Heard something about this the other day, I guess a court awarded Miller Quick Couplers $74 million dollars after Cat stole their Q/C design and made it under Cat's name? Tried to find a news article online, this was all I could find... http://www.equipmentworld.com/cater...ng-trade-secrets-for-excavator-quick-coupler/
Sounds like cat musta hired a deere executive...
74 million is pocket change for Cat but I'm sure it's not the first time Cat has stolen someone else's technology. The fact it was in the courts for 5 years suggests Cat was trying drag it out hoping Miller wouldn't want to pursue it. Now if buyers want the coupler, they might look at other machines that have the coupler available. I heard a long time ago that JD sources more products from other companies than anyone else. Their compact tractors were made by Yanmar for years but a lot of owners still insisted they were genuine JD tractors.
looks like a red painted JRB coupler
That's a slippery slope. Deere has sourced Hitachi equipment for years. The 444, 544, 644 loaders were Hitachi. Hitachi made all the excavator undercarriages for years, and may still. All the small Deere diesel motors are Yanmar. New Holland made their skid steers for years. Many of the smaller tractors were made in Germany or Italy. But, Cat is no better. Cat sources tons of equipment from Mitsubishi. In fact, Cat owns about 80% of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries. Same with Perkins. Cat owns them outright and most of the small Cat motors are Perkins or Mitsubishi. I could go on and on: Link Belt = Samsung Gehl = Takeuchi IH = Hough Case = Drott Etc, etc.
Gehl/Mustang and Tak split a few years back fwiw.
Case & Link Belt = Sumitomo
The point I was making, is that Deere is perhaps the thievingest manufacturer, out there. They lost another lawsuit, against Kinze manufacturing, coupla years back, google it, its a good read, kinda like David and Goliath... Deere also had an agreement with Cat, in exchange for cat teaching them how to build a 4 cylinder motor, back in the '60's, deere was supposed to stay out of the construction business... Randy Leffingwell wrote about it in his book, see link. I don't necessarily have an animus toward deere, just like to guffaw, when they stub their toe... https://books.google.com/books?id=A...tractors engine design by caterpillar&f=false
It's SOP I'm afraid. In another life, I was an engineer for a Japanese OEM designing cars. There was a database of all the patents the company held and you could see any legal action ever taken with those patents. Something like 25% of all of them were being battled in court for infringement by a Korean competitor. It pays to break the law. You copy the other company and sell as much product as you can while fighting it out in court. When the lawyers have wasted enough time and money, maybe you pay a royalty or some big fine. But who cares? You now have massive market share and momentum in the market.
If Cat owns Perkins, is it really a Perkins or is it a Cat?
Distribution=Cats Look how many companies use Cats distribution system and how many tried to figure it out and try to copy it. Harley Davidson, Nike are a few.
Its a perkopillar...
The same engines go out of the door in Cat or Perkins livery. Same motors, different badges and paint. Cat ET won't work on a Perkins, and Perkins Electronic Service Technician won't work on a Cat. Wes, where have you got this about Cat owning 80% of Mitsubishi? They have had various joint ventures and licensing agreements with Mitsubishi, most of which they are trying out get out of, or already have. They are also looking to displace Mitsi, Fiat and Kubota engines with their own product over the next few years.
http://www.prnewswire.com/news-rele...wner-of-japanese-joint-venture-140950833.html
I used to work for a Tier 1 Cat supplier. We shipped OEM Cat parts to Japan weekly. Various models move back and forth depending on exchange rates and demand. Lots of Cat machines have been made in Belgium and France. No offense to anyone from England, but I hope Cat drags Perkins out of the dark ages, kicking and screaming if needed.
we call em perkiepillers!!!!
Later model Volvo engines are from Deutz. Volvo skid steers are JCB. Deere and Hitachi have been together for years. Hitachi the brains, Deere the marketing. JCB excavators I thought were Sumitomo also. Always seems like if you can`t build it, buy it.
Cat sold Perkins a couple years ago if my memory is correct.
They didn't, it isn't.
Were you referring to the joint venture between Cat and Mitsi to produce forklifts, 80% owned by Cat? Or Caterpillar Japan, which was formerly SCM, itself set up as a joint venture predominantly to develop and share excavator technology but gradually bought out by Cat? Both of which are small fry to Mitubishi Heavy Industries. As for the comment about Perkins, care to elaborate? Preferably Without retreading the (true) stories we're all familiar with concerning the Perkins/Shibaura compact engines, which only represent a small proportion of the output from both UK sites.
jcb are their own now too
Cat and Mitsubishi are in cahoots on all kinds of equipment, not just forklifts. See the article above. Yes, it's not the same as Mitsubishi Heavy Industries which is into ship building, railroad, nuclear, etc. I've worked on many Perkins in Massey Ferguson tractors and various forklifts and other equipment. They all seemed to be straight out of the 19th century. All fine thread hardware, everywhere. Countless places where power tools cannot be used to access fasteners, often even a socket will not fit. Multi-piece cork gaskets and rope seals that leak as soon as you put them together. Cheap stamped oil pan, valve cover, front cover, etc that promote leaking. Shallow or non existent oil galleys that promote leaking, especially from the valve cover. Then there is the functional stuff. Pre-combustion motors with no glow plugs and terrible manifold heaters that will not start below 50F. Poor oiling in the bottom end. I've seen more Perkins that have throw a rod or spun a bearing than any other motors. Now they have computers on them and :beatsme . Maybe things are much better now, but up to the late 1990s, they were pretty unimpressive. The Japanese engines from Kubota, Isuzu, Yanmar, Shibura, etc are also similarly low-tech, but their reliability is much better. Something like a 4BT Cummins looks like a lunar lander compared to a similar sized Perkins.
That's cleared that up, then. By the way, you didn't attach the article. I think you're a year or two out of date with your information. The excavator division in Japan is now virtually nothing to do with Mitsi, with the exception of some carry over technology and agreements. Not sure where the D3 is made now, I know it was (along with the 931) originally a Mitsi joint venture, but as for the small engines being Mitsi... Any new product with a Mitsi engine, the engine is clearly marked Mitsi, unlike a few years back when Cat badged the 3 litre Mitsi engine as a Cat. The last Perkins that had all UNF bolts and screws was the 3152 and variants, which was being produced in small numbers until about six years ago. By the way, this engine was so crap it was only produced with variations to fuel system, turbocharging, etc for just short of 50 years. The 1000 series from the mid nineties, Darwin range and Tier 2 six cylinders had UNF head bolts, flywheel bolts and big end bolts, but everything else was metric, now the only UNF is the flywheel bolts (I may have missed the odd plug somewhere, so don't be too hard on me) even though some are metric fine. Everything tightened and torqued by smart tooling, i.e. sockets on power tools. None of the last three aforementioned engines had pre combustion chambers, and tin sumps and valve covers are a thing of the past, etc. I think you may be a bit more behind the times than Perkins/Cat.
The last one I worked on was a 4.108 made in 1987. That model was made from some time in the very early 1970s until somewhere in the 90s. That doesn't make it a good engine. Rattling, noisy, oil leaking thing that refuses to start below 40 degrees. I actually added glow plugs to it to get it to start. I mostly get to work on old clapped out equipment, but there is a reason we regard "British engineering" as an oxymoron.
So did I when I was a kid that didn't know too much. 'Bye.
I'm glad to hear they are much better now. 30 years ago there just weren't a lot of options for small 50ish horsepower diesel engines. All the American made stuff would be made by an equipment company like Deere, Case, Ford, etc and they would not want to sell engines to a competing company. So, you had Cummins, Waukesha, Perkins, Deutz, Detroit, Teledyne/Hercules and that was about it. Then the Japanese came on the market in the US and pretty soon even the companies that normally made their own motors were buying from them. I imagine this competition forced Perkins to improve. That's a good thing for everyone.
The AD3-152 Perkins is the most popular diesel engine ever put in a tractor. ** 135's didn't set sales records, get their legendary status and become the most sought after tractor in their class because they had a bad engine. Maybe you're confusing the Standard Motors 4 cylinder diesel with the early Perkins? The D3-152 and later AD3-152 with direct injection pretty much saved ** from the disaster caused by the hard starting Standard Motors diesel. Isuzu went to Perkins with help to develop some of their engines. Did they have some less than stellar engines, sure but the 152, 236 and 354 are some examples of the best and most fuel efficient engines ever made. Cat did pay 1.1 billion to buy Perkins. Deere engines are known for being fuel hogs and Cat has made some less desirable engines too.
WesJ, thank you for your comment on British Engineering as we Brits often laugh at some of the U.S. Engineering, to keep things on topic I would like to bring up the fact that even Komatsu used Perkins engines in lots of their equipment until CAT bought Perkins forcing Komatsu to use the less favoured Cummins in its place, some years ago a U.S. Company sent over to the U.K what they thought was the smallest tube in the World ever made (what for??) anyhow a U.K. Firm sent the tube back to the U.S. and told them to look inside their bit of pipe, as they had popped a pipe inside it, we have Rolls Royce, Bentley, Aston Martin and the Flying Scotsman here we are sort of happy with things. tctractors
I thought Rolls Royce, Bentley, and Aston were all now owned by foreign companies. There is a great series of books by Carrol Smith, an American race car engineer, called the "To Win" books (Tune to Win, Drive to Win, etc). He writes at great length about the horrors of British race car design in the 1960s and 70s. Things like putting critical fasteners in single shear using unsafe designs for brake hats and control arms. Even if you don't car about race cars, the books are very entertaining.
I think what TC was getting at is that some high end products originated in the UK. Who owns them now doesn't change that. Perkins were the best selling smaller diesels for years and the fact other great manufacturers came to them for assistance speaks volumes. Nobody ever complains when they look out the window of a plane and see a Rolls Royce badge! For many it's peace of mind knowing they're going to get to their destination safe.
In the same vein as Cat buying Perkins I suppose Wes, but at least its all still made here in the U.K. well that is all the good bits are, we do have a few F1 race cars built here that are World Class Merc, Lotus, Mac, even the old Beneton cars being built here, I also recall a small outfit by the name of Supermarine that had a bit more than a shoddy amount of Speed records, Napier is another name to link into the race spot that would offer a Sound Thrashing to any Yank built chariot with its safe control arms and brake bits, I would suggest you pop down to your Library for some more modern Tome's on who builds and where modern race F1 cars, please list all the makes of F1 cars that are built in the U.S. as I would like to wave at them when they ask for a push off the Track, if you ask in your CAT store shop for anything made in the U.S.A. including the Baseball Cap, would it shock you that its all made in China, you would leave the Shop with Now't. tctractors p.s. in the 60s and 70s we had some of the best race cars and drivers like Jim Clark and G,Hill as a start off, you need to use that book for Colouring in with your crayons.
Not to poke anyone in the eye, but the safety record of racing in the 60s and 70s was appalling. Jim Clark was killed in an F1 race in the 70s. Those spooky control arms and brake parts may not have affected the speed, but plenty of guys didn't make it home when they piled up those rigs.
Well ...... Mid to late 20th century engines . That's what I like about them :thumbsup. Don't have any Cat equipment and could care less about the lawsuit . We do have a Perkins 4 cylinder diesel in a 1978 Allis Chalmers 175 farm tractor . My only complaint with it is the hard starting in cold weather . Plug it in for about half hour on cold day's & she fires up fine . Makes good power and runs forever on a tank of fuel . Tractor has about 7500 hours on it and all we have done is changed the oil & filter , never even had the valve cover off yet . Use it all the time on jobs and farm . She's a keeper ! HeavyEquipmentForums
As far as racing and safety goes, everybody owes a great debt to Jackie Stewart. He almost single handily was responsible for implementing much higher safety standards in Formula 1 in addition to being arguably the best driver ever. Before he was even signed and doing practice laps gave Bruce McLaren fits because his lap times were consistently faster.
I'm familiar with a JCB 530 with four cylinder Perkins. Great engine. So great it can be ran with the crankcase just about full of a sludge mixture of coolant and engine oil after the gear cover "comes into contact" with a dumpster! Then when the oil it leaking out.... quickly.... keep running it until the blow by tube just has smoke coming out of it!!! LOL
Wes J, The Jet engine if I recall correctly was invented just up the road from my billet, although its made by a few Company's its claim to fame is made in G.B. we even invented the Track type Tractor, we have NO problems with Perkins engines and it would seem the rest of the World has a fondness of them. The Miller Hitch saga is going to cost CAT a lot more than posted in this thread, no doubt CAT has plenty of coins but it all takes earning and I suspect to get this amount back in the CAT Litter Tray will be hard to do by selling a hitch or 2. tctractors
Tony, you forgot that well-known British disaster story the Harrier jump jet. So poorly engineered the Americans couldn't wait to buy them when we sold up, even though some are 40 years old. Oh, And the Cat ADT range, all designed and produced in the good ol' U of K and sent around the world, or the Cat Backhoe r & d centre based - wait for it - the UK, or the excavator design and construction facility that Komatsu set up here, because our engineering is so ****. Did we mention those rough old Terex trucks and dozers that used to be built here and exported back to America, among other places? Just out of interest, Wes, the Perkins site also carries out some machine development work for Caterpillar, things like engine/machine systems integration, hydraulic system tuning, transmission testing and a few other bits of magic above our pay grades. Not bad for a company stuck in the 19th century.
I don't know much about the subject of this thread but it is a great read! Thanks and keep it up!
British engineering in a nutshell - sorry if it's turned into a p###ing match, no offence intended to anyone. We did manage to produce some cars as poor as the Edsel, just to keep the balance. TC will know the ones I mean, mostly products from Longbridge and Cowley.
Did they say "Leyland" on the tag? I just call it like I see it guys! As far as the Harrier, it's interesting, but I'm not sure how great it is. I know you're proud you could shoot down some untrained Argentine pilots, but the Harrier has a very limited application. I'd rather have an F-15 that can fly 3 times as fast and has never been shot down. If you want to hang your hat on an airplane, why not the Concord?
You might want to check your facts before posting..........much like the rest of this thread. There have been several F-15s shot down. And the Concorde was not solely a British creation.....that's probably why they aren't claiming it is.
Wes J you seem to be so set in your ways that the US is the only country that can build anything decent but you're sadly mistaken. Seems to me the Harrier was instrumental in the Falklands Island ordeal a few decades ago. You can't lump all aircraft together. The F15 is designed and intended for a completely different application than the Harrier and certainly can't land without a runway. When it comes to aircraft though the most advanced in the world in the 50's was the Avro Arrow designed and built in Canada. A big reason for it's cancellation was because it embarrassed the US it was so superior to anything the US had. A.V. Roe Canada had many talented people come over from A.V. Roe UK. It was headed by Sir Roy Dobson from the UK. Avro Canada were the recognized world leaders in aircraft design and research in the 50's. Their accomplishments in aviation are second to none. Without ex-avro employee's Nasa wouldn't have put a man on the moon in 1969. Chief of engineering, Jim Floyd was a consultant on the Concorde and the engines were based on the Orenda Iroquois from the arrow, compare the cockpit of the SR71 to the arrow and the list goes on and on. They also had a jet airliner 7 years before Boeing as did the UK but the DH Comet had a major flaw with the rectangular rather than round windows. The DH comet was given the title of first jet airliner to fly because it lifted off the runway and then landed. 2 weeks later the Avro jetliner went for a complete flight test at altitude. Sorry the US doesn't have a monopoly on greatness and many great products have come from the UK, Canada and other countries.
While we're talking airplanes and quality British engineering, it is impossible to ignore the Hawker Hurricane. The world may well be a very different place, had it not been for it's incredible success. I'am reading a 60yo book on the subject at the moment.
Don't forget China invented fireworks and Australia invented the boomerang and Fosters. Wes, you might not be able to see how good the Harrier is, but your military people obviously can. I know whose opinion I put more value on. You'd best do a bit more research as you obviously have nothing sensible to contribute.
Oh yeah, my favorite argument. You don't like what I'm saying so you throw out "do some more research". This is the internet. Post a few links that refute what I have said. The Avro Arrow was cancelled because Russian spies successfully infiltrated the Canadian design team and were actively sending the design specs back home. Several F-15s have crashed, but none has ever been lost in combat.
If Perkins engines are/were so bad then would someone kindly enlighten me as to a) why the company never folded and b) even successfully managed to be a global brand in the small/medium engine market for probably close to 50 years. Also to explain the reason why Cat paid a ****-load of coin to buy Perkins, and why all Cat's small product line including backhoe loaders generally all run Perkins engines, now of course badged as Cat but they're still made in the same place..? Reading this thread from the start I detect a large dose of the NIH (Not Invented Here) syndrome. Some of our members here on HEF really need to get out more......
Well all the Brits sticking up for Perkins seems like NIH as well. Put the shoe on the other foot. I'm not saying Perkins are terrible, just that they are very "old school" and stuck in the old ways and it makes them hard to work on. They hung on with inferior technology like rope seals, goofy hardware, crappy stamped covers, no turbo charging, no direct injection, etc long after others had improved. Instead of updating those old engines, they just pumped them out the same as ever. I'm sure British mechanics love them if they get paid by the hour. Fixing oil leaks on an old Perkins could be a full time job. I don't know what they have done in the last 20 years. Maybe they are awesome and amazing. Again, they worked, but they could have been better. Every company makes a dud from time to time. Just think of about any large v-8 diesel and you can conger up a list of pretty terrible motors: 510 Perkins, 3150/3208 Cat, 903 Cummins, DV-800 IH, 8850 Deere, etc. All I know is that my home town had two equipment dealers, Massey Ferguson and John Deere. The Masseys with Perkins motors were nowhere near as reliable as the Deere equipment being sold across the street. But, it was cheaper, and they sold a lot of it.
All the "Perkins" I see are the smaller end and are actually Japanese Shibaura diesels which seem very reliable.
:IMO :trdjk haha
WesJ, it might be time to quit on this very narrow band width that you are transmitting from as you are starting to come over a bit doubtful, this is a polite thought from myself only, but you are looking on your own here. tctractors p.s. we also invented English that you speak as the U.S. just sort of copied us???
I give up. Perkins are awesome! I love them! They never made a bad one! I wish every motor had 100% fine thread bolts (actually let's make them all studs that are a mother****er to take out). I'm having the guys in the shop switch all my equipment to positive ground and using 100% Lucas electrical components. I'm trading in my F-250 for a Reliant Robbin. I always thought that 4th wheel was a total waste of money. I think you Brits are wound too tight...
Yair . . . Like WOW I love this thread . . . I have ignored it for ever because I thought it was about couplers. (big grin) In the correct application there were no engines in the world that would give better service (fuel economy, running costs, engine life) than the English Gardner or Lister. Cheers.
OK, here you go: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_F-15_losses To snip a couple of examples out of this: 7 April 2003 : F-15E-46-MC, 88-1694, c/n 1103/E078, of the 335th FS, 4th FW, USAF, crashed during a combat bombing mission near Tikrit, Iraq. Both the pilot, Capt. Eric Das of Amarillo, Texas and Weapon Systems Officer (WSO), Major William R. Watkins III of South Boston, VA were killed. From the investigation of the crash site neither man tried to eject, and the aircraft was destroyed in the crash. That sure sounds like it was lost in combat to me. 17/18 January 1991 : F-15E-46-MC, 88‑1689, c/n 1098/E073, of the 336th FS, 4th TFW, USAF, was shot down by anti-aircraft artillery on the first day of operation Desert Storm. Hmmmm, says it was shot down....can't be because Wes says otherwise. 19/20 January 1991 : F-15E-46-MC, 88‑1692, c/n 1101/E076, of the 336th FS, 4th TFW, USAF, was shot down by a Soviet made SA-2E missile during Operation Desert Storm. Both crew members ejected and were POWs. Shot down again.....hmmmmmm As for the Russian infiltration of the Canadian Aerospace industry....why don't you post something to prove this?
Oh, by the way, it's not that I don't like what you are saying. It's that some of what you are saying is blatantly false.
The Harrier and the Warthog were both good in the storm. They had different applications and performed very well at their assignments. So it all depends how efficient they are on certain missions. They both are ground support aircraft. Now if all you guys want to talk about a real aircraft take a look at the F-22. Now its the real deal!
I should have specified that the F-15 record was for air to air combat.
And we have the invoice to prove it...
Yair . . . I dunno about the F22 being the "real deal" . . . or any of the present generation of overpriced hardware. If you want the "real deal" print out the specs on the 1960's Aardvark . . . in service for thirty years. I have a mate who flew them and he has pointed out it compares pretty well with what is flying now and he mourns their passing. Cheers.
Wes, don't give up! I'm enjoying my daily dose of this thread. From Miller to British engineering to fighters in four pages. I admire you sticking to your guns, it's just a shame you've got a batch of bad powder.
My favourite part is how you change the parameters of your claims to suit your current argument. First you stated none had ever been shot down, then you claimed none had ever been lost in combat, now it's only air to air combat. Incidentally, it appears no harriers have ever been lost in air to air combat either. While we're at it, let's look at your early posts in this thread. You claim the Deere 444, 544 and 644 were Hitachis badged as Deere machines. I believe you'll find the exact opposite. The Deere machines were badged as Hitachi machines. You claim that Cat owns 80% of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, that is false. They may own a percentage of the joint venture they have with Mitsubishi, but they do not own Mitsubishi Heavy Industries. You claim that Link Belt machines are made by Samsung, that is false. In the case of the hoes, they are made by Sumitomo. If you want to get down to it, Samsung hoes were bought out by Volvo, and Samsung no longer makes hoes at all. You claim that Hough made IH's machines, but in fact, IH made IH's machines. They bought out Hough many years ago, and rolled them into their product line. You claim that Drott made Case machines, when again, The parent company Tenneco, bought Drott and rolled them into Case as a division of Case. Like I said, you should really check facts before you go spouting off about something you apparently don't know as much as you think you do.
WesJ, open up your map of the World and you will see the U.K. in the Middle at the Top, not to 1 side like the U.S.A. then look at your clock as we invented time in the U.K. all the clocks in the World are basic set from our clock in kitchen, its another thing we have invented and let the rest of the World use. Back to the Perkins issue and the fine thread (UNF) well even CAT use fine thread on D8 Head studs as an eg' keep it up Wes I love a laugh, but you are beating me with your experience tctractors
Someone apparently has forgotten to follow the tenet of the "First Rule of Holes" which reads - "as soon as you realize you're in one - stop digging" .............. ointhead
Huh? We own a 444E. It says "John Deere" in huge letters on the side. On the serial number tag it says "Hitachi Made in Japan". There is a joint Hitachi-Deere plant in the US that only builds a few models of excavators under both marques.
I clarified the Mitsubishi statement. It doesn't change the fact that plenty of Mitsubishi equipment runs around with "Cat" labels on it. Forklifts, skid steers, excavators, etc, etc. Cat has sold forklifts made by Eagle Pitcher, Towmotor, and others. They may have owned Towmotor for a while until it became Royal. Yes, I did confuse Samsung and Sumitomo. My humble apologies.
I said Hough = IH and Drott = Case. That's completely true. Hough made loader attachments for IH for years before they were bought by IH. My dad had a TD-9 with a Hough loader. Drott was rolled into Case by Tenneco and many machines were sold with both Drott and Case labels on them. What is false about that statement?
There are plenty of technical reasons to use a fine thread fastener in some critical applications. There is no sensible reason to use them everywhere.
Alright boys. Bring it on! I'm getting my wig powdered this afternoon and my Austin Allegro should be out of the shop so I can turn in this Morris Marina loner they gave me...
" Now if all you guys want to talk about a real aircraft take a look at the F-22. Now its the real deal! " Not that I know anything about aircraft, but I caught this several months ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBKvlLzGkvU
Wes, one thing I've learned is that Britain makes the best movie villains ever known, except for Benny Hill, he didn't get the memo.
I thought Marvel was from the US?
Think you're also confusing your ideas with facts. Skid steers? No. Excavators? Not in the last 20 years, which coincidentally seems to be when you last learned anything. Perkins all UNF? Apart from the last versions of the 3.152 (last off the line nearly 10 years ago) all metric, except for flywheel bolts and head bolts on some ranges. Don't know which machines the etc. etc. are, but in Wes's world anything seems possible.
OK, so after what, 50 years of making everything UNF for no ****ing reason, they fell in line with the rest of world? That's a real commitment to innovation.
Wonderful. Here is a video of a Cat 320E. It's brand new and being sold in the US. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=If7HFqZ1Z_Q This machine is built by Shin Caterpillar Mitsubishi in Japan. This company is a joint venture between Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and Caterpillar.
Find me a rubber tire Cat skid steer with a Cat motor. I'll be waiting.
I think we all need to check out theChive. About 1 hour ago John posted the link "There are sexy chivers amoung us" with 84 photos. might take the tension out of the room for a moment lol
Shin Caterpillar Mitsubishi was renamed Caterpillar Japan Ltd in early 2012. There is nothing Mitsubishi on that 320 E other than possibly a few components from a shared supplier. Keep digging Oh, did you think the little Japanese stickers in the cab say Mitsubishi? Easy mistake.
Yep, you've got me there. The real hallmark of a Neanderthal company - UNF bolts. The engines must be shocking if they used - gasp -UNF threads. You the man, Wes.
Yair . . . To get back to one of the gripes . . . what exactly is the issue with UNF? I always associate fine threads with precision, holding power, and providing somewhat better tolerance to vibration. Over the years I have worked with (and had spanners and wrenches for) Whitworth, the National series, and now the abomination of metric with a fine and coarse pitch threads and seemingly no standard size for nuts and bolt heads. Sure, I realise there is a metric standard but I have never bothered to figure it out . . . for the work I do these days metric wrenches in one mill increments get me by on most jobs. Fine thread in any flavour can cross thread easier than coarse but I suggest anyone who gets their knickers in a knot about fine thread on a Perkins should work on certain Aero engines or perhaps a big 1940's vintage Meadows diesel which have hundreds of small fine thread fasteners holding inspection covers and so forth. On a slightly humorous note . . . the biggest issue I had with threads was the closeness between half inch NC and Whitworth. In the scrub we had a constant threat of fire in the belly gaurds and it was an advantage to have the floorplate bolts free turning and well lubricated for quick removal. I remember on one occasion at a service giving a feller a box of new one by half bolts and asking him to fit them after running a tap through all the holes . . . he came back later and reckoned they were tight and I realised he'd tapped all the holes to Whitworth. (big grin)
As far as I know, the fine thread fasteners is a hold over from the old piston aircraft engines. As you say they can be better at withstanding vibrations and in the right material, can be stronger. There is nothing wrong with it. It just takes longer to take apart or put together and sourcing replacement fasteners can be difficult, though not as difficult as Witworth. It's not wrong, it's just different for no real reason.
Holy **** what is your deal? Mitsubishi was involved in that venture for 40 years. Should we just write all of those machines off? If Cat buys out a joint venture with Mitsubishi, do those machines cease being Mitsubishi? Nothing has changed except the paperwork. Like I tried to say before, if a Cat machine is made in Japan by a company that is 50% owned by Mitsubishi, is it a Cat or a Mitsubishi? If you buy a Deere hoe with a 100% Hitachi undercarriage bolted to a US made machine, is it a Deere or a Hitachi? By your logic, there is no such thing as Perkins anymore, so you can stop pissing and moaning about it. It's all Caterpillar now. I understand that you are 100% determined to be "right", but you're acting like a petty child.
Scrub, I still pack ** up 1 1/4", along with all the small metric, anything bigger and I've found there's so much variation in tolerances between makes of spanner that I just have flank drive metric above that and so far I haven't rounded too many nuts. Still have a couple of BSP spanners for some specific fittings we use, and my brother gave me all of his Whitworth stuff last year just in case I buy myself a traction engine. There's a fine metric thread which is damned close to UNF, and that's caused some issues on equipment I've worked on. A speed sensor on one engine I worked on was M10x0.5, at first sight it looked more like turning marks than a thread. All this standardisation and we've got more threads than we ever had.
Simple facts which you can't grasp. Shin Caterpillar doesn't exist anymore, replaced in 2012 by Caterpillar Japan Ltd which is not 50% Mitsubishi owned. Things have moved on and the current crop of excavators is, as I said, developed at Cat's Akashi and Ono facilities. I am fully aware that there was a joint venture, that some excavators marketed in the past as Cat were actually more Mitsubishi than Cat, that Cat got into bed with Mitsubishi in the early days so they could get a Cat excavator into the market place, that the early D3's and 931's were more Mitsi than Cat. These are facts which I have never disputed, or if I have show me where. But the fact is most of these arrangements are no longer in place. I don't care anymore whether this fits your worldview or not. As for wanting to be right, posting a video of an excavator and asserting it's 50% Mitsubishi? Which bit of the video proved that point? I could post a video of an identical machine from the factory in Gosselies, Belgium, and you wouldn't know the difference if you couldn't see the ID plate. Where did I say Perkins doesn't exist anymore? The factory is five miles from my house and engines go out of the gate with Perkins ID plates or Cat ID plates on the block. The gate has two signs, Perkins and Cat. One factory, 100% owned by Cat since 1998. So don't lose your temper. I haven't, and never will with someone I'll probably never meet face to face. And please don't start accusing me of saying things that I haven't said. It's probably time for me to bow out now, as much fun as it's been this is becoming circular and unproductive.
So when Cat takes down the Perkins sign, there will be no more Perkins? You can't have it both ways. When an engine leaves the factory with a Cat tag, is it a Cat or a Perkins? The Cat equipment made in Belgium, France, Brazil, China, etc is usually designed in America and often being made in multiple plants around the world. The Shin Caterpillar Mitsubishi stuff is or was designed in Japan and built in Japan. To me that is different. It really makes no difference.
Yair . . . ih100. Gotcha mate, all this standardisation is a b*****d . . . o'course if our American friends had gone metric it would have done no one any harm. (wink, wink) Cheers.
The Avro Arrow was cancelled in large part by heavy American influence and pushing the Bomarc Missile/paper weight on Canada and then offering a deal on used F101's that were inferior. I don't think the Perkins in my 135 is metric and it's a UK model built for export to Canada because American production couldn't keep up with demand. After the Mitsibishi designed Cat excavators I think Cat went to Sumitomo as did Linkbelt and Case. Every major excavator brand is based on a Japanese design. You need to take the blinders off.
opcorn
If it leaves the factory yellow with a Cat tag, it is a Cat engine. If it has a Perkins tag, it is a Perkins. If if leaves with a bowtie is it a Chevy or a GMC?
opcorn:drinkup Given the timeline & context on subjects in this thread I suppose everyone is correct & really no argument at all . That being said .... Where is Doctor Who when we need him . LOL ! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUgYnAI2w7s
So what are we going to call this then? http://www.adelmans.com/new-perkins-804d-33-diesel-engine3
A Mitserkins..
Perkibishi?
Catsubishikens?
:drinkup This thread is entertaining, even if there was hardly a post about the original topic of the Miller Coupler lawsuit
Right on! I loved that show.:thumbsup It used to come on public television here in the eighties, watched it all the time as a kid.
Same story CM ! Like you said it was on public broadcast station . Looks like it's still going . http://www.bbcamerica.com/shows/doctor-who/ We get a BBC station on the over air digital signal , I'll have to investigate this further :cool2 I need to get out of this thread but the door seems to be jammed on the "TARDIS" . One more thing to fix . https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TARDIS
I'll never get over being freaked out by those darn cybermen in the mid sixties. As a little tacker, I didn't get a decent nights sleep for months.
Me as well Queenslander . Those cyberguy's are pretty spooky . Back on topic ..... http://www.equipmentworld.com/cater...ng-trade-secrets-for-excavator-quick-coupler/ Hate to see an idea stolen for money but that's how works for the most part . I don't have to participate in it . No effect at all , still hop out of the cab to change buckets & fold out manual thumb on excavator . Could care less about the lawsuit .
Most of us has forgotten what this thread was originally about. I've been into several OEM factories over the years and they all have the opposition's products being measured, photographed and stripped down in plain sight. It seems once a product is out there, it's fair game to be copied. Fair play to Miller for not laying down and being shafted. it's the daleks that used to have me hiding behind the sofa.
Me too. "Exterminate!" - That shrill techno voice gave me nightmares. The daleks were ruthless killers. This explains it for the non-watchers. This thread derailed a while back...:cool2
OEM's take note, the Daleks haven't fundamentally changed since 1963. Why does your equipment have to? They probably still have a few UNF bolts in there somewhere...
WesJ, credit to you in your first post you did say "you could Go On and On" this you have stuck to No Mistake, I liked your next Pearl of Wisdom the No Offence to people from England line, on this it would be Un-Wise to ever post details of any travel plans to the U.K. I feel the Customs Body check might be the Iceberg Tip, as your line of well thought out and intelligent comment is never going to leave my English Mind, we do have people very similar to yourself within the U.K. usually living in the Queens Hotel or with a gadget adorning their ankle so they can find the way home before a pre-set time. it's been fun tctractors
Why do you need to egg me on? I've been to the UK. It was great. I'd love to go back.
Just let it serve as a reminder that it's not productive to get in pissing matches on this forum. Most of the people on here like a good discussion, but do not put up with arguments, and that's what WAS going on. There was some spirited discussion, but you're not gonna get the last word here. Maybe next time, but not on this thread.
No doubt!:drinkup Daleks don't need a particulate filter or DEF to indiscriminately exterminate whatever's in their way - that's a fact!:avid Now what was the argument about again?:cool2
Hey all, this is quite entertaining lol. From an outsiders perspective where we use things from both parts of the world one thinks that both have made plenty of Good and bad equipment! Quite comparable are most things in a way. For example my opinion of a Perkins ie 3-654 kinda primitive but a good engine, great for there time. Some would say primitive but than again who's still producing flat head,side valve, pushrod motorcycles in 2016? How olds that technology? ( I want one lol)
6-354
Think I have my wires crossed there mabe only pushrod, you get my point though.
Who would that be? Not since the 40s. Though your point is quite valid. I'm not sure if you can still buy a flathead Continental. I would not be surprised. We made jillions of them. I have one in my Clark forklift from somewhere in the 1980s. Runs on propane and never misses a beat.
That's a simple issue of Hitachi building the machines in Japan that were badged as Hitachis....you know, built under license? When Deere couldn't keep up to the demand, some of the Hitachi machines were imported to fill the gaps. But make no mistake, they were Deere loaders that got built and branded as Hitachis under license from Deere, not Hitachis
" They may own a percentage of the joint venture they have with Mitsubishi, but they do not own Mitsubishi Heavy Industries." So what is the JV and what percentage does cat own?
SCM (Shin Caterpillar Mitsubishi) was a joint venture started in the 1960's to give Cat instant access to Mitsubishi's existing excavator technology, so that Cat could get a foothold in the growing market, and Mitsubishi could get access to Cat's wallet and the American market. The early machines were more Mitsi than Cat, in some cases were Mitsi machines with Cat badges, no different to many other joint production and marketing ventures even to the present day. Over time, Cat bought a bigger share and by 2012 were 100% stock holders, when the jv was dissolved and The operation became Caterpiller Japan ltd. Cat Japan is responsible for all Cat excavator design and development, apart from some aspects of development (some engine/hydraulic system interfacing, some engine optimisation for the application to name two). The Cat organisation is quite complicated and they have design and r&d facilities In other places besides the USA and Japan.
Not true... Samsung was bought out by Volvo, the rounded cab volvo's (before the B series) were repainted samsung machines. Link Belt (LBXCO) is owned by Sumitomo and their machines are repainted sumitomo's. Case is the same, just a repainted sumitomo. Not saying that is a bad thing as Link Belt/Case IMO are the best hoes on the market...
Hitachi’s partnership with John Deere Since 2002, Hitachi sales, marketing and many product-support activities in the Americas have been managed by the Construction & Forestry Division of John Deere. Together we use common parts distribution, information systems and training and support programs, ultimately providing you with more value. Deere and Hitachi produce excavators at their Kernersville, N.C., factory – a 50/50 joint venture established in 1988. Hitachi-branded construction excavators are also produced in Japan. The purpose-built Forester models are produced at a Deere-Hitachi jointly owned plant in Langley, B.C. Select rigid frame trucks are made in Guelph, Ontario, while the 200- to 320-ton-class trucks are manufactured in Japan. The huge mining shovels and backhoes are all produced in Japan.