I was working a D8T a few years back, mostly working a fill for a few haul trucks. I took some pictures to explain the truly limited forward visibility on those machines. They have been used in other company safety programs. Feel free to use them. My diesel beetle in front of the blade. my view from the normal seated position. Leaning hard one way and the other. in the last picture, you can see the barest sliver of the back hatch window. That's it. A person straight ahead is a dead one. After I showed and explained this to the dirt squeeze, he always crossed behind me.
I once came across a D8L in the middle of the night parked on a dump with the engine running and all the lights on. No operator in the cab, when I looked I found him curled up asleep in front of the (grounded) blade. Just for sh1ts & giggles I jumped up and pulled the throttle control from Low to High Idle RPM. A split-second later he shot out of his resting place like a rat up a drainpipe....
you'd have ended up spitting teeth if that was me
What I do is blow the horn and twist left and right to see in front of dozer if I stop and sit for awhile in a busy area.
Just curious, what were you doing in the dump in the middle of the night?
reminds me of the time i was working deep inside a massey 760 combine at the front of the strawwalkers. one of the other mechanics in the shop just for giggles, hit the engine starter and i shredded a pair of coveralls on the serrated edges trying to get out of there. by the time i got out, there was nobody in sight. i was mad for the rest of the day. never did find out who it was. i can chuckle about it 40 years later but it wasn't funny at the time
I would suspect he recognized a teaching opportunity.
Some good photos. I like how the profile of the beetle fits within the blade outline perfectly. You need to get a buggy whip
24/7 mining operation. I was the night shift maintenance supervisor at the time. I was driving around checking on my guys when I came across the tractor parked with the engine running, lights on, and apparently no operator anywhere to be seen. And you'd have ended up being fired, just like he was, on the spot......
TWo checked as it were. I remember a story from this really nice supervisor, talking about a canadian super they had. They teased him aboot his accent and then the end of the job came, he was handing out the two checks and VERY tongue in cheek he says, "How aboot that!"
I always thought I worked extra hard that week when I got two checks
Running over that beetle would have put it out of its misery.......Amirite!?
No, I miss that beetle. The one I have now is stock, but that one was a beast. turbo, exhaust, injectors, intercooler, boost sensors, altered digits in the computer. Then clutch would 'compensate' from 2200~2700 in any gear, so a south bend clutch added. The torque would put a grin on anyone's face
I always wanted to build up a Volkswagen TDI. One of the performance diesel companies pushed one hard to see how much hp a stock crank could handle with just changing top end parts. At 550hp, they bent a rod and the crank looked great. I tried to find the article but couldn't find it right away. I'll share if I come across it again.
Great demonstration @skyking1 thanks! I ran around on small forklifts and now my backhoe and while you can tell people, all day long, that you can't see things this is a very good representation of how much you can't see!
Excellent! People just don't seem to understand that we can't see everything from the seat.
and the land fill application has a pre cleaner that is twice as tall. The entire center window is pre cleaner and stack
^ yes the front window is good to see if it is raining or you are about to hit a 35 ton offroad truck.