Cat is selling purpose-built foresty line to Weiler, the manufacturer of praving products for Cat. Looks like Cat plans to continue building forestry excavators. https://www.equipmentworld.com/cat-...business-with-sale-of-product-line-to-weiler/
There has to be something between the lines in that article. Strangest thing I have read in a long time.
A local contractor told yesterday that forestry , logging is only 5% of there business.
I wonder if this is mostly about labor costs and unions? Cat dumps manufacturing onto a company who may be nonunion, or at least, pays lower wages, then gets to sell the Cat-designed machines again and make a bigger profit. As they say, "Follow the money".
Could be as simple as the forestry line was not that profitable for the investment. With the construction equipment market booming that would make sense. Just like my business I could try to do 20 different scopes of work, run ragged and not make a profit or focus on what we are good at make money. Just my $.02 On a side note I will be driving right by the training and demo facility in Auburn this afternoon. This facility is a co-op of sorts with Auburn's Forestry School.
Back in the 1960s they were so proud of their forestry equipment. My grandfather was in a full size photo one month of the calendar, skidding logs with a D6 or something. But times change, that was several generations ago.
It’s all about shareholder value. A long time ago Caterpillar forgot it was the customers that made them the money. Somewhere about the time the pacman logo was retired I would say.
All the purpose built forestry machines are manufactured in Georgia not far from Auburn. I can't say for sure but I doubt any type of union is involved here. My opinion is that profits are the motive. The Cat skidders have gone in and out of favor through the years. Popularity started to gain with the B series and peaked with C. The 525/35/45C were they best overall skidder ever made IMO. The redesigned D series has been a debacle. It is not just emission issue, it is transmission issues, boom breaking off , wiring harness issues. Some of my customers have had as many as 50 service calls related to warranty and updates. However, Cat seems to be taking care of the customers with loaner machines and such. We have not even got into the purchase of Blount( hydroax and prentice, both formaly good machines). Poor Quality and problems that can't seem to be resolved . Wieler has a hard row to hoe on this deal. I hope they can turn it because that just leaves us with Deere and Tigercat.
What about track skidders? They seem to be reasonably popular around here.
They stopped making 517/527 several years ago. To get a brand new one, you have to get a D6N-based TSK from Peterson. http://www.petersoncat.com/products/new/track-skidders/tsk My guess is Cat wants forestry machines for their dealers to sell, but they don't want to invest in engineering/production for product updates. The relatively low volume and low parts commonality with the rest of their equipment probably doesn't help.
This year at OLC they had both the Peterson ugly as sin 527 and a true new 527 from cat. Some time back before we picked up our JD 1270 we looked into a Cat 501 to replace our JD 653 with the 4 roller fabtek same head and the 501 is something we were familiar with from the Fabtek days. Glad we didn’t with the locked down systems they run a lot of customers aren’t the happiest with how stuff has been handled. Seems like every time Cat gets its hands into a company they monkey it up pretty good.
I didn't know they started building 527's again. Cat no longer the builds the D5N, so there are a lot of parts that only get used in the 527 now. I think i'd rather have a TSK with diff steering.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the track skidder, shovels, and processors don’t go with a non compete for x amount of years kind of like Timbco when it got sold to Valmet/Komatsu. Other then some shovels I haven’t really seen much new Cat stuff sold out here.
Honestly the forestry market is a loss generator for a multi faceted company like Cat. Tigercat is light years ahead of them in forestry & they know it. With Deere, Komatsu, Madill, Link Belt, ect, Cat realized it's best to sell a sinking ship that will float long enough to get to the bank instead of totally redesigning the chassis of each model for the tier 4 compliant power package and watch it sink out of sight.
The information in the article indicates the sale only covers rubber tired machines. Those types of machines are suited to flat land tree farming found in the south east and south central parts of the United States. Cat acquired the Blount / Prentice lines some years ago and never really did anything with it. What does surprise me some is Weiler expanding out of the pavement business. From my experience it is like trying to work on construction equipment in a truck shop. While a lot of stuff seems to be the same it never really works well enough to make any money.
That leaves excavator-based swing machines and track skidders, if they continue to build the 527. Surely the track harvesters are going with the track bunchers. The article doesn't mention wheel harvesters and forwarders one way or the other.
Cat hasn't built the track skidder line for years. If you know of a used 527 that could be rebuilt post it up as they are rare. A wheel feller buncher is the same as a wheel harvester. The forwarders have been a huge problem since Cat took them over and I don't know of any working in this area of the country anymore. The only unit I know of that was sold in this area was bought back by Cat because of safety issues. I would be surprised if Cat sold any of them in the last couple of years. I would highly doubt that knuckleboom loaders are the same as log loading shovels but could be wrong on that. The 568 shovel has been the hot seller for four or five years. My sources at the local dealer say they have not been informed about what the article means. I would guess that they are jettisoning the old Blount / Prentice line they bought out a few years back. Why Weiler would think they can make money in a low volume industry with so much competition is beyond my limited vision of the future. I agree with most of Hallbacks's comment.
I remember them stopping the 517/527, but skeans says he saw a new 527 at OLC and they have it listed on Cat's NA product page. Which is weird as hell, considering they haven't built D5N's in years. https://www.cat.com/en_US/products/new/equipment/skidders/track-skidders/17831465.html
I would guess the marketing people don't know what they have on line. New track skidders have not been available since Tier 4 Interim went into affect. There are dealers that are rebuilding them. I have seen both Peterson and Western States advertise them.
I heard Peterson experimented a while ago after the 527 was discontinued as it was not emission compliant. They brought in some with no engines (only way they could enter North America), cut the frame and stretched the nose out to fit in a new electronic emission compliant engine. But like most things I'm sure it wasn't really cost effective to do. As for Cat they sold 4 divisions - wheel skidders, tracked feller bunchers , wheel feller bunchers and knuckleboom loaders. As part of the deal Weiler gets the product lines, factories, workers, some engineers etc. Basically when the switch happens its Cat paint and decals Friday and new yellow and decals on the next Monday. Over time I'm sure Weiler will make changes and improvements to the machines. Being a smaller company they can change and respond much faster than a big giant like Cat ever could so they should get competitive again if they play this right. Cat dealers will be the dealer for the Weiler products if they reach an agreement to be a distributor - eg Finning has already signed with Weiler to be the distributor in their territory. Cat has kept the FM HEX line - 538 (320D2 FM), 548 (324D FM), 558 (325D FM) and 568.