I was looking at some old photos and came across this. It shows my grandfather, William H. Vogt, skidding logs with what I was told is a D7 Cat that was nearly brand new at the time. It doesn't look so new to me though. I think this was done as a photo shoot by Cat for a calendar and this picture shows up on one of the months. He was working for Robinson Timber or possibly Cal-Ida in this picture. I don't know any story on this other one: Here are some logs:
Pretty cool. That was back when men were men and logs were logs...
The area would most likely be Grass Valley or Downieville, Ca. The first picture looks like high elevation red fir forest, the second is most likley in Penn Valley, Ca on the Robinson ranch just judging by the oak tree, and there isn't really enough info on the third.
Awesome pictures you found there! Definitely worth framing and hanging on your man cave wall!
always good to have family equipment still around or pictures of it. i know where my grandpas cat d4 dozer loader is that he used for years but sold a year after i was born.
That tractor in the picture is a D7E.... not even made in 1957 to my knowledge.
I was thinking the same thing.........a D7E. I thought the first E models came out in the early sixties.....'61? It had a BIG 4 banger in it, low rpm engine, like 12-1400 rpm. The turbo had a real scream to it. I believe they were 165 horsepower. This one looks to be direct drive, it has the bubble nose hydraulics. Those seats were a long way from comfortable. 12 hours a day on one of those will get you callouses where you do not want them. They were a good Cat, really slow by todays standard, but extremely dependable. Regardless of the issue of the date, great to see her here. I grew up with a family named Vogt in Humboldt county, not a real common name. Might be related. Thanks for sharing...Gramps would be proud.
Yes Redwood Climber...they later moved the hydraulic unit from the front to the side... with the early E's you only had basically half a radiator and was always heating the hydraulic unit so they had premature failure.... another give away is the stubby steering clutch levers,, the last one to have the long levers for steering were the 17 A D7. You know your getting old when you JUST know this stuff.....lol.... but still great pictures.
No Frills Cat Interesting to look back at how it was done not so many years ago. That D7E was top of the line in it's day when Mr. Vogt was logging with it. Only a rear screen, (side screens were mosty unheard of then), certainly no airtight, air conditioned cab with wipers, no fingertip ergonomic controls, no electronic tier III engine, not even a muffler, just a straight pipe, (they sounded so cool). No adjustment on the seat whatsoever.... now onto the logging end of the machine... certainly no grapple....on a Cat? Unheard of in that time...no integral arch, not even a simple fairlead! AND YET!!! These men got logs every day, lots of them. They fought the dust, and the cold they fought the limbs and brush that wanted to slap them at every turn. Many of them lost much of their hearing, the cotton balls that some guys used did a poor job of protecting their ears. They did it with none of the comforts of the machines we have today. Yes, I love the cool comfortable machinery we have today, but my hat is off to men like Mr. Vogt and all the loggers before us. They were real men.
That must have been in 1967 rather than 1957 my friend, these D7Es didn´t come out until the early sixties