Anybody use any cat attachments for skids or track loaders? pros , cons?
Pro. All parts listed in SIS. Case in point. Only today, customer had an auger head with a leaking drive motor. Quick phone call to the dealer with the serial number. Seal kit ordered, here by 7:30 AM tomorrow. No mess, no fuss. I've said it before and I'll say it again. Caterpillar's parts system is second to none.
This, used to work for a machining company that made Cat parts, the phone would ring.....you have castings being sent air-freight, YOU WILL SHIP FINISHED PARTS AIR FREIGHT TOMORROW. No questions asked, all hands on deck, current jobs pulled, programs were sent to the cnc's, tooling setup, gages assembled, ...Cat worried about the cost after the fact. Ed
anybody?
We've got quite a few Cat attachments. They seem to be pretty decent. Biggest issue I've had was Cat had the wrong hoses listed in SIS for a couple attachments so I've learned to bring them the old one as a sample rather than going by the part number.
They buy them out from other manufactures. In my experiance the local Cat dealer was unable or unwilling to get any kind of detail info such as hydraulic or electrial schematics.
What type of attachments? Simple buckets - grapples - 4 in1 type attachments ? Cat's a great outfit but some attachments are not worth a penny more just for the Cat sticker on it. I had a CAL (Construction attachments Ltd) 4 in1 that was very well built, but still, basically only a bucket. Now expensive mulchers, milling heads and other big ticket items (with a motor involved) a big name manufacturer/dealership would become more important to have parts support like Cat's, but certainly not limited to them. This is not to say Cat can't be competitive on pricing either, it's just up to your dealer like any other dealer but your local NH or Case dealers may both offer the CAL line, while Cat, JD & BC (possibly) sells the same, just rebranded.
The CAT drum mulch heads are made by FAE.
At least with my CAT grapple, the hoses are run in the proper place to hook in the hose holder on the arm and up to the fittings. My fit-em-all hyd attachments just drop the hoses out the top, or maybe the side- but never quite by the pivot point to go in the hooks. Im sure I paid more for that, but it is nice.
All I have is a Cat skid steer auger I bought used. No problem getting a point for it. Cat is generally better than others at supplying parts, but that ain't saying much. Sometimes they're reasonable, sometimes they gouge your eyes out. A handful of rubber seals to fix a leaking joystick is around a thousand bucks. Not my idea of great support, just OK.