Wanting to get into the mini ex game

[CaptainTexas]

It's been pretty enlightening to watch this forum for a while, but I finally convinced my finance department (wife) to let me buy a mini excavator. All I had to agree to was selling my boat (damnit) but I have more fun on my tractor anyways. I am completely new as of 6 months ago to anything motorized that didn't come off a car lot, not so much as a ride on lawn mower. But I got a bit of a windfall and went out and impulse purchased a brand new JD 2038r and decided this is my thing. Shame too, because I'm 3 credits from my (CS, ouch) degree. I've been watching equipment trader and Craigslist and a decent sized (i.e. not a go cart motor strapped to a portapotty) mini excavator seems to be unobtainable for less then 25k. I'm not picky but if the turntable is listed as "having some play" and the video shows it kissing its feet I'm not excited. I probably lack the ability to fix it, and I'd rather spend 50k then 25 to buy and 25 to fix. But I found a company that refurbs old komatsu and IHI minis and sells then for highly affordable prices, they have videos where there is no play, the pins, bushings, undercarriage, etc are very tight with no slop, but the things are about my age, and it looks like the plates are in Japanese. Should I be worried? They look great (yeah they repaint them), I mean they handle like I'd expect a 20 grand piece of equipment ought to at the price point, given the age. Typically about high 1000s low 3000s in hours. Am I missing something? Is equipment trader just terrible within 500 miles of me?

Thanks in advance, yes this would be my first heavy equipment purchase that couldn't be misinterpreted as a big lawn mower, but I've got rocks that are bigger than a 1970s sedan engine and weigh as much too. 1 or 2 ton range. And I have a few acres of them. And they need to go, a nice wall would be perfect. Stacked.

 

[lantraxco]

The plate in Japanese indicate a machine built for the Japan domestic market that has been imported into the US, usually referred to as "Gray market"

Imported Japanese gray market machines *can be* a good deal, just know that it is perfectly legal and acceptable IN JAPAN to reset the hour meter.

When shopping for a grey market machine, before you buy make sure you can:
A) Get English manuals, or digital manuals that can be digitally translated to English.

B) Find a dealer in the US that will supply parts for your exact make and model and serial number, *without* complaining or charging ridiculous "gray market" parts prices or surcharges.

C) Be aware that many gray market machines will have been built with, and may still be, Japanese control pattern. I don't recall the exact name but it's neither CAT nor Deere, the swing and bucket are on the left and the boom and stick are both on the right lever. Just remember to ask, or if possible check it physically.

 

[CaptainTexas]

I think that's the ISO/SAE thing, since I'm starting from literally nothing I'll try and make sure to learn SAE (seen it referred to as pattern A in a Messicks video I think.) I was a bit excited about the possibility to not deal with DPF/DEF since it is an 80s or 90s machine, too. The tractor is my first diesel, and my first regen day was hair pulling. Nothing like a 33 thousand dollar machine doing something automatically, but wants a bit of I put that it doesn't ask for. Either way the whole story actually started on tractor by net I wanted a backhoe for the tractor but was disappointed at the price for what I got. If this little mini ex works out I'm going to be one happy owner. If not my wife will poison me I am sure. No pressure.

Honestly though, I'm extremely impressed at the quality difference. Literally 4 mini excavators within about a state of me in my price range and every single one checks a box that starts at least one (most 2) cautionary tales on here. I think one of them might have more than one piece to the slew gear. I don't have the capability to fix that. Most of the rest are not bad on hours necessarily, but the common wear points are just about to come apart and likely need welds of a quality I can't do.

But you bring up a good point, what do metal tracks cost? Just about everywhere I look it's "call for a quote" or put in an email address and various other info I might offer for a drink, or at least a picture of the product (speaking of course of just putting in the generic measurements) I imagine that's a purchase I can just make in advance because it's going to eventually get there.

 

[673moto]

The plate in Japanese indicate a machine built for the Japan domestic market that has been imported into the US, usually referred to as "Gray market"

Imported Japanese gray market machines *can be* a good deal, just know that it is perfectly legal and acceptable IN JAPAN to reset the hour meter.

When shopping for a grey market machine, before you buy make sure you can:
A) Get English manuals, or digital manuals that can be digitally translated to English.

B) Find a dealer in the US that will supply parts for your exact make and model and serial number, *without* complaining or charging ridiculous "gray market" parts prices or surcharges.

C) Be aware that many gray market machines will have been built with, and may still be, Japanese control pattern. I don't recall the exact name but it's neither CAT nor Deere, the swing and bucket are on the left and the boom and stick are both on the right lever. Just remember to ask, or if possible check it physically.

Here’s the patterns on my gray market machine. Somebody switched the hoses around tho... I have CAT pattern in the “K”

 

[Welder Dave]

I think you're better off to stay away from a gray market machine. You get some kind of odd repair and the machine becomes a paper weight because you can't the part(s) you need. Also if someone else is doing the repairs they aren't going to want to fool around trying to find parts or jerry rig things. You'll need a lot bigger machine than a mini for 2 ton rocks. Keep in mind it costs a lot of money maintaining and keeping a machine running and it will breakdown. Simple thing like a blown hyd. hose. Get a new hose for $50 but also need a $50 pail of oil to replace the lost oil.

 

[CaptainTexas]

Appreciate the input guys, thanks. Is it really that hard to find grey market parts? I'm guessing some are more difficult then others, and some machines are worse then others (and apparently some serials are worse then others too) but is there any way to tell if a specific one is passable? Looking for a way to make this work, or at least gauge how difficult it is before I get in over my head. Honestly for my price range I'm still rating local trash as worse then a potentially reasonable if challenging to source tool.

 

[673moto]

Depends on the machine.
I got lucky and mine is basically a Deere 35d.
But for the headache its probably worth it to spend a bit more for something name brand

 

[KSSS]

Do you really need to own one? Once you set your rocks what are you going to do with it? Nothing wrong buying one if you just want one, but perhaps the better money is to rent one for a month in the size you need and call it a day......and keep your boat?

 

[crane operator]

I don't own a mini ex, but I've set a lot of rocks. Are you sure you can set your 2 ton/ 4000 lb rocks with a mini? Its one thing to just shove rocks around, but setting big rocks in walls takes a pretty good sized excavator.

We get in on helping build a lot of big rock walls in a couple resorts by me. The rocks are always heavier than they look. The main mason/ excavator guy that I set them for is always using a 20 ton+ or so excavator. Not a mini.

If you're serious about making walls, I think you are looking at too small of machines, but I haven't seen your rocks, or where you want to put them.

 

[CaptainTexas]

I don't have many 2 ton rocks, but if it's impossible to set them up (or just push them elsewhere) I'm not above using some expansion mortar on them. Actually I have to be rather accommodating with rocks anyway, I'm sitting on maybe a foot of dirt, some parts of my small ranch have more, but I doubt anywhere do I have greater than 10 feet. That's where I'm hoping to change things. I bought a house on a hill, it's a shame it's a limestone hill. So I've been bringing in dirt, the problem is simply burying the rocks doesn't work, they migrate to the surface. So I'd like to get my yard(s) dug up, remove all the rocky soil I can, and start fresh. In the back I have wannabe pasture, the builder (prior to me) didn't do soil remediation, and of course had no soil management, therefore I've lost what soil was likely brought in (which looks to be expensive stuff by the way) to fill in the yard, maybe as much as a 1/4 acre square. Reclaiming that would be nice. Playing a long game here, pretty sure there is 10 years of work to do if I wanted and not bothered by getting a small machine, if it can't then I'll wait till I'm comfortable with a larger one, even a rental won't help me if I can't use it properly, not to mention that I'm working around exceedingly old oaks that would ruin my property values if I lose them, they canopy most of my small private road, and even a sizable box truck can't get in one side of my road, and the other side is down hill and an empty light trailer got stuck there last time I used that side.

I think there was like 5 jobs to do in just that last paragraph. I think I might buy an excavator. I'll have to send a picture of my "pasture" I have goats and can't trim their hooves, because they can't grow it as fast as the insane amount of 5 or 8 hundred pound rocks are in that particular spot. I've been successfully removing them and built myself a pretty long fence already just with a bucket, a prybar and a ton of sweat. But I think the amount of rocks I can access and move will only grow with any excavator that doesn't turn into yard art.

 

[Welder Dave]

First you say you have 2-3 acres of 1-2 ton rocks and now you say you don't have many??? I don't know but you seem to be all over the place. Equipment can be nice to have but they don't call it a money pit for nothing. If you can't do repairs yourself it gets real expensive. Hard to give a price on undercarriage without knowing what size of machine but figure a minimum of about 8K and up for steel track undercarriage. If you want to pick up rocks you'll probably want a hydraulic thumb.

 

[gwhammy]

I've got a 18,000 lb. machine, it will handle a 3500 lb. concrete block with the bucket off but not real good. A 12,000 lb. machine will probably drag and push the bigger rocks but anything smaller is of little use.
For personal use a rubber tired backhoe might be of more use. Pushing and hauling dirt and rocks with the ability to dig and pick. Just a thought. I sold a fairly nice 18,000 lb fwd extendahoe for the same money a decent 12,000 excavator cost. Since I have a skid steer and bought a excavator the backhoe only got used a couple hundred hours a year in my business.

 

[CaptainTexas]

I was speaking directly of the 2 ton variety in response to crane operators' post. I still have many of the others, but so far I can't do anything about those even approaching that size and there thankfully haven't been many. Sorry if that was unclear, just responding to posts. I'd like to increase the amount of rocks I can deal with, if that means whatever I want, great. If that means pushing them away from my hill top, so be it, I can't do either now. But honestly all the rocks I have are partially buried so for all I know I could run into nothing but 300 pounders which my tractor can handle at any time. But given my average over the last 1/2 acre I'll get one or two ginormous ones that I'll take a saw, wedge, and jackhammer to, and only to "lower" their height so I can bury them fully, then maybe 10 to 50 ones too big for my tractor to lift, but able to be broken and removed painstakingly, with the rest being not valid for this conversation because existing equipment handles it fine. If I can handle that 50ish amount with as little trouble as the bottom tier then I'll be a happy mini excavator owner. If I can use gravity (and the mini) for the 2 ton+ category that's great, there is exposed bedrock along the route and it might solve two problems at once! If not, well doesn't really change my situation that much.

I don't think I'm in the market for more then 12k of machine, and probably not that much honestly. I can always grow my requirements until it's a 120 ton behemoth, but at the end of the day I have to justify it to my wife, and about 7k seems right. If it turns out to be a great thing, and I can get a ton of usage out of it then she usually is OK with me expanding, selling and upgrading. Currently I'm entertaining ideas of getting proficient with it and maybe doing some odd jobs for the farmers I'm surrounded by. They're always looking for help with washouts and ditching, but that won't be a primary concern. I've got plenty to do where I am on my own land. As I said 10 years of work if I want it. Probably 2 years with a serious machine (as in no mini in front) and my typical schedule, but I don't have any desire to deal with something too big for a gasser or light diesel to pull, or anything that might stray into CDL territory to pull, which includes bringing a small tractor on board too.

Appreciate the responses guys! Seems like the consensus is: get a small one, consider a wheeled one, avoid grey market if possible, 2 ton is out of scope, what the hell are you talking about we need pictures!

Pictures will follow but it went from 75 out to 9 and snowed here, which hasn't happened while I've been alive, so we're in pause mode and without power. Fun times.

 

[CaptainTexas]

I don't own a mini ex, but I've set a lot of rocks. Are you sure you can set your 2 ton/ 4000 lb rocks with a mini? Its one thing to just shove rocks around, but setting big rocks in walls takes a pretty good sized excavator.

We get in on helping build a lot of big rock walls in a couple resorts by me. The rocks are always heavier than they look. The main mason/ excavator guy that I set them for is always using a 20 ton+ or so excavator. Not a mini.

If you're serious about making walls, I think you are looking at too small of machines, but I haven't seen your rocks, or where you want to put them.

While I'd like to circle around and say I'm using an internet calculator or my own measurements of a irregular shape to guess weight here. Assuming all the rocks I can get completely unearthed are the limestone I think they are, and assuming a weight of between 150 and 162lb per ft^3 I'm looking at rocks that almost totally fall in the 1200 to 1500 pound range, with outliers that are at *least* 4000 pounds which I cut down with a demo saw, jackhammer, and wedge and hammer. None of this (for those size anyways) is to break them, they're just too big. It's to make them shorter so I can bury them. But flipping them out would be great. I've got an incline (conveniently away from my house, and down into my valley) and gravity is probably up to the task. Besides, I wanna see what happens, and maybe record it. If I do run into rocks that none of this works on expansion mortar generally works, I'm not on a schedule, and three days to wait for it to kill a boulder is fine, when it warms up at least. I'll get pictures of the (small, 1500 pounders) I've conquered so far. Most were too big for the tractor to brute force, but being rocks I was able to outsmart them and they sled out just fine. Standing them up depended on shape. I had one maybe 5.5 feet across, 4.5 feet tall and a foot and a half thick that fought me. But unless I'm mistaken that's about 3,000 pounds of rock. The rest are just more or less 2x2x2 (or 3x3x3) cubes oddly enough. I'm wondering if it's tailings from the builders, and they cut or broke them to the smallest size to be efficiently moved by a small skid steer.. then buried the damn things. Either way erosion has unburied the tops of many of them, and aside from an eyesore it prevents easy access down the backside of my property.

It's impressive how quickly rock gets heavy though, the 2 foot semi-cubes are totally manageable, while the square cube rule makes the 3 footers absolutely a nightmare. Difference of approximately 1200 pounds to 4600 pounds. I've been able to roll several in the in-between sizes out effectively but it's not really the norm. I need heavier equipment for that. Actually I have one I might take pictures off that I think might be in that range, tractor was able to sled it but it dug a channel in my driveway, which wouldn't normally be impressive, but my driveway is bedrock. Had to cover it with gravel to hide it from my wife. Ha!

 

[Welder Dave]

If you're dealing with a bunch of rocks over 500lbs. you want an industrial machine to deal with them. An AG tractor with a loader will be ruined in short order. If all you had was a dozen maybe but it sounds like you have lots.

 

[CaptainTexas]

I think I may have purchased several square acres of them.

Loader is pretty worthless for most rocks, prybar works fine, and if I don't burn up the jackhammer I'll keep working. My intention is saving myself some serious back for getting old with, and delegating the tractor to being a tractor, basically pulling what I dig up with something else.

The loader was a game changer for the rocks I was working with pre tractor, but then I started trying to move ones that are like car hood sized and a foot thick, and it became obvious it was too much. I have zero illusions that upgrading even to a 6 ton excavator will result in the same thing: I'll find new rocks I can't do what I want with and will be looking at new tools. Probably a hydraulic breaker for the mini. But I'm hoping that this will be the final stop.

 

[gwhammy]

I'd probably rent one for a weekend and see what a certain size does for you. Lot cheaper than buying something that won't work. I dug a basement this fall and ran into rocks I could barely roll with my 200 komatsu. Rocks do get heavy in a hurry. I run into a lot in our part of the country.

 

[CM1995]

I've got a 18,000 lb. machine, it will handle a 3500 lb. concrete block with the bucket off but not real good. A 12,000 lb. machine will probably drag and push the bigger rocks but anything smaller is of little use.
For personal use a rubber tired backhoe might be of more use. Pushing and hauling dirt and rocks with the ability to dig and pick. Just a thought. I sold a fairly nice 18,000 lb fwd extendahoe for the same money a decent 12,000 excavator cost. Since I have a skid steer and bought a excavator the backhoe only got used a couple hundred hours a year in my business.

Same here. My 420DIT will set a 3500-3800 manhole base in a shallow 4-5' deep hole but the conditions have to be right and she doesn't like it.

A 420 and 308 midi will lift similar weights.

 

[KSSS]

I think honestly your caught between wanting to buy a mini ex and trying to find a way to justify it. Your all over the map on this thing. Reading all of this several times, I cant for certain follow your thought process. If you have a couple acres of rocky ground composed of various sized rocks, consider this: Rent a 160 or 210 with a thumb and rake the entire property. Sort the rocks and pile it by size. Use the sorted rock to build whatever you want to build, and sell the rock you cant use. Cover the area with 6" of soil if you need to and plant it back in pasture grass as you reclaim it. Your not going to buy the one size mini ex that is going do all that you what you need to do. So don't waste your time and money trying to accomplish that. Rent a machine that can handle the biggest rocks and use that to reclaim the property.

 

[CaptainTexas]

I think honestly your caught between wanting to buy a mini ex and trying to find a way to justify it. Your all over the map on this thing. Reading all of this several times, I cant for certain follow your thought process. If you have a couple acres of rocky ground composed of various sized rocks, consider this: Rent a 160 or 210 with a thumb and rake the entire property. Sort the rocks and pile it by size. Use the sorted rock to build whatever you want to build, and sell the rock you cant use. Cover the area with 6" of soil if you need to and plant it back in pasture grass as you reclaim it. Your not going to buy the one size mini ex that is going do all that you what you need to do. So don't waste your time and money trying to accomplish that. Rent a machine that can handle the biggest rocks and use that to reclaim the property.

Like I said, I'm not going to stress if it's too small, all that changes is my toy budget, and my chances of having a toy budget in the future. Maybe renting something could be an idea, but again as I've said my hard limitation is what I can haul, which isn't much. Renting or demoing has been a thought, but I can't afford to rent for the 6 months to a year I'd need it, and I doubt even the awesome dealership I've been doing business with would let me keep one of their minis for serious work (rightly so).

Hell, if I don't find one I like that doesn't change anything either, but it's getting to the point where I swear it feels like I just let go of the jackhammer and my hands are numb all the damn time. If it was just 2 or 3 acres maybe I'd be fine but it's at least 5. Probably time for a bigger/better tool, I just don't know what.