Looking for recommendations on an older smaller dozer. I had a case 350 which was nice, sorta wish I never sold it. Like the 450C Case, its about as big as I would go. I suspect most here use bigger dozers, but any input on the subject would be great.
Hand clutch D4. Not much to go wrong you can't fix yourself.
I bought a Dresser TD7G. It's a 1990 vintage. 70 hp cummins, 14K lbs, 6 way blade. My first dozer so I don't know much. But originally I was looking for a JD450C or Cat D3. Could not find one that seemed worth the money they wanted. So I bought the TD7G and put on new rails and sprockets for less money than an "as is" JD450C. I am glad I went with the Dresser. It runs and works great, is easy to work on, about 20 years newer than a JD450C, and Komatsu has had all the parts I have needed.
JD 450G torque converter and 4 spd shift on the fly transmission, the last 'mechanical' drive dozer before the H which has the hydraulic drive motors. Not too many Case around here.
Cat D4D or a Fiat 70CI.
deere 450c - 650g are all good tractors. The 450b's is good except it has dry steering clutches that are more suceptible to problems than the wet ones. That being said cat ran dry clutches i think up to the c series I belive, but i'm not a cat guru. IH/dresser made a nice product, but parts tend to be more expensive and harder to get than deere or cat. Cat in my opinion produced the little dozers, but focused on the larger ones, leaving them a little behind the competition in that field. Case is ok I guess never seen enought of them to draw an opinion, other than that they have a unique steering system, that has a learning curve that I havent mastered
The 350 and 450 older CASE dozers with the gonads steering system always got high marks from people who owned them . I would stay away from the newer machines. I had an eyewitness report of CASE and Komatsu coming off the same assembly line in the mid 90's.
Deere 350 or 450, good little machines, and easy to work on.
Cat D3 is great little machine. Tozzi, I beg to differ on the easy to work on about the 450 deeres. My experience they are a real rotten little bitch to work on.
I've ran and worked on a Deere 350C and it seems to be a great little machine.
we have a case 450D with a 6 way blade and have owned it for about 25 years...I'm going to guess it's a late 70's or early 80's model. We've had a couple issues, the biggest one being rebuilding the engine last year and in hindsight that may have been avoidable - we had a bad water pump which we thought we had fixed but I think it got run low on coolant once before we changed the pump, which led to a blown head gasket which put coolant in the oil and the rest is history. All that being said parts are easy to get and relatively inexpensive. I personally like the way the case operates, one reason is ours has not had any brakes at all since we've owned it and I don't even miss them. Another thing is if you have the right setup you can haul it behind a pickup. I like our case better than the neighbor's JD350 but that's the only other small dozer I've operated. With my limited experience I vote case 450.
I have to give a vote for the D3. I have a series 2, and parts are easy to get, and for the most part its fairly easy to work on too. Except one starter bolt that is right next to the frame. That one bolt, nearly made me bald, and grey. Ohh wait, never mind, I was already like that. There are alot of machines out there, I guess it just depends on your budget, and just how old you want to go.
My vote is the komatsu D31. Im surprised no one else has chimed in for the Komatsu. To be honisted my D31 is the only dozed I have ever operated so I'm probably not the best one to get advice from. I have to say I really like my 1985 D31.
I also vote for the Komatsu D31. Our is a 1996 model and a real work horse.
TD 9 the old start on gas switch to deisel style good lil tractors hard to beat run forever and they aren't bad if you run it once in a while if it's an everyday thing it gets old i have done that before and you can do all the matainace yourself
Stay away from the used 350 and 450 Deeres with shuttle shift trannys. If they very many hours on them, the discs are probably already glazed, and you don't want to the the sucker who came along at the right time, trust me. This problem was recently discussed here. Don't let it happen to you. The CAT D3 of yore has a rock-solid torque convertor. That's where I stick my money if I wanted powershift.
John Deere 450J LT gets my vote for top contender for small frame dozer. From a mid size up ie. CAT D6 and up I switch over to CAT for best of breed........my .02 farmer
Hi ! I own a 1966 350 straight dozer with a 6 way blade ! very nice machine easy to fix very versatile hydraulic reverser I love it !! parts are pretty easy to get
Sorry,NOT true at all.I've had 350 and 450 B's,C's and D's the last 34 years with absolutely no issues from the reversers,tranny's, or anything else for that matter in thousands of hours. I use mine regularly from basement excavations to stumping and heavy pushing,it's definitely NOT just a topsoil princess for sure.IMHO the very best small dozer class alive.You can keep your powershift trannys and that goes for Deere also.
Agreed 2X..350's and 450's are a great machine. I have owned numerous of each over the years.
What deere 450c's with shuttle problems? I picked up mine with a blown motor, had been setting neglected for several years. Every mechanic told me the same thing, if its a wet cluch machine, dont worry about the tranny, its fine. They were right. I did the main clutch because it was apart, and all the springs were shot, but the tranny and shuttle were fine. Machine has 7k & some odd hours on it. In my area deere is the number one in the under 100hp dozer category, and they are thumping cat hard. we are not just talking new stuff. I'm talking 350c&d, 450b,c,d,e,g, 550g are super common, a couple 650g's, and some 700h's, 750c's, and about to be an 850j. Some of the 550g's are in the 13k hour mark and the owner has no intent to sell, works it daily.
I like my 450g, no problems.
Deere 450
I'll throw another vote in for the Fiat 70CI. Go forever and the parts are all available
Would you like to pay the repair bill on mine? Glad all you hats are having such good luck with your C model Deeres. But sh*t happens with the main clutch pack. Ask any Deere mechanic. I'm just sayin'...
**** can and will happen to ANYTHING mechanical there bluetop.I just asked myself your question.The answer is there simply is no problematic history with the main clutch pack.
OK, have it your way, just keep a check on that line pressure accessed at the gauge tap near your right foot. Dimes can be used to shim it up should a factory spacer not be handy. If it ever drops below spec and those discs get the slightest bit glazed over, that is the beginning of the end. Best of luck to all who have had good luck so far with a design to be avoided IMHO. The basic design originated with the Ford tractor Select-O-Speed transmission, and later the developing engineer went to Deere, who used it in various applications, some successful and some not so successful. If you are one of those people who had good luck with early Deere heavy equipment, lucky you, that was not the norm in this neck of the woods. I do concede that the above may not be so much a problem if you are operating your own C Series machine. But, Oh, God, let a hat get on it...don't ask me how I know this... If you want to know if one of these dozers is already infected, simply put the blade against something immovable. Throttle the RPM's into the power band and push. The engine should die. If it does not, but slowly accelerates instead because the discs are slipping, the virus is present and no amount of vaccination can cure the problem. I can't recall if this test is in the shop manual, but I believe it is. Anyway, good luck to all concerned. They are great little workhorse machines when they are up.
I have a 1993 CAT D4C Series II. Sweet machine. There is not much left on the grouser height which actually makes her a great dresser machine! Hardly leaves any tracks in the fine material. I am using her on a rock fill job pushing quarry rock into the excavated muck hole. A few passes and she can push the entire truck load in, even the big 24" shot rock. And she is easy on the diesel as well.
My JD 650J has been a great first machine for me. It is easy to control and work on and it has been very reliable. I would recommend this machine without reservations.
I can vouch for the Case 455/450C crawlers. They run the same trans as the 850 and the motors are pretty well bullet proof. Very well balanced and operator friendly machine. Whatever machine you get, it all depends on what the previous history is as to how reliable it will be. I have had mine since new and has 10000 hrs up and no major parts replaced, but any abused machine will prematurely fail.