Scrub Puller
Senior Member
Yair . . . .
I started a fourteen pound brisket on the drum early this morning and, and for some time I was busy laying back in the hammock soaking up the morning sun.
As often happens my mind wandered back in time and I thought about how things are done “different” these days.
It seems to me that jobs that used to be easy are becoming increasingly difficult . . . witness Tradesmans battle with a sewage pond and other posts by folks looking to purchase extreme low ground pressure dozers for boggy conditions. Across the years there have been threads on long and not so long reach excavators getting stuck clearing silt from ponds.
Then I see discussions about modifying excavator buckets to have the pins and bushings made to take automatic pressure lubrication with bearings and seals . . . this just to win gravel from thirty feet of water.
It has all been done before of course.
Thirty odd years ago a dredging outfit on the North Coast spent thousands of dollars modifying an excavator stick and bucket to take oversized floating pins, roller bearings and what we then called “Caterpillar” metal to metal seals. The whole thing was oil lubricated with a twenty gallon tank on the stick . . . the theory was that the head of oil would maintain a positive pressure in the housing and keep the crap out.
My boss just shook his head and we continued with the “quick change with the oxy” system described on that thread . . . to take that thought process further he had modified the buckets on his Scoopmobiles to take sections of D9 bushings in the pivots and of course used the D9 pins.
In fact just about every pivot he owned used dozer pins and bushes, cheap as chips he reckoned and it only took a few minutes to split them with the gas axe and knock the buggers out.
The thing is, as I have mentioned, the rock and dirt remain the same and we choose to move it with ever more complex and fragile machinery . . . witness the discussion about pushing trees with a PAT blade.
I have mentioned before (to almost zero response) I reckon there is a machine missing from the arsenal available to contractors today . . . imagine a modern version of a small dragline.
There may be a few on here who have seen a small dragline in full flight baling and I put it to you that (say) a twenty five ton excavator equipped with a side folding lattice boom and hydraulic winches would have many applications.
And what a joy it would be, some real tractive power and easily adjusted tracks and no drive chains and frictions to contend with.
Draglines are not just about mud. I have a thread on here about a contractor I worked for who bid road cuts with a bitser dragline and me ripping, pushing to him, and cutting batters with a D6. He would load hired in road trucks all day and we’d spend half the night on maintenance but it seldom broke down.
Cheers.
I started a fourteen pound brisket on the drum early this morning and, and for some time I was busy laying back in the hammock soaking up the morning sun.
As often happens my mind wandered back in time and I thought about how things are done “different” these days.
It seems to me that jobs that used to be easy are becoming increasingly difficult . . . witness Tradesmans battle with a sewage pond and other posts by folks looking to purchase extreme low ground pressure dozers for boggy conditions. Across the years there have been threads on long and not so long reach excavators getting stuck clearing silt from ponds.
Then I see discussions about modifying excavator buckets to have the pins and bushings made to take automatic pressure lubrication with bearings and seals . . . this just to win gravel from thirty feet of water.
It has all been done before of course.
Thirty odd years ago a dredging outfit on the North Coast spent thousands of dollars modifying an excavator stick and bucket to take oversized floating pins, roller bearings and what we then called “Caterpillar” metal to metal seals. The whole thing was oil lubricated with a twenty gallon tank on the stick . . . the theory was that the head of oil would maintain a positive pressure in the housing and keep the crap out.
My boss just shook his head and we continued with the “quick change with the oxy” system described on that thread . . . to take that thought process further he had modified the buckets on his Scoopmobiles to take sections of D9 bushings in the pivots and of course used the D9 pins.
In fact just about every pivot he owned used dozer pins and bushes, cheap as chips he reckoned and it only took a few minutes to split them with the gas axe and knock the buggers out.
The thing is, as I have mentioned, the rock and dirt remain the same and we choose to move it with ever more complex and fragile machinery . . . witness the discussion about pushing trees with a PAT blade.
I have mentioned before (to almost zero response) I reckon there is a machine missing from the arsenal available to contractors today . . . imagine a modern version of a small dragline.
There may be a few on here who have seen a small dragline in full flight baling and I put it to you that (say) a twenty five ton excavator equipped with a side folding lattice boom and hydraulic winches would have many applications.
And what a joy it would be, some real tractive power and easily adjusted tracks and no drive chains and frictions to contend with.
Draglines are not just about mud. I have a thread on here about a contractor I worked for who bid road cuts with a bitser dragline and me ripping, pushing to him, and cutting batters with a D6. He would load hired in road trucks all day and we’d spend half the night on maintenance but it seldom broke down.
Cheers.
