I just made some mud mats with 10 foot long treated 2x10s. I nailed 2x6s to the 2x10. My question is, how do Y'all move them? Do Y'all have cables attached to them, or just grab them with the thumb when removing and loading them. I don't have a thumb on my CAT, yet. I realize my mats are toothpicks for bigger machines. So far, they are working great for me. How are Y'alls mats held together? hugs, Brandi
Grab them with the hoe, you should be able to scoop the bucket under them enough to cradle them and pull them out.
Yair . . . The only mud mats I ever built were eight or ten inch round bush timber held together with a weave of wire rope from a crane. We just left a loop both ends and you could pick up and position with a tooth. Cheers,
All of mine were built with cables caddy corner to each other to lift them up. They're 3 layer laminate mats. All probably rotted to nothing by now! Lol Junkyard
only ever seen them moved by a hoe with a matt grapple on it... http://www.northernmat.ca/Products/Access-Mats
Cables are nice to move them, but if you don't have them, slide the bucket carefully under them and pick them up. I view mats as a consumable item, as many get damaged in extreme conditions and with inexperienced operators. Always bring extra if you can.
Thanks Guys! I pushed them around today with the bucket. But when I moved them out of the way, I still needed a little girl power to get them all on the bucket. Really need a thumb. The cleanout bucket doesn't have teeth. When I needed a little extra to level the CAT, I just stacked one on top of another. Worked great, even on the dam slope. hugs, Brandi
Those dam slopes get me every time! I have seen the ends staggered with an iron bar stuck through in the swamp mats for a good place to pick them up. Usually they were 8x8 timbers bolted together. Usually 8 or so together. Usually guys just used a thumb to move them on the pipelines.
If you track out and swap your bucket for a set of forks, preferably facing towards the cab, you can pick them up and stack them as you go without causing any damage. Works for me. Graham
On you-tube there is a guy mulching a right-of-way though some wetland. He is working on 4 mats, and when he crawls off the back one he hooks an attached cable on each mat with a big hook he has hanging off his boom,by keeping it low to the ground ,he slides it to the front using the mat itself to help guide into place. Pretty slick working.
Yep................dam slopes! hugs, Brandi
Good idea. But I don't have a quick coupler on my CAT. It takes me awhile to swap our buckets.....and that is not counting fighting the new grease seal o-rings on if I break one in the process. Don't have forks for it anyway. I do have forks for my tractor loader, and a grapple. Guess I could keep my grapple out there to swap with the loader bucket. About evey 5-6 dump truck loads, I police the area so it won't get so bumpy when I miss putting the dirt in the truck and the muck that drips out the tailgate. I hate getting my wore out, leaky boots in that crap! hugs, Brandi
I couldn't find that video. I did see a video how the bucket can pick up a mat without help from a thumb. But those need to be wider mats than mine. hugs, Brandi
It is incredibly rare to see an excavator without a quick hitch round here (apart from purely bulk loaders). I don't know how you get on with just one bucket. You would be amazed how useful a set of forks and quick hitch would be if you had them, not mention if you had a quick hitch you could run all sorts of attachment with ease.
Brandi, I purchase 3 mats last year when I was wanting to get in the bottom of my pond with my LB 330, I have a manual thumb on it which works fine for most things but was cumbersome picking the mats out of the deep mud since it was at a fixed angle and it made digging really inefficient. So I put a 3/4" cable loop on the end of each mat that I could hook with a bucket tooth and pick up. Have not used the thumb since then. I used 3 so that I could keep 2 in front of me in case I needed to move on quicker than I had planned. I had mud up to the cab several times and the mats came in handy.
Graham1, Since I use the CAT for projects at home, I just plan on which bucket to use and have it on when I need it. I've never seen forks on an Ex. hugs, Brandi
CatToy, I don't have teeth on my 48 inch cleanout bucket. hugs, Brandi