After many years of pushing trees one finally got even with me. My first broken window.
Gotta love the safety glass and the zillion pieces to try and clean up. You will find them for months!
Its sucks but at least the tree didn't end up in your lap. A guy I work with had one come across his legs and he couldn't move it. So count your blessings, I'd lose a window over a leg any day.
I bet that was a heart stopping moment, was it a complete shock or did you see it coming and could do nothing about it? Its what I call a reality check. We all need them once in a while to keep us on the ball. Glad it was only glass and not body. :drinkup
lucky boy!
My heart definitely missed a few beats over that one. There was a hoe dragging the trees out and making piles. I was pushing the piles down the ROW to the burn pile. I was backing up and turning to go around the next pile to get behind it. There was a small tree about 4 inches in diameter that somehow the butt end of it hung the outside of the track as I was turning and bowed it up. I was looking back and turned to the front just in time to see it rolling up to the top. I hit the decel but too late. It jumped off the track and hit the window like an arrow. I saw it coming but couldn't do anything about it. Lucky for me it hit the wiper motor and broke the wiper off and busted the glass. Didn't actually come in the cab. Definitely flashbacked some bad memories tho. I lost a friend to a limb thru his chest on an old hand clutch D8 in the early 80's. I'm usually very cautious around trees. :drinkup
I had a very close moment on a D-8H one time while clearing. I had a good sized pile of trees to push, and was working through them when one branch snapped around the end of the blade and headed into the operators station. It was an open cab machine. I was easing through with the decelerator pushed down to about 1/3 throttle, and really watching. this branch pushed up under the decelerator, so the tractor accelerated, bringing the branch in faster. I was pushing on the decel. for all I was worth, and it kept going, with the main part of the branch, about 5 or 6 inches, headed right for me in the seat. Fortunately I had the presence of mind to grab the gearshift and throw it into 2nd reverse, and I backed away from the problem. I have rarely been so glad I can think fast when in a jam. I could have been impaled right there in the seat. For any beginners, clearing is one of the most dangerous things to do, and a lot can go wrong. Probably more than you can even imagine.
Those are what the heck moments... when it happens.... I've manages to get a few.. and usually it's gets snagged up then wack... My worst was a piece of rebar someone had thrown in a sand pile... I had a 247 as I pushed into the pile...K BOOM..... right dead center in the front door glass... It definitely stops then speeds the old heart up for a few minutes...
Just an idea for ya. Have you ever thought about using Lexan for your windows? I have ran a 527 Cat track skidder as well as a 515 Cat wheel skidder in the past and can tell you, that stuff is like John Wayne! It wont break under any presure. I was on the 515 one day going about all out down the skid trail getting pushed by my drag of logs, seen a HUGE stick bending off the end of the blade and come loose right towards the right side door. I ducked and screamed like a school girl, only to about get deafend by the impact slap and watch the top fly on by the rear of the skidder. The stuff is tough/ Just a pain to take care of. Seems to scratch way to easy, but if you use Pledge to clean it with, it seems to fill the scratches up and helps keep the dust from sticking. Jason
Ya, you were lucky!! I have often thought of replacing glass with plexi-glass . Much tougher , plastic see-through material but I think the material gets more difficult to see through over time. Where you wearing safety glasses? That's alot of tiny pieces.
i had a branch hit my left hand on a 963 b with no cab. it pinned my hand to the direction controller and i could not stop going forward. it did not break anything but my pride and some knuckle skin but taught me to respect the heck outta trees.
I was brush clearing with a 428 backhoe a few years back, and one branch, no more than 2" thick, rolled under the bucket, and when the back wheel went over it, it reared up and torpedoed my door glass - bloody toughened glass exploded all over the cab. What shook me was the speed it whipped up and around the tyre. Never came into the cab, just smashed my window and pride, then lay down again. Worst one I had with glass was on a Cat 206 duck, one of the old ones where the window hinged up and in. I had a crack right across one corner. A H & S muppet doing a site visit stopped me and said I wasn't safe to work as I hadn't got full visibility. So I swung the screen up and in, and said "I can see OK now". He'd only left a few minutes when I hit a big lump of concrete in the ground, the glass fell out of the frame and completely broke over my head.
My boss was popping stumps with an old pc300 when a big root came through the front window, pushed on the travel levers(working over the final drives of course). As the Hoe started tracking toward the stump, the root proceeded to crush the cab. It was one of the old kommies that you had to slam the throttle down 10 times as hard as you could to shut it down. He managed to get it shut down after the travel levers had broken off of the pedals and the machine stopped walking. He was very lucky and now all of his clearing machines all have heavy screens in front of the windshield.
And he makes sure all his operators only work over the idlers because he has first hand experience of what can happen if you dont
hey you guys I am a newbie that really appreciates this thread. I have experience with a compact track loader and am shopping a D5 and this kind of stuff really concerns me. Thanks very much for you sharing your experience.
i was pushin over trees with my 175 and it has a open hole in the top so you can see the bucket at full lift and a widowmaker branch broke off the top of the tree and came right through the hole and almost got me...........i will be putting a screen over that shortly
Ouch!! Falling limbs are a big hazzard around here this year after that hugh ice storm we had last Feburary. Still lots of hugh limbs in the trees that haven't made it to the ground yet. I had one come crashing down across the sweeps a couple months back. Lucky no damage.
A guy I use to know bid a small land clearing job for a ridiculously cheap price. The job started out bad and only got worse. The highlight was when he put a limb through the grill, radiator and fan of his CAT D8K. The repairs cost him almost as much as he bid the whole project for.
OUCH! part of me says he got his just deserts, but it might have been due to lack of experience that made him go in at such a rediculous price. Either way I dont like anybody damaging plant especially knowing its their own really sucks. Hopefully he learned another of lifes valuable lessons
Yes, be careful out there. (2nd post)
Actually, the guy was an old hand and just got a little careless. He bid the job super cheap because he was hoping to get his foot in the door for a larger project that the company was planning. However, the company got purchased by a much larger company. The new owners scrapped the large project!
If you replace glass windows with clear plastic sheet material be aware of the fact that the product refered to as Plexiglass is an acrylic material. The better choice is to use polycarbonate sheets. Although it is more expensive it is extremely more durable and break resistant. I know this from using both types.
Thats not safety glass is it, looks like tempered glass to me, safety glass is the stuff like in the front windshield of your car.
While both type of windows are considered safety glass, the glass in most machines is just tempered. Car and truck windshields have a thin film sandwiched between two layers of tempered glass to stop it from blowing apart all over you.
when i was first on blades i was pushing around some demo mess and i had a piece of rebar snag in the n/s track which i did not see until it came around my blindside and smashed the bloody door glass..nearly s..t myself but 3 guys watching laughing at me sure taught me a lesson, only lost one more glass to date.
Figures had to happen in the winter! There goes the hot air !
I had a tree come through the right door on my 850c JD like a spear, all it got was the window and part of the seat...... well actually something else ripped the seat... my bottom side puckered up and tore out some foam! LOL I was working SE of Ranger TX, and had to take the door to Abiline. The glass was $500.00 labor was $100.00 and it had to be left 24hrs for glue to dry when they put it back on door frame. I put the latch, handle and wiper motor back on myself. Total cost was around $1000.00 with hotel and fuel, not counting the $2500.00 for the 2.5 day loss in revenue on a contract job. Being an OW/OP i was sure going to be more carefull in the future.
The landfill dad and I run I was clearing a slope full of scrub to make a new cell. MY older brother had his 120 Hitachi on the bottom of the slope making a silt dam with the brush. I was on the trusty old D5B and my push was 150 feet with the last 40 or 50 being a commitment when I broke over the hill. at the bottom Id turn and go about 40 feet to a 2 to1 slope and walk up and start over again. I got started going down the hill and got hung onto an old stump and got my belly hung. My brother was walking down in the cell and didnt see me. I had one track on the ground and walked around into a circle heading back the way Ihad come. I ended up having to bac down the slope. I was riding my brakes goin down and I was sliding a bit and then I felt something shoving into my back. I t was a little red oak about 10 feet tall and an inch and a half thick. It had been stripped to a pole and was sticking up from the toe of the slope. it hung under my coat picked me up a a bit. It then came out by my collar about that time the drawbar caught it and drug it back down and back under the machine. I had a nice stripe down my back for a few weeks. The next worse thing wasnt a branch but a wood block 1by 4 6 inches long. We have a spill rack on the D5 and I was pushing rubbish and spreading for the compactor and I had a load if blocks come in. I was pushing them out to the side to use for an alternative cover and had to push them to the side. We get some 8 inch wide stips of fiberglass sheeting thats an 1/8th inch thick and 8 foot long. One of thies had been buried with a foot or so out of the ground was sticking up lie a flag. I was pushing over this usually it will shear off but this one had stayed there. I had started pushing the last blade of blocks over to the side when one spilled over my rack and some reason I watched it fall on the ground right on that fiberglass panel. In that instan the blade passed all the way off it and it shot it up and knocked the dog crap out of my head. Now when I see a sheet of that panel the compacto has missed ill usually corner it out and let him grind it up.
Normally I would agree with you on that but lucky for me the D51's have 2 heaters in them. Turn em both on high with the outside temps in the mid 20's and by the time the machine is up to operating temp you will be turning the heat down even with a door glass missing. LOL It's been kinda nice the last few days having fresh air and still stay warm as long as I'm not turned into the wind. The mechanic called me Wednesday and said to leave it where he could get to it and he would get the new glass installed while I was off for the new year holiday. I hope he did or when I get there in the morning the cab is gonna be full of snow. LOL
These stories are a great reminder. I am still learning and most the work I do is clearing so this is a good reminder to be careful. Thanks
Please delete.
Trying to delete this post. Not smart enough. Got them both deleted now, will tell the story later. Tired, need to go to bed. Sorry