Working around idiots....

[JimBruce42]

Looks like an awfull lot of trouble to go through for an oil change.

here I thought he was just using a new technique to unload. Just kidding, but in all seriousness hope everything goes well this week and its good to hear you were wearing your seatbelt.

 

[alan627b]

The surgery went fine, they put you under, do the deed and it seemed like no time later, I woke up in recovery! The left wrist is a bit sore, more of an annoyance than real pain.
The real pain is trying to open anything...and it slows my 2 finger typing speed up a little...but if it fixes my arm going to sleep all the time, it will be worth it!
Thanks for the concern, everybody!
The accident happened right alongside the Interstate, where everybody could see it. I took the pictures just to beat anyone else to the punch, and I thought maybe someone could benefit from the experience.
You know the funny thing about the rollover, my last words when it happened were the same ones most commonly heard on black boxes just before a plane crashes.....
"OH ****!!!!!
I swear it's true.....
Flip

 

[wrenchbender]

Glad to hear everything went well :scool and as for the two finger typing I wish I could use two fingers at once.

 

[Blademan]

Alan627B ,

awesome photos . THANK YOU VERY MUCH ...... I'll have nightmares now .

Glad to hear the surgery went OK . Was it Carparal Tunnel Syndrome that caused the numbness ? I've often suffered from it , waking up in the morning with numb hands/wrists , and they would get so inflammed that I'd have a bump on each wrist . Last summer I hand to go to see a doctor it got so bad ,but after some meds and a splint ,things healed up after a couple of weeks or so . I do worry that as i get older it may get worse .


I loved the photo of the side of the cab where the window frame is made out of plywood . I too used to work for outfits that would just patch stuff together to keep it going . If it got too hot in the summer , the foreman would just tell you to quit whining and boot out a window if you didn't like it . Of course , this meant two things . Number one , you'd eat dirt and dust all day , and sweat , so you'd be black by the end of the day . Number two , come fall and it started to get cold ( and it can get really cold , very early up here ) you'd freeze and get snow AND dust swirling around the inside of the cab , so you'd just couldn't win .

Anyhowww , thanks for the memories . I used to really like running scrapers , and especially so when teamed up with another twin operator and we worked well together . It was such a great feeling to get into a syncronous rhythm with another operator and you both just boogied . I loved the ease of loading with an extra two motors pushing/pulling . Except in the lune xxxx or frost , that is ....

Thanks !!

Rob

 

[alan627b]

Hello Blademan, I see you have a good eye. When you work for Flintstone Excavating, you gotta do what you can to keep warm! We had a good guy in our shop, who made these plywood windows, with removable plexiglass, so you could close the cab up to suit the temperature, leaving the frame in place helped keep the heat away in summer, as it was when these were taken..
Walling up that side and the door side is usually enough until it gets really cold..I'd still rather have the EROPS with heat and AC though...
I just got back from the doc this morning, getting the stitches out from my carpal tunnel release. The numbness is getting better, hope it leaves completely.
In two weeks, I have to get the right wrist done, for tendonitus this time. The right wrist gets to hurting real bad, probably caused from sawing my arm off self loading this junk...back and forth on a lever with 10 or 20 pound pull, about 10,000 times a day...when you are reliable you get to work alone a lot.
That, and it's hard to find two of our operators or scrapers that can work together, but I like it when it happens. Push pulling rules with 2 or 3 good operators, and we've had up to 4 hooked together
at one time....stuff happens real fast with a string of 4!
Funny, I always thought scrapers were supposed to ruin your back and kidneys, not your arm and hands!
What a drag it is getting old...
Here's my ride from last spring, when I worked out in Arizona, notice the slight improvement.....
alan627b

 

[Dozerboy]

Alan
How did you like that 21, I demoed one when they first came out. Told the boss to get them if they could turn up the rotation of the auger, it loaded to damn slow. We got one but that was it since there are a lot of old utilities in the ground out here, and if you don't get them all with the rippers you spend the next day cleaning 200lbs of wire off the auger.

 

[Dusty]

man that a caddy next to what u were runnin

 

[alan627b]

Dozerboy, you are right on about the auger speed, although it loaded fine in the fine soil I was working with, if you didn't crowd it too hard. We had to clear old plastic sprinkler type hose off the auger a few times, as this area used to be an irrigated field.
I don't think it would load the heavy clay we have here worth a damn, however. I think this thing loaded about as easy as one of our 627's would have, in the same soil. I'd still rather have that second engine though....
I used to come into the cut, shift into first or second, and hit the throttle lock and load until it was full. It was odd, getting off work and still being clean...a guy could get used to that!
I wish cat had thought up that low effort, single lever control 20 or 30 years ago...
alan627b

 

[Deas Plant]

Nice Ride But A Bit Hi-Tech?

Hi, Alan.
That 621G looks like a nice ride but how did you cope with all that technology that wasn't 30/40 years old? LOL.

Pleased to hear your wrist surgery went O.K. How's it going now? All well, I hope.

 

[LowBoy]

=Squizzy246B

That was beautiful, mate. Keep up the good work.:wink2 :naughty

 

[tw_692000]

road closed non believers as i call them

see thats where i would have been an *******.. road closed means road closed.. back that bitch up.. sorry bout your luck! yeah im a **** but thats me..

im with ya there !!!! I was digging out soft spots in a road and parked my excavator off to one side of the road so trucks bringing in stone could dump in the hole! This was @ lunch time i was sitting in the excavator eating and waiting 4 trucks to show ,when a 4x4 pickup drove around 2 road closed signs he thought he was going 2 drive around the excavator i saw him and jumped out waved my arms in the air to stop him,he drove right in the hole......hahahahaha...... good thing i put the stone in lifts the hole was 3 feet deep he drove in 1foot 1/2 ! when i pulled out his truck he said i saw the road closed signs ,but it didn't say hole in road !!!! as they say HERES UR SIGN STUPID !!!!!!!

 

[Garrie Denny]

Danger-No entry signs would probably work.Who told him you were working the area he entered ?

 

[DoosanFan]

Working this June (winter here in the Southern Hemisphere) I was busy burning fire breaks with neighbours. One morning, I ride with the lorry and tractor and all the labour to meet the farmer and start the burn. This particular day we had had heavy frost, and starting the burn midway up the slope and working down to the bottom of the valley was going to be difficult. Unfortunately, I had to leave, so having convened with my labour supervisors and the farmer, we decided to start at the top of the slope and work our way down. I left. I come back at around lunch time, to find the controlled burn running away on the neighbour's side. His labour was too few, so my labour had to help him put it out. Turns out the farmer told my supervisors there was no way they were going to start at the top, he lit up midway up the slope and told my guys to burn uphill. Despite his being on the up-slope side of the burn, he made my guys burn ahead. No wonder the fire ran away. Once my guys had gotten his side under control, he got in his pick up and sped off. We finished the burn, no more mistakes. He then proceeded to stop me on the road the following day and cuss me and my labour out for his stupidity. Turns out that all of the farmers in the area know him to be a top notch ***hole. Go figure.

 

[95zIV]

Yesterday after we had gotten off track, I got a report from one of the guys working in my gang, "I heard "x" yelling and when I looked up, he was standing on the pusher(we're using a backhoe to slide rail and built a custom pusher bar that replaces the forks) and "Y" had him picked as high in the air as he could. "X" was up there swinging a sledge around above his head."

 

[CM1995]

There is a chain Chinese fast food project going on close to my yard, bid on it but didn't get it. This is an outparcel at a large suburban mall, adjacent to I-65, fronting a well traveled 4 lane HWY.

Anyway I was riding by last week and saw a guy on a 4x4 pallet, on a rental Lull, 15' in the air putting some sort of synthetic siding on. I figured the super had left as it was around 5 PM.. The next day I rode by at 10 AM and the guy was on the pallet again..

The lack of basic safety on some of these sights amazes me.:beatsme It would be just my luck to be finishing up my portion of work and OSHA show up to nail this sub and the GC - then proceed to give us a level one inspection as well..

 

[JDOFMEMI]

I guess that low bidder did not have enough money in his bid to do it safely. I bet he don't have enough to pay the insurance after the idiot falls and breaks his neck either.

It is a shame to have to compete with idiots like that, they screw up the prices in a whole market area.

 

[CM1995]

Yeah Jerry it's all about speed and money sometimes. This GC is from out of state, travels and builds retail accounts.

All the contracts I see now a days have a clause in them that the sub is responsible for it's own safety and if the GC gets an OSHA fine due to the action of a sub, the sub has to compensate the GC for all the costs associated. I think it creates a culture of not caring, since the GC is covered monetarily. :beatsme

It would get interesting if the GC gets a repeat violation via a different sub on a new project.:cool2

 

[JDOFMEMI]

It is sad that the GC treats the subs that way. You would think with heavy handed tactics like that, they would run out of subs to bid to them, but a new sucker or two pos up to replace every on that goes broke working for these kind of crooked contractors.

 

[CM1995]

It is sad that the GC treats the subs that way. You would think with heavy handed tactics like that, they would run out of subs to bid to them, but a new sucker or two pos up to replace every on that goes broke working for these kind of crooked contractors.

Jerry, every contract I have come across in the last 3 years has this type of language. However as we all know, not all GC's are the same. Some I have worked for are very safety conscious and others not so much. Expectedly, the larger the GC, the more safety conscious.

Personally I don't have a big issue with the clause per se, as we try to be safety conscious and follow the law. Here's the problem I have with the blow and go mentality - being on a job with other subs that don't give a damn but blow and go. OSHA man drives by, writes those guys up and decides to give us an inspection as well. Two birds, one stone..

Fortunately work is picking up here and I am finally able to start shifting from hard bid to more negotiated projects and not have to deal with the lowest bid mentality.

 

[RollOver Pete]

Say when..
Ok
there?
more.
There?
little more.
There?
OK
More?






Thats good....