggest, not the biggest of the smallest models because most of the time they are overbuilt.

as far as my maintainance strategy. it seems to me if you are going to have a catastrophic machine failure, changes are there is nothing that you could have done to avoid it. its pretty much the luck of the draw. i have had 2 tranny failures in 2 different farm tractors more recently. one was a case ih magnum 7120 and one was a case ih mx200. these were both early hour failures, before any maintainence was even called for. at the time neither of these machines were abused because we did not have any farm equipment large enough to work them. i think we did blow every hydraulic hose on the farm once we got the 7120 because the hydraulic pump was 3 times what our previous ih 986 tractor had.

the reason i dont bother to change tranny fluid anymore is because... the tranny went out of the 7120 just after i changed the fluid $14000, the neighbor changed his tranny fluid at the same time in his tractor and had problems right afterwards. i changed the tranny fluid in the dodge truck (this was all years ago) and the tranny went the next day. did the same to the oldsmobile intrigue and the tranny went within a couple days. so i said hell with it...and have not had a problem since. i guess you could say i somewhat follow the owners manuals recommendations of machine maintenance, i just triple their numbers that im interested in and ignore the rest.

our honda 4 wheelers get 3000 miles a year put on them, we run them to about 9-12000 miles, change the oil a couple times, and thats it. never have any problems with them, except for the electric shift shenanigans sometimes.

i do use exclusively cenpeco oil and grease which i believe in.

i drive my machines around 2000 hours a year between doing all the farm work like milking the cows and such.

i like to run the fine line between respectuflly abusing my machines, and just being retarded. obviously if it looks like im going to snap the skid steer boom while im leveraging things around, i back off. if im experiencing power hop with a machine, i back off the throttle so as to not cause harm.

a lot of equipment has grown on our farm, but the tractors have not yet grown with the equipment, so its not uncommon for me to pull around 35,000 pounds with a 12,000 pound tractor. most of the time the work i do in my tractor could never be done by an average operator. if im in the skid steer the rear wheels just have the tiniest amount of weight on them just to make it look like im not going to topple over forwards. and when im in the process of dumping the back of the machine comes off the ground, but only to bounce back down once the bucket is emptied. its how i roll, i work with what i have and get things done.

i dont see why the purchase cost of the machine would matter much.

obviously if your running your machines 24 hours a day they are going to need more maintenance. doesnt seem like thats the case since most ppl comment that they have 1 or 2000 hours on their machine.

 

[Andy512]

A review of the new JCB skid steer by Construction Equipment Magazine

http://www.constructionequipment.com/article/top-operators-can%E2%80%99t-defeat-jcb%E2%80%99s-powerboom

 

[JCBiron]

Next time the JCB boys call, you might want to ask them why when sitting in the cab of their CTL you cant reach the door handle to close it. I sat in one at ConExpo and tried to close the door and no dice. Unless you are part Sasquach you cant reach the door. I mentioned this to the rep who was walking around the machine with me. He did not have a response. He said that they blew that. Kind of a big goof I thought. How does a machine make it through a multi million dollar redo and THEN you find out that you cant close the door while sitting in the machine.

You have to give a little to get a little.....by making the entire side of the machine the entry door, it does put the handle a bit out of reach when you are sitting in the seat, but I was able to simply lean forward and reach the handle, and I am only 5'10". I don't think it was a "goof", I think that's just inherent of the design....and it is quite easy to grab the handle as you are still standing/getting ready to sit down.

I wish I would have known you were there....I worked the booth (specifically the skid section) Tues. and Wed. all day....you must have just got the wrong rep! (even though I don't work for JCB).

So, the million dollar question, what did you think of them? I'm not asking if you are ready to go trade your Case in on a new JCB, but what were your honest opinions on the machine build/quality/comfort/features/etc?

 

[JCBiron]

They discontinued the free life time warranty on the boom. Now you have to buy it.

While it is true that they no longer offer the boom warranty as a "Standard" feature, it is still available (as you noted) for a nominal fee (either $250 or $350, i've heard both and not yet been confirmed on which is correct). Their thought process for this was that they were putting the decision in the customer's hands. If a guy feels that he wants the extra piece of mind of having the lifetime warranty, so be it. Otherwise, he can save himself a few hundred bucks. No matter how you slice it, no other manufacturer is willing to warrant their two arms for any price.

 

[dave esterns]

yes. and i have seen quite a pile of broken booms on hew holland and bobcat. no other brands are around.

 

[KSSS]

While it is true that they no longer offer the boom warranty as a "Standard" feature, it is still available (as you noted) for a nominal fee (either $250 or $350, i've heard both and not yet been confirmed on which is correct). Their thought process for this was that they were putting the decision in the customer's hands. If a guy feels that he wants the extra piece of mind of having the lifetime warranty, so be it. Otherwise, he can save himself a few hundred bucks. No matter how you slice it, no other manufacturer is willing to warrant their two arms for any price.

I was trying to remember what day I was there talking to the JCB guys and I think it was Wends. I sat in the tracked machine with the mulcher on it. I am 6' and I could not reach the door handle on that machine. I am not saying that the machine is a POS because of that only that it should have been addressed before production in my view.

The serviceablity seemed ok. I liked the cab layout. Having the door on the side allows for more of a wheel loader type layout of the cab which was nice. Fit and finished gave the impression that it was a quality built machine, at least in view.

I don't question the boom strength. I think the warranty is necessary simply because of the way it is designed. It makes guys question its functionality and durability.

The real question is how it runs. That I don't have an answer for.

 

[dave esterns]

i have decided that you are probably making too big a deal out of this door handle issue. there are very few machines where you can close the door from the seat without moving. dont make me start making crap out of the engineering flaws on your case machines, flaws that are a lot more obvious.

 

[KSSS]

Fire away. Maybe before being a JCB fanboy you should actually buy one, then tell us all about it. I had more to say but I will leave it at that.

 

[WV earth mover]

Easy now the main reason for this thread was to get opinions on how well the jcb rubber track handles its self on steeper ground like 25 to 30 degrees range not to argue .The steep ground issue is 80% of why i need a ctl but the only 2 that i have tried are cat 277B and the terex/asv pt80 both do very well but im not sold on the asv track yet but all of the ctl's with steel undercarrige seem to have alot of overhang past the bottom rear idler.I want to worry about the oil pump picking up befor i get light in the front it is very common for us to have to work on slopes that steep our last retaining wall job required us to carry all the block and all the gravel about 300 ft on 25 degree slope and at an angle just to get material to the wall .The slipping of the tracks was awfull on the asv that what i really dont care for about them its not the wear i think that could be fixed by installing the aluminum idlers and rollers.

 

[dave esterns]

ah. all i know is you can run our bobcat on any slope it will go on and never had a problem.

u see i would buy a jcb skid steer, however, they do not make my size yet. so i have to wait.

how bout the oil filter location on the 400 series.
the fact that you have to stand on your head to work on anything. (clearly worse on case)
the junk 420 engine.
the huge pain it is to keep replacing the hydraulic hose that blows that goes under the engine.
1 piece of glass on the outside of the cab and one in the inside on the side of the cab.
tiny cab. there is no reason for that. there is no way to argue that it is not too small. 1845 cab was fine... y did they have to make it smaller?
"pressurized cab" on the 430 420 and 440 where you can clearly see daylight through the floor.
cheap door handle
foot throttle linkage that sticks on certain machines.
axles that you have to grease.
do you still have to crawl under the machine and take the access panel off to change oil?

 

[WV earth mover]

I once owned a 1845C and loved it when i went to trade it on a new case 430 in 06 i noticed when i sat in the 430 in a normal position i could only see about 4' of 6' cutting edge without leaning way ahead that was definetly not the case on the 1845C maybe that issue has been addressed on the new ones i dont know anyway i ended up buying a cat 236B that day and ended up spending 2000$ less due the trade in amount given .Dont get me wrong i like case stuff i have cx31b exc and a 580L both of which i think are top of the line.

 

[KSSS]

Do you want me to run down BC or JCB? I wont run down either one. I guess after 16 CASE skid steers you would think I would have gotten smarter by now. I mean with the cheap door handles and sticky foot throttle (really), grease the axles? All those JCB models and they don't make a model to fit you?

 

[dave esterns]

ah i would like you to run down both. see what the competition says about my machines. hey i have an open mind (thats why im open to jcb) i never considered case until one day i accidentally noticed that a 440 series 3 is fairly sweet. since then i have lost interest in case because their new machines are crap in comparison.

no jcb is eventually going to have 18 models. their smallest machine built in savanah is the same size as a 435 or 250. too big. im looking to replace the s185.

so how many hours do you run your 16 skid steers to? my brother in law has a case 465 and he has had a a lot of problems with it and he always complains about how slow the boom is.

yes i dont see why you would need to grease axles on a skid steer. what a pain.

 

[WV earth mover]

You 2 better calm down befor i come take both your machines and put ya in 80's model mustangs with a t handel controls and no doors or foot throttles hahaha

 

[dave esterns]

haha. ah we have been running bobcat machines since about 1970. never had a major failure unless the machine was worn out anyway. of corse, this was before i was born. i grew up running the 743 and 773. that new black vertical boom was the coveted machine at the time.