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New Member from Upstate NY (Glens Falls area)

digger doug

Senior Member
Joined
Nov 2, 2011
Messages
1,371
Location
NW Pennsylvania
Occupation
Thrash-A-Matic designer
Another factor, EVERYTHING here is sidehill. Mini excavators don't level themselves. I particularly don't like that, sitting sideways swinging cockeyed to level.
You would think....that the Gehl/Mustang mini with the tilt house would be more popular.
Unlike the old Case/Drott, these swing both axis.
 

Willie B

Senior Member
Joined
Jan 2, 2016
Messages
4,039
Location
Mount Tabor VT
Occupation
Electrician
IH made excavators, I guess production numbers were low. I've never seen one in person. Here, the earliest ones were 100% John Deere.
Crawlers are another matter. In the day, IH sold nearly as many dozers & track loaders as Caterpillar. One family business had dozens of them. They still have two TD7E, they use only for grading new lawns. One had 27000 on the meter last I looked a few years back. They subscribe to the leave it running approach. It might get started at 7:00 AM. If the day doesn't go as planned, it might run overnight before somebody shuts it down. A staggering number of hours accumulate without moving at all.
They also have a fleet of 175 crawler loaders. None see much use these days, but they might put on in the pit to load trucks to exercise it.
The TD15E?, & the TD25C? are sold.
Dresser took over the dozer production with only minor changes at first. My TD7G is VERY similar to the TD7Es, biggest difference is the Cummins engine.
 

ecnorton2001

Well-Known Member
Joined
Feb 7, 2022
Messages
47
Location
Upstate, NY
Reliable, available parts.....Not IH. I've always been a fan of OLD IH tractors, In the 1950s & 1960s, specially in the 1970s the IH tractor dealer was 1/2 mile away.
These days I have a Cub in pieces I keep promising myself I'll reassemble. Engine has been rebuilt.
I have an M, a B275, & a 385. In the shed is another M owned by my son.
Excavators are very rare built by IH, but you know that.
I've never owned an excavator, I consider them less versatile than a backhoe. I have owned 5 backhoes. Backhoes are in my opinion more versatile & much more mobile. I own land 3 miles from home. I can drive there in a backhoe in minutes, It'd take longer to hook the truck to the trailer.
Very true about the mobility of a backhoe. I need something with more reach and since the my land is all attached with where my house is I want need to trailer the excavator. Once I find a machine, I'll move it to my place and it will stay as long as I am there. Hence the reason I need something with parts availability (the excavator version of the the Farmall M) :)
 

Willie B

Senior Member
Joined
Jan 2, 2016
Messages
4,039
Location
Mount Tabor VT
Occupation
Electrician
I follow the publications & on line stuff. I see the bigger excavators listed at 20000 hours. I wonder if that is utterly worn out?
Mini excavators seem more often low hour machines. I suppose the minis are bought new by white collar types wanting a toy. In ten years they haven't used them much.
I had a backhoe, John Deere 410C at 27 years old my son's friend bought it. 2200 hours, it looked pretty good. Nine years earlier a trust fund hippie, maybe 45 years old bought an old farm in VT & moved there. As he explained it, he thought it made sense to buy a backhoe. After 9 years he hadn't thought of a reason to dig a hole.
I hauled it home for the buyer, a builder. He planned to do his own digging.
Two years later, he decided digging was not his idea of fun. He sold it to me. Some of these smaller machines excavator, or backhoe, are owned by people who don't use them every day. They sometimes have a lot of life left in them. Big excavators tend to have a lot of hours on them.

I had it in mind you were way out in the bowels of NY, near Saratoga.
 
Last edited:

casey518

Well-Known Member
Joined
Apr 2, 2020
Messages
150
Location
adirondacks ny
Greetings from Lake Luzerne. Welcome. Massey 35hp tractor and jcb hoe have served me well with a fair amount of tinkerin.
 

ecnorton2001

Well-Known Member
Joined
Feb 7, 2022
Messages
47
Location
Upstate, NY
I follow the publications & on line stuff. I see the bigger excavators listed at 20000 hours. I wonder if that is utterly worn out?
Mini excavators seem more often low hour machines. I suppose the minis are bought new by white collar types wanting a toy. In ten years they haven't used them much.
I had a backhoe, John Deere 410C at 27 years old my son's friend bought it. 2200 hours, it looked pretty good. Nine years earlier a trust fund hippie, maybe 45 years old bought an old farm in VT & moved there. As he explained it, he thought it made sense to buy a backhoe. After 9 years he hadn't thought of a reason to dig a hole.
I hauled it home for the buyer, a builder. He planned to do his own digging.
Two years later, he decided digging was not his idea of fun. He sold it to me. Some of these smaller machines excavator, or backhoe, are owned by people who don't use them every day. They sometimes have a lot of life left in them. Big excavators tend to have a lot of hours on them.

I had it in mind you were way out in the bowels of NY, near Saratoga.
I am starting to look around, at excavators. I am thinking bigger, as I have some jobs requiring more reach and I won't need to haul it around from job to job. I agree the bigger stuff has lots of hours 10K+ or quite a few and large price tags. Smaller ones do seem to be for sale with few hrs, sometimes just 100's. So either someone bought a toy or they found out the excavator was too small. Being raised on a farm, I envision lots of things a big excavator with lift and reach can do (besides dig big deep holes)
I am a little nervous on how you fix the things if they break, as the parts will be big, heavy, and expensive.
 

ecnorton2001

Well-Known Member
Joined
Feb 7, 2022
Messages
47
Location
Upstate, NY
Greetings from Lake Luzerne. Welcome. Massey 35hp tractor and jcb hoe have served me well with a fair amount of tinkerin.
Thanks. Used to live near where west mountain road and luzerne road came together years ago. Seems like there is always some tinkering. At least with the older stuff, you can possibly fix it yourself.
 

Willie B

Senior Member
Joined
Jan 2, 2016
Messages
4,039
Location
Mount Tabor VT
Occupation
Electrician
I am starting to look around, at excavators. I am thinking bigger, as I have some jobs requiring more reach and I won't need to haul it around from job to job. I agree the bigger stuff has lots of hours 10K+ or quite a few and large price tags. Smaller ones do seem to be for sale with few hrs, sometimes just 100's. So either someone bought a toy or they found out the excavator was too small. Being raised on a farm, I envision lots of things a big excavator with lift and reach can do (besides dig big deep holes)
I am a little nervous on how you fix the things if they break, as the parts will be big, heavy, and expensive.
Digging machines are classified by dig depth. Reach is important, but dig depth, not so much. Deepest hole I've dug is 7', what is the value of a machine able to dig 16' deep? It'd be terrifying you'd fall in!
Reach is another matter. A few times, I've used a Kubota miniature tractor fitted with a backhoe when the hole was small. 7' from swing tower pivot to bucket pin, the machine was painfully slow. Dig out a yard, then reposition the tractor to move the spoils, otherwise it falls back in the hole.
 

casey518

Well-Known Member
Joined
Apr 2, 2020
Messages
150
Location
adirondacks ny
I imagine big machines get expensive if you have them long enough to break. Not only parts but now you need another machine or a crane of some kind to lift heavy parts, and you need way bigger tools. If not you pay someone good money who has those big tools. Just be prepared if you go big!
 

ecnorton2001

Well-Known Member
Joined
Feb 7, 2022
Messages
47
Location
Upstate, NY
Digging machines are classified by dig depth. Reach is important, but dig depth, not so much. Deepest hole I've dug is 7', what is the value of a machine able to dig 16' deep? It'd be terrifying you'd fall in!
Reach is another matter. A few times, I've used a Kubota miniature tractor fitted with a backhoe when the hole was small. 7' from swing tower pivot to bucket pin, the machine was painfully slow. Dig out a yard, then reposition the tractor to move the spoils, otherwise it falls back in the hole.
Thanks. Dig depth comes with reach, but reach what I need. I have some dead trees and muck in a pond that I need to clear out, and many trees in hedgerows.
 

ecnorton2001

Well-Known Member
Joined
Feb 7, 2022
Messages
47
Location
Upstate, NY
I imagine big machines get expensive if you have them long enough to break. Not only parts but now you need another machine or a crane of some kind to lift heavy parts, and you need way bigger tools. If not you pay someone good money who has those big tools. Just be prepared if you go big!
That thought is in the back of my mind!! I can probably move around parts up to a ton or so with my tractor and bucket.
 
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