The company i work for sent out one of the equipment managers today to look at a 330c i'm running said cat is having a problem with the sticks and booms cracking ,(not from abuse) the stick is cracking on a weld and the booms are cracking between the boom pins and the lift cylinders (not on a weld) said he has not heard on the D models yet.so keep a eye on your machines!
I haven't seen that one yet, did they say its one of the specific booms or all the options? We have some early 330B's with 20 000hrs on em and no cracks, and a couple C's with over 7000hrs on em. Interesting.
I remember a post being started about this same problem with the 420E backhoes, and I heard the 316M series had the same problem.
That's the first I've heard of that kind of problem and I probably look at more excavator and loader backhoe booms than anyone on here. Instead of circulating a rumor I would suggest a photo or two to back up those statements. Just a thought.
On the B's, if the machine had a breaker on it for any amount of time, cracks would appear, even had one lose the top ears. The C's have been good, and the D's have not cracked either.
I dont believe he said the booms are cracked on his machine.Therefore he couldnt produce pictures. Thanks for the heads up cat385. It is nice to see people "show conscern" for other peoples machines. Never hurts to give advise.
Well our 385C had its stick replaced before we even use it due to the quality of construction. Also had about 15 hours of welding to do to the boom and carbody before they would let us use it. Prior to this i worked at the dealer and have seen brand new 345Cs come in with cracked booms so bad they replaced instead of repaired. Mostly where the nose welds on. Many extremely low hour failures. I am told this has changed but am unsure.
All of our C's{11) are operating in the 11K to 24K hour range.Our shop foreman or service dept has not heard of this or seen any signs or indications.The 330C has proven itself to be a true workhorse in our fleet.The 330D's {4} on the other hand have not proven themselves.We have had our fair share of electrical and valve problems.I guess that even a blind squirrell gets a nut every now and then.
No it wasn't my machine, I remember hearing it.
I have seen th same thing on a JD 200clc, cracks down the sides of the boom.
If the manufacturer has a problem that they admit to they will put out some kind of product service bulleton. I've not heard of any cracking problems on Cat excavators or loader backhoes in quite a few years. If anyone knows of one and has the PIP number please let us all know and I will make sure all my customers get the information. I have seen problems on logging booms in recent years and I know they were problems because they were the exact same issue on mulitple machines. I had no problem raising hell with the manufacturer and spreading the word to all my customers about what to look for. However I don't like someone making an unsubstantiated statement concerning any manufacturer out of "concern for others". My thought process makes me wonder who the "others" are and what their motivations may be. The fact that there were no problems found makes the annoucement smell a little fishy.
"Fishy"? am I following you? Are you saying that a possible "anti-cat" guy would start a bunch of crap to push one away from buying a cat? Has this happened before? I think I am following you now
I cant speak for the booms or sticks on 330s. I can speak about the 325 material handlers. The 325Cs had problems with the turntable welds where it meets the carbody. In fact, Cat is just replacing the whole undercarrige, in this case wheeled machine. When we got our 325Ds they had to have some plate welded to the boom where the stick is pinned on due to cracking concerns
This is a problem, When i was still at the dealer, there was about a dozen engineers from caterpillar from all over the place that flew in and inspected the booms, along with several customers low hour failure machines. This was about a week after those 345's landed. I have a feeling it is being rectified quietly. They have covered all boom related failures up to 5000 hours on customer machines. I noticed great improvement over the quality of the structures by the time i left. The 385 was a fluke, It was an inspector who did not do his job as they followed the paper trail and it was supposed to be repaired prior to leaving the factory.
330C boom I rented a 330C with hammer this summer and the sales man was telling me to watch the boom for cracks. (nothing about the stick) He said they had a "couple" crack and were "fixing" them when they did. The machine only had 1500 hours and It did not crack while I had it. A friend/contractor had his 330C boom crack with 1200 hours and Cat replaced the boom. His machine does have a hammer on it some time. I wonder if cracking is due to having a hammer on them. All manufacturers booms and sticks seem to crack when they have hammers on them?
i am a cat person i have ran cat hoes and other cat equipment for 25 years,the co. i work for has almost all cat equipment and a very big customer of cat, and i was passing a little info along!do you want me to go around and take pictures of wich ever excavator in the fleet it was? i know he said they have had two so far in the fleet,if this is what this sites about see you guys later.just remember i told you so!
I would not leave the site over someone that may own a lil stock in cat.Hey Once Again thanks for the heads up!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Let us know if you ever get any more useful info.
As far as Cat backhoes go, Ive heard of the old straight style booms cracking. The B series I know for a fact had a problem with cracking. It happend to the 416B we had. Right were the boom and dipper connect. It opened up right across the pin. The dealer, so I was told, had a pile of booms that cracked at the time.
90% of the machines i dealt with or know of did not have hammers, just buckets. But a couple of them had thumbs.
Boom crack I would not leave the site over one person remarks. His motives could be not ethical. Just because a manufacturer does not publish that they have a problem, does not mean they don't have a problem. Most problems with machines start in the field and the dealers/service dept. are the last to find out. Most dealers love to claim they never heard of problems and it is not until several owners/operators get together that a manufacturer will do some thing. Also many manufacturers will fix a problem and not publish or announce they have a problem. Keep letting everyone know what you hear and don't let one person get you down
I don't think that John C. is unethical, or is acting on behalf of Caterpillar. He does know quite a bit about excavators from what I've read here and elsewhere. I don't think there are any "fishy" claims here, being made by anybody. We all see what we see.
Terrorism has not been completely ruled out. Terrorist will stop at nothing to bring our economy down and defeat our great country.Maybe they (the terrorist) have decided to start at the proverbial "foundation" of our country.................. Laughing my dang azz off :usa
The original post is quoted: "The company i work for sent out one of the equipment managers today to look at a 330c i'm running said cat is having a problem with the sticks and booms cracking ,(not from abuse) the stick is cracking on a weld and the booms are cracking between the boom pins and the lift cylinders (not on a weld) said he has not heard on the D models yet.so keep a eye on your machines!" We have a someone, "equipment managers", sent to check a boom because someone said "Cat is having a problem". This type of statement is called hearsay and is the basic tenant of character assasination. The further descriptor "(not from abuse)" is indicating the problems are spontaneously occurring from what is known in the industry as "inherent defect". The statement further states "the stick is cracking on a weld and the booms are cracking between the boom pins and the lift cylinders (not on a weld)", again implying inherent defect and not observed by the original post. The post further indicates the problem could be occurring in the D models. The last statement "so keep a eye on your machines!" with the exclamation point implies a certainty that if the problem isn't there now, then it will be in the future. Had the post described an actual failure that occurred and then asked if anyone else had seen the problem, I would not have had any problem with it and would further have polled my customer base for similar issues. Had the post stated they had spoken directly with a representative from Caterpillar I most likely would have taken some interest and contacted people I know in the Cat system to see if there was anything to it. The idea that I care whether or not the machines were Cats is absolutely ridiculous. My reaction would have been the same no matter what manufacturer had been stated in the original post. The facts concerning this thread in my opinion are that the original post is full of innuendo and is inflammatory in writing style. This site has a world wide viewership and if you want to make controversial statements to a world wide audience, you should at the very least be able to back them up with observable facts.
less than 1000 hrs. I worked for a contractor in an agg. land fill and we had a boom split right above pin that connects the boom to the frame. I think it might have had 600 hrs, although he was running pulverizers on then exclusively so the extra added weight and the constant up and down movement could have been a factor. Although, he owned 5 or so 330b and 4 330D's that he had no problems with.:usa
"so keep an eye on your machines!" is simply a a statement of caution, NOT of certainty. The exclamation point was a way for the writer to express his OWN strong feelings or emphasis, again not a point of "certainty" As far accusing the OP of "innuendos and inflammatory writing style", you are being a character assassin yourself. (I would know, I went to school for criminal law) The guy was trying to be helpful and nothing else, nobody else is having a problem understanding that.
This summer the Cat service tech was showing me some pictures of a 320 excavator with the boom broke at the base next to the cab an it had swing over into the cab.It didn't look good. It wasn't a new machine by no means and they took the boom and had it rebuilt. The machine was used with a grapple for loading and feeding salvage junk iron.
First, let me address my concerns with the first post. You made the title of this thread "330B and 330C OWNERS/OPERATORS !". This means you include the entire B & C series Cat 330 excavators in your post. You also mentioned the D series as being a suspect for future problems, although they haven't been found yet. I have no idea how many years these series were in production, but to just state that the machines you listed have a possibility of defect is kind of wreckless isn't it? You show no proof, include a wide spectrum of a whole excavator line and then offer us the opinion of a third party. How do you think Cat would feel about that? Some of their folks do frequent here you know....or maybe you don't. From the Forum Rules: The information you have provided us supposedly came from Cat, then went to your equipment manager, then to you and finally to us. That's a fairly long chain where information can easily become misconstrued with rumor. This is the reason behind the rule....to stray away from rumor. The information might be completely accurate, I don't know. I'm not here to determine the accuracy; I'm here to enforce the rules. The only thing you have been asked to do is back up your statement, as we do with every statement of this kind. Doing so will fortify your statement and resolve the possibility of inaccuracies with the information. Every machine is going to have problems, but to say that a whole line of equipment will possibly have major defects is kind of vague isn't it? You should also know the definition of slander then, correct? In case you don't, please see below. We do not want to deter people from passing along problems with their machines but slanderous statements will not be allowed without proof. After all, if you offer proof with a slanderous statement, the statement is no longer slanderous is it? I don't find the direction this thread is taking to be very productive or helpful. Show us some proof to your claims so we may continue to move forward with the topic.
Country Boy, I cant disagree with you. In this situation it would be considered "libel".(basically the same as slander, slander is spoken, libel is written, just thought you may want to know ) It is very clear in 385's post that the information he was providing us was in-fact third party. I did not believe in anyway he (or anyone else) was trashing a particular manufacturer. Should he have worded his original post differently? yeah he probably should have. Was his intention to cause harm? no. I got off on the wrong foot with this post mainly because, I was really blown away by john c's comment: However I don't like someone making an unsubstantiated statement concerning any manufacturer out of "concern for others". My thought process makes me wonder who the "others" are and what their motivations may be. The fact that there were no problems found makes the annoucement smell a little fishy . Cat 385's original post was to simply caution others. It is my belief that neither he nor anyone else had ulterior motives. I would also like to see this topic move on in a productive manner, so with that said, I would personally like to see this "co-topic" be laid to rest
Thank you for understanding. Everyone picked sides rather quickly which is why this thread took the direction it did. It isn't my intent to determine which side is correct, but to elimnate the unnecessary bickering that came about. Third party information usually brings about these types of disagreements because of the difficulty in proving them, hence the rule discouraging them. Hopefully we're all on the same page now. Let the discussion continue...peacefully.
The OP was correct in that Caterpillar does have a service letter out for cracks in the boom on 330C excavators. My dealer is certain that there is knowledge of specific cracking in the boom(s). Mine has 7200 hours, and it has cracked in the exact same place that the boom cracked on my 320C, from several years ago. Working with Cat on this very issue right now. The crack occurs vertically in the side, approx 2 feet back from the boom jacks. It initiates in the side plate, and does not reach the upper or lower box welds, if caught in time. Sorry for dredging up the past on you guys, but, it was, and is, true.