At one point my family was logging with another crew that used a small cat dozer to skid logs. The boss put a brand new saw up on the dozer track, got sidetracked with something else, fired up the cat and proceeded to run the saw off the end of tracks and then under them. Apparently, even one of the old, heavy McCullough saws is no match for a tracked machine. That same crew burned up their skidder/winch truck engine by backing as far down a hillside as they could, getting against a tree or stump, and winching logs out of the holler below them. The No. 1 Main bearing wasn't getting any oil. Also heard stories of them using a big bar to pop the log truck springs back after putting on a little too much wood and pushing the springs down over-center. I wonder what a 2-ton truck has to gross to do that to the springs!
On the subject of the Bell skidder, I have driven some ag equipment with crazy wheels on the rear and it can be interesting. Would probably turn on a dime. The 3-wheel arraingment would seem to be a little unstable, especially while skidding a turn out.
The timber in this area supplied a large portion of the railroad ties used to lay tracks from the Mississipi river to the Rocky Mountains. 9' cuts, hardwood, minimum of 10" dia. on little end, anything over the minimum was just extra wood that had to be cut off with an axe. In the 20's and 30's the men hewing ties by hand got 10 cents a tie, the top hands could hew about 10 ties a day (IF i remember correctly, saw a documentary years ago about it). The ties were hewed, put in a river (usually), floated down in rafts or booms, and then hand carried up a springboard into boxcars. I don't believe I would have wanted to pick a fight with the men that loaded the ties.