Anyone with experience in this type of work that can give some thoughts. My thought is that a vibratory plow in the 48K or so (D-6) weight class would be ideal in rocky ground over a larger dozer with a solid shank. Easier to transport, easier on fuel and cheaper to buy? Ground conditions are dry but rock can be an issue. I believe a track set up with narrow tracks would give the most tractive effort.
Tell us more about the project. Are you pulling conduit then pushing the fiber? What's the distance? How deep is the installation depth?
105–130 HP class dozers (e.g., Cat D5/D6, John Deere 750/850, Case 1150M) are the sweet spot for 3" conduit in most soil conditions, + Bron V75-3 vibratory plow. Capable of ~36” bury depth in many conditions. Good footprint, efficient, and transportable without extreme logistics.
Billions are being spent to run cable in Alaska to every nook and cranny in the state. Even to places where nobody lives. I don’t pretend to know anything about it, but this is what the baller’s are using.
Very profitable niche if you can get the contract.
Adak even has operational fiber that your tax dollars pay for, even though the town was abandoned decades ago. https://alaskabeacon.com/2026/07/21/on-a-nearly-deserted-alaska-island-you-pay-to-keep-hundreds-of-empty-buildings-wired-for-internet/
Doing a prerip is the best idea and marking were the depth can't be achieved. Then open up the prerip and deal with the obstruction, close it after that's done then plough in the cable. No exotic ripper is required. In the early 90s I worked on about 3000 kilometres of the new optic network which was ripped to 1.5 meters, the cable was laid at 1.2 metres. The prerip machines were D9s and 10s and the cable layers were D7s which could lay up to 20 kilometres a day. The big thing is the cable layer can't backup if it hits a snag.
Thats crazy, I was stationed in Adak in the late 80's in the Marine Corps. Why would they waste the money putting fiber in Adak?
The contract is about a million LF, 3' deep. conditions will have some rock. They are suggesting a D9 stationary plow. I thought about a Bron on a D-6 or Case 2050M would be more ideal, as ChrisMafera points out. The conduit is 3". There is a rock clause built in. It would be pulling the conduit and pushing the fiber. Thanks Tones, that makes a lot of sense.
In modern, heavy equipment vernacular and hip-hop culture, a baller is someone who has made a lot of money pulling fiber, achieved high status, and spends it on luxury items, child support and ex-wives.
Because somebody who works for a non-profit that receives Federal grants for cable installations has a drinking buddy who has a lodge and a cable installation business decided it would be a great idea to give the children of Adak connectivity to learning resources. It was for the children.
Ironically, the new FTTH connections are not being used. My wife was spending $1,300 a month for a 100 Mbps business plan for her clinic in Deadhorse. Residential service is $300-$400. It’s all been replaced with this, practically overnight.
All five of them.
This BEAD money train has no brakes. Bust out another 1$ Billion. Milestone in Broadband Expansion with Final BEAD Funding Approval - Alaska Business Magazine Alaska’s final BEAD awards unlock $629 million, with the largest shares going to Alaska Communications and GCI to connect 46,000 homes. www.akbizmag.com
My son’s buddy, worked for GCI during the fiber craze. Young millennial. Graduate of Nome High School. Can barely read and write, but amassed a fortune ( pi$$ed much of it away ). Climbing poles in villages doing FTTH connections. Grossing $250k annually. Bought a lodge on Wasilla Lake and rents the cabins out, runs a arborist gig on the side. Another round is happening if a young feller wanted to climb poles and stack some cash.
@KSSS , Telstra, the Australian owned phone company developed the zero tension cable plough tractors. They could be set-up to lay the cable in condute. They had a splitter which opened up the condute, inserted the cable then it went down the shute. They also had a separate shute for the marker tape so it became a 1 pass operation. Some of those machines are still around if you have a hankering to buy something exotic. All the D7s had PAT blades and could be used as a normal dozer if required. Another outfit imported some cable layers from Canada that weren't zero tension. Their first job was a 100 kilometre lay which they achieved but had 10ks of cable left over, they had stretched the cable by 10% and had to redo the job on their dime. 1 very big OUCH
Unlimited money, magic.
A couple years back they got a govt. contract to run fiber all over Texas. I live in a fairly rural area and they installed a fiber service box at nearly every gate around. Didn't matter if it was just to a cow pasture they put a box above the ground. Half of the boxes have been run over or hit with a bushhog now, big waste of money if you ask me. Several guys in the area bought drill rigs and got in the fiber business. Some are still doing it some fizzled out. Good money if you've got the money to start and don't mind being on the road for several years.
Starlink? We have one for camping and used it this weekend on the highest point in AL. Cruising through the 'net and streaming TV.
Could be, that future usage 'might' require bandwidth that isn't dependent on systems that can and do fail. Only physical access can inhibit a cable and it has ultimate security potential where we cannot predict future population demand technologies and bandwidth needs. Thirty five years ago, Australia had a fully funded blue print to replace all copper with Fibre to the premise, then politics intervened, fattened up the Government entity (Telecom) and sold it off, naturally the schematic went in the bin and the money to the new shareholders'. We have never recovered from this mess, rural / regional IP is pathetic, although we do have our own National satellite (Skymuster) which has been incredible, but now its near EOL (2031). In '85 the copper came through here and the team had two D7G's with the deep shank, power tilt bull blades and two cable drums on the front for the second machine, unfortunately I didn't have a camera to share an image now. The copper install cost $5,500 (≅$3,850 USD) per kilometre fully installed forty one years ago, by 2005 we should have all had Fibre, but alas NO.
Yeah. I’m not sure how the telecom companies are going to stay in business. Musk has his Arctic satellites working pretty well
No cell phone service on Mt Cheaha where we were camping. Wife stuck the Star Link to the windshield as we trekked home and we had the net. Amazing technology.
I like those places!
Certainly can understand that, however for those living in the 'digital divide' it isn't fun. We recently had cell outage early on Boxing day, later there was lightning and spot fires took co-ordinating when there was no cell to guide air, heavy plant and ground crews. This happens when a rush of new 'devices' hits the system and it falters due to "the high contention rate " (or congestion), which wireless / satellite technologies will suffer from over time.
LMS Construction was a company specialized in phone lines. To my knowlege they worked for one small phone company. Their along the highway work was multi pair wire cable that was armored. Tractor was a TD15 Dresser, I don't remember the letter suffix. It had a massive ?Broan? plow. I don't believe it vibrated. The owner died, the company closed. Years later, VTEL replaced all the wire with fiber. I believe all that was done with directional boring.
As kid a long time ago I remember a crew pulling a pretty good sized cable down the railroad ROW. IIRC they had a D8 plowing with a D8 pulling it. This was the early '80's.