Loaders, Limbers and Roadbuilders.

[skadill]

I've been to the plant ,that puts these together. I've always kept quiet,even had videos i could have uploaded,but didn't.I'm not knocking the brand or taking on a huge company,but every single component stacked in the yard for assembly has a laminated placard on it for import/dock/shipping identification that is in Chinese characters,i was shocked.Saw that it is an ASSEMBLY facility not a manufacturing facility.Hope no one is offended,not looking for trouble,but have heard of a lot of metal problems through the years on the green machines.

 

[John C.]

Which machines are you talking about. The Hitachi or the Tiger Cat?

 

[skadill]

Which machines are you talking about. The Hitachi or the Tiger Cat?

Deere/Hitachi

 

[Truck Shop]

Cool photos TS! Doesn't he have an 071 Madill also? Would he sell any of it?

Steve would probably sell some items, most have seen pretty hard use. And yes he has a early Madill.

 

[John C.]

I've been hearing about the Hitachi issues for years. Problems at the boom to stick connections and the stick cylinder connections. People whine and complain about it but the dealer says sorry unless the company is big enough to force the issue. I have a client right now that wants to sell both of their one year old 370 shovels and go to all Tiger Cat. Is Wajax still assembling the loggers for Hitachi / Deere.

 

[Hallback]

I owe about 5 million dollars right now and told them if they do not fix that **** that it will be sitting in the street in front of their Branch. I don't f**k around with these equipment dealers anymore I put my foot down and make them do what I want because after all they work for us.

 

[Truck Shop]

You know Hallback that's a good way to handle it. That should apply to everything-cars, trucks, lawn mowers whatever. Freightliner reps won't come to the shop anymore since I
told one of them he was full of Sh!t. And when they did show up it was nothing but double talk just like every industry.

 

[hoechucker]

We just had one of our 3756 (or whatever the new ones are) processors with 4000 I think hours loose a pump drive. Im not sure how that was handled but as far as getting a tigercat we are isolated here where we are and getting service on one would be tough. Not that I sign any of the checks but I sure like the deere salesman in our area. My old 568 with 9400 hours is still going strong with only the normal breakdowns. You can see it in the photo of the 959, broke down with early southstar loading head problems.

 

[hoechucker]

 

[hoechucker]

We've had several of the standard deere issues but the dealer is trying really hard to make

 

[John C.]

So far my clients have had no issue with the service from Tigercat. If there is a question about something, a phone call delivers an answer. They don't get the "who wants to know" or "I've never seen or heard of that type of problem before" kind of crap that is so common with the big three. I know from personal experience that fix as fail is the most common aggravation about warranties and any design problems are always blamed on the operation or the operator. Haullback's situation with the accusation of not greasing properly is the perfect example of a dealer's get out of jail card on warranty repairs.

 

[Hallback]

Deere/Hitachi is trippin' If they think I was going to accept the blame on that. You can blatantly see this thing has been getting lots of grease.

 

[John C.]

The dealer did the same song and dance with Weyerhaeuser Vail a few years ago. Last time I heard from the guys up there was that if there was a problem, they called the people in Eugene.

 

[Plebeian]

Is it feasible to purchase the Hitachi/ Deere without the boom/stick/ cylinders set and have someone like Pierce Pacific do the boom, stick, cylinders, grapple etc? or Is there likely to be a warranty conflict?

Where do the bits for the Linkbelts (Sumitomo/ Case) come from? I see white and yellow machines parked at the Sumitomo factory in Japan.

There was picture posted a while back allegedly showing a set of rusty booms being delivered to Victoria, Texas from an off site supplier.

 

[Hallback]

You should have seen the look on their faces when I sent them these photos. I bought this used 568 because their piece of crap was broken down. Caterpillar yellow or link-belt red makes them greener than a John Deere!

 

[John C.]

All logging fronts used to come from either Young or Pierce Pacific. Link-Belt hydraulic loggers had the FMC booms on the old 5400 and 5800 loggers. But Young and Pierce took over after that for a bunch of years in the PNW. The owner of Pierce was asked to enter into a partnership to take on the Link-Belt dealership around 1991 or so when Howard Cooper Corporation went into bankruptcy. All the Link-Belts then had Pierce logger build ups. I would guess it to be that way still. Jewell came up with their logging fronts and installed them on Kobelco machines down in Portland, Oregon. It wasn't a bad setup but they did add copious amounts of steel guarding on the sides and back of the house and I'm sure those shovels weighed 20% more than the comparable model Link-Belt or even Cat. I know most of those older Kobelco that I did inspections on had worn out Rotec bearings. When I worked for the Komatsu dealer, they used to buy the boom, stick, heel and grapple from either Young or Pierce and install all the guarding package themselves. Bean counters killed that after a few years and turned it all over to Pierce. That ended up being a mess. Wajax is or was the Hitachi dealer in Canada and did their own manufacturing of the logging shovels in British Columbia I think. They build their own booms and sticks which for the most part follow the lines of the Young and Pierce Pacific logging fronts. They just do some dumb stuff now and then and don't want to take care of their customers after that.
If someone knows what is different now, please fill us in.

 

[John Shipp]

"every single component stacked in the yard for assembly has a laminated placard on it for import/dock/shipping identification that is in Chinese characters"
Hi Skadill, just wondering if it was Japanese characters, as they have similar characters in their alphabet.

 

[John Shipp]

Is it feasible to purchase the Hitachi/ Deere without the boom/stick/ cylinders set and have someone like Pierce Pacific do the boom, stick, cylinders, grapple etc? or Is there likely to be a warranty conflict?

Where do the bits for the Linkbelts (Sumitomo/ Case) come from? I see white and yellow machines parked at the Sumitomo factory in Japan.

There was picture posted a while back allegedly showing a set of rusty booms being delivered to Victoria, Texas from an off site supplier.

Japan I believe.

 

[Hallback]

Double post

 

[Hallback]

You are pretty much spot-on John, the jewel booms and guarding package were excellent for the shovel logger down here as it really kept the machine from just getting destroyed. It did a add some extra weight but the Rotech bearings in the kobelco failed because they were a standard Duty excavator bearing and not up to the task for a shovel logging application where your boom is stretched out all the time and the extra Leverage. Pierce and Ian were the two main players for a lot of years and I believe link-belt manufacturers their own booms now in a carbon copy of a pierce.