We built some excavator to log loader conversions in the late 80s . A good customer we had was importing Hitachis from Japan and we did the hack n slashing on them. I think we did about a dozen machines of various sizes . widened and raised under carriages, raised cabs ,built cabs ,straightened booms on some of them. It was good work ,sometimes constrained by the customers demands but we designed and did it all on the shop floor.
One of the things I took away from the woods when I quit to go into the electrical trade was the idea that you make, build, invent whatever you need if you have the desire. The word can't just wasn't in the woods vocabulary.