An interesting video. Especially seeing the different machines. Never heard of a "K" series CAT.
Pretty cool video the K series cat blades were made for the customers out of the states pretty much same machine as a 140H in the states.
I saw a 160K today in Alberta.
Too bad there wasn't a clip of someone backwards blading...
I’ve heard that cat allowed some k series machines in the states and Canada
You just had to bring that up.....
Some K series graders did not meet the tier 4 emissions, some got in under the wire, you see Cat sold a lot overseas it seems where tier 4 emissions are not in place.
I've seen a couple K machines in Alberta.
I think the only time I unlock my saddle is to change my cutting edges or cut them strait with a torch. Not a whole lot of call for ditching or sloping here.
We have been doing a lot of road recovery these last year or so, I ditch and keep the ditches cleaned out every chance I can get, these last couple of summers have been real dry so I do find you can ditch and clean out area's that normally stay wet.
I might have put 250 hours on my volvo this summer. My maintainer grader probably got about 1200, well I put 1200 on, mine was down for a month when the motor went, and had to run the other one
I unlock my saddle frequently. Especially now with AWD. As for torching a cutting edge straight. I've never done that. I rotate frequently. When I have a set worn out they'll still be within 1/2" of straight.
I don't do a lot of road maintaining. Mostly road building and asphalt prep. Under normal conditions, it's not worth it to rotate. She'll start just touching on the outsides of the edges. Only takes a couple min for one of the welders to zip a bit off the ends. I have heard for years that the heat ruins your blades, but in over 25 years, I have never broken a cutting edge on a grader. Doing a fine grading job on a road, especially with quarry agg, I can have the blades cut twice a week sometimes, maybe 3 if the guy on the string is really fussy.
I have not done any fine grading not sure if I could, fine grading and finishing is a art on its own.
It's true that not everyone can do it, but it's not as hard as you might think, Patience and practice. I get pretty rusty if I don't do it for a while. Probably been a couple of years since I've had the string out. I did a grading job for modern a couple years ago, and they just wanted it to look pretty and have a 3% crown. As long as I was inside their allowed tonnage, the inspector was happy. I've never tried a GPS system. A lot more companies have them, but I can't see us ever getting one unless it becomes part of being able to bid jobs. Most of my grading these days involves trying to make water run on someone's driveway while still keeping the paving guys happy when they come behind me. After all these years, I find it pays to be aggressive, and tell the home owner what you are going to do after they tell you what they want.
Yes for sure, there are operators that can't operate without a GPS today, its hard to find a finish grader guy that can lay in a grade now with a basic meter and a good eye and stay within the allowed tonnage, i'm amazed sometimes what some people think a grader should be able to do with nothing to work with, some think you should be able to take pit run fill and shoot class a out the ass of the machine, lol, yes you have to be a bit aggressive sometimes, your part of a lost art, Hats off to you,
I just got done doing a big ditch clean out and leveled out the fence line and put all the dirt in the farmers field really turned out nice I pull my saddle pin a fair amount. Here our some pictures of the project I did. View attachment 229336 View attachment 229337 View attachment 229338
Apparently my pictures didn’t post here they are again
I do a lot of work on roadbanks and drainage areas where farm fields border my roads. I'd guess 60% of my roads are bordered with farm fields, no fences. This year we have been on the dry side so was able to get projects done that had been too wet for the last few years. I rarely have problems with land owners. I maintain field entrances and driveways with the thought of them being used by large equipment. Been doing it long enough that I've built a following. The farmers trust me and mostly leave me alone. If I have problems it's always with absentee land owners. City people that buy a parcel of land and think the entire World revolves around them. What they want and what I am willing to do may have a sizeable spread. My "go to" line in a debate is this. "What is the priority here, the public road or the private driveway?" With the most stubborn that may have to be repeated a few times. But they always concede. I will not build a driveway or field entrance that dumps it's water onto my roadbed. I did two road elevations this year with a hired dozer helping me. The first one went very smoothly working with a dozer operator that I've worked with before and known for decades. The second one went very awkwardly working with a new dozer guy that "thinks" he's a dozer operator. That required flagging him down and having a discussion about what he was doing? When we were down to shaping the roadbed and sloping the banks I sent him home. It was faster to just do it with the grader than fix what he messed up...... I've never worked on construction sites. Never used a transit to get my grade. Just eyeball it.
I would prefer roads built by eye, but the educated people ( and there is nothing wrong with having an education ) want to design it and have you follow the specs. We did a mill in place job this fall. They mill 4 inches, but instead of loading the milled asphalt on trucks, they leave it on the road. After the second pass, you get one shot to grade it, and shape it before it tramps back into asphalt. Push too hard, and it slides on the milled surface below, and you get a bump. Roll it, then pave over it. The inspectors couldn't complain about what I was doing, because they had never been on a job like that. Lucky for me, the guy on the miller, had done this a few times, so he had a few tips, and he is married to the district engineer, and told her to be happy with what she gets, because it's not going to be pretty.
Man.. you got some room to work with, that's the holy grail of ditching, just looking at all that material with no washing machine size rocks to move, awesome job!!!, ps, i would love to have a AWD new 140.
Thanks it finally was a dry fall so was nice to get some of the ditching projects done and I really like the new 140AWD it’s a very well balanced machine for moving dirt.
This is the 8th new machine I've had the fortune to run. Every time we've traded we priced AWD and it was usually around $20K, sometimes as high as $27K. I always advised the Township Board that it would not pay for itself. Last year we traded for our current AWD machine. I was wrong. AWD increases productivity so much that it easily pays for itself. Now looking back I regret that I misled the Board. I use it a LOT. Especially doing ditch work or bank work. According to manufacturer specs it increases blade force by 50%.
I always had the same opinion until I ran one with AWD, would not want to go back. I use it more than I ever thought I would.
I have not run one with AWD, but would love to try one ditching and for snow removal.
I got my first AWD grader in 2012 and it’s crazy how much of a difference the AWD drive makes turns a blade into a whole new machine definitely worth every penny I’m surprised they even make a non AWD machine cause I certainly would never want another grader that didn’t have AWD.
We had a very easy Winter last year. Only pushed snow three times. Twice without chains. I wouldn't have tried that without AWD. I forgot to add, this trade it only cost us $10K for AWD. Deere was pushing them to keep their assembly plant busy I guess. Was a no brainer for us.
The K’s were teir 3. Not sure what the 160K had, but the 140K had the C7. They were very similar to the first series H but with that C7. A few guys that demo’d them said they felt a bit down on grunt and a tad thirsty. There was the occasional one sold here in Alberta. They were allowed up until 2017.
My experience with C7's are not good, stay clear of them.
Anyway, I've got my machine all cleaned up and serviced for snow work. There's something satisfying about pushing snow in a clean machine.
Which one had the motor go? The Volvo or the little one? What happened to it? How was your year?
The little Mauldin. Cooked her. She always ran too cold from the day we got her, 125, 150. She started running closer to normal this summer. I mentioned it, but was told that I could stop complaining about it being too cold. Real hot day, shouldering new asphalt. Asphalt millings are hard to push, but the Volvo can mark this new environment friendly pavement really easy, so I used the little one. Full round of trucks went through the spreader, no paved driveways to work around, so no need to look up, head down keep grading, gauges up over head, work under your feet. I thought she was starting to run out of fuel, looked up, lots of fuel, but 250 degrees. Scuffed 3 pistons. I was in the shop later in the week, the mechanic said she was dry on coolant, just when I was going to say no way, he smiled and said, not your fault. The tank is on the top of the rad, buy once you unbolt it, you can see it is not part of the rad. There can be 3 inches in the bottom, but the hose is above that, and the tank is only another 2 inches higher. The neck of the fill pipe goes down into the tank, and it looks full. Checked the other one next morning and put almost 2 gallons in it. They put the plow gear on the Volvo this year, Got a bit excited, but then they told me it was just to plow a short road going into a cell phone tower being built. When I am done my loader route after a storm, I can drive the hour, jump in the grader, they are leaving it at a house in the area, walk the grader around 10KMs up the road,plow in the woods about a km, plow a small laydown area, then back to park. They are gearing up an old one way plow for her, All they had was an old V that was on an old Clark grader they had before my time. Not a lot of work for the Volvo. They hired a new fella this spring. Kind of an all around guy. He is from here, nice young fella, big strong boy, a bit hyper. He has been working in the oil patch, wanted to come home. He had some seat time in a 24 out there, so they put him on the old Volvo he calls it. He did a gravel job for Miller group. They touted his skills, and I was Greg who? The government surveyor told me later that he tore down a lot of stakes. Then the inspector on the job told me that he could handle the machine, but he was wide open trying to keep up with 40 dump trailers, and probably fell into bed every night. But he said it was a by the ton job. He was pretty sure that if he pulled a string across in front of him, it wouldn't have passed. Miller's graderman had a lot of work getting it ready for chip seal after the young fella was done. He ended up leaving to go into business with his father. On the private side, work was crazy, people were not traveling, so there were a lot of driveways getting paved. At the end of it, I was working 7 days a week. I think we have around 25 that didn't get paved before they shut the plant down, and at least 50 to start making ready in the spring. Plowed twice so far, nothing frozen, lots of grass tore up. Been cold the last couple of days, so everything is starting to stiffen up.
Glad you had a good year. Some have had okay an okay year, but then some you talk to didn’t do much.