Not long after I started for the company I now work for I got put one my first serious rock job all by myself too. I told my super I haven't worked in rock like this before he sad just go slow and keep as clean of a path as you can. I had to stock pile all of the fractured rock then track in 3' of dirt cover over the rest to be blasted. Well at some point in the day I think when I was cleaning up wind rows a 2' or so rock came over the blade and I lifted the blade and smash the crap out of the rad guard then the rock could fall out. I was bummed that I messed up my new rig and let my super know, but never heard about it. I was guessing it was understandable, but now months later after getting back on my dozer now it’s a big deal. I'm not in trouble, however when it can up it was like I was some kind of idiot for doing it. And no one believed I could of done at first like I'm suppose to better then that. So for you guys that have worked rock are there anything I could I of done to prevent this or watch for next time? I never saw the rock or felt that it was jammed up in the guard.
I've ran a lot of different Rip Cats and I've never seen a big rock come over the blade. I was having a lot of shale coming threw the grate on our D10 so I plated it over. The big rocks always rolled down the front of the pile.
Never pushed rock before but I don't think you would've been able to feel it when raising the blade. The hydraulics probably didn't even strain to bend that thin a piece of metal. Did it push it back far enough to come in contact with the radiator?
Rock is easy. If you think that is bad try clearing with logs constantly attacking you and the machine. Its all in the proper technique and knowing what is going on at the business end.
No I didn't get the rad and the guard is 3/8"x3" angled steel slats tougher then what Cat runs. Lashlander your right I never thought of that that makes this even more of a freak thing, but this dozer has been turned up so much it boils dirt like nothing. While I haven't done tons of clearing in forest I don't think it holds a candle to a real rock job, but I'm sure there are extremes.
I have pushed alot of different types of materials with a dozer. I worked in a rock quarry, I did a stint pushing chipped cars (steel chips), many years of steep land clearing, and of course pushing dirt, and moving thousands of yards of mud. The mud is the most difficult, it takes planing to move it effectively, cause you can't push mud when your on mud. Clearing is the next and most dangerous to both operator and machine it is the most demanding operating there is. Average 2 to 4 foot size rock is easy(D8 and up size machine) and can come over the blade, since it is very light weight as compaired to mud and wet dirt it is easy to push, but have to keep an eye on it. Busted concrete is similar to rock, but the rebar is horrible, I guess that is kinda worse stuff than clearing, the rebar will reach in and get things if your not careful. Wood chips are fun, but that dust is pretty flamable. I have never pushed large banks of snow. I have heard some stories about pushing it. What makes the rock easy is only so many can be bunched up at a time, and they space themselves, unlike wet sand that has pretty much no space between the granuals.
Working in rock Depending on the type rock you are in, it can easily build up over the top of the blade and get caught on either the tag link on the newer Cats or the angle braces on the older models. If I've fixed one, I've fixed a hundred with rock damage to the grill, hoist and tilt cylinders and hoses and guards. Then there are the ones that get jammed between the tracks and fenders and tear the fuel tanks loose. Working in rock you are not likely to feel the rock that bends your belly pan, grill, or lift cylinders. Quite often such damage happens when you are backing up and looking out the back, and lifting the blade at the same time to clear more rocks. When working the high walls in the surface mines in Kentucky we had all kinds of damage from rock as the operators were required to doze a practically vertical wall clear of all loose rock and dirt so the coal could be removed. Some of these verticals were 150 feet high. No set backs there you see. Rocks fell on the top of these dozers all the time and there were times the falls were so big we had to dig the dozer out with another one or a 992 cause they were all but buried. Always lots of busted glass. Had to use a labor crew to hand dig a D9N out at Convict Flats on the Kings River in California's Sequoia Park one spring when a rockfall came down on it. All the cab glass was busted and the doors, the hood, and several hoses and guards were busted or severely bent. It busted several items on the engine too, turbocharger, exhaust manifold, fuel lines, induction piping, and the thottle linkage. Sheet metal was beat up pretty badly. Many times I have had to just stop and think a rock problem over a bit before figuring out how to shake it off. I've had to get out and man-handle the damn things off too, no fun! Had to do this just last summer in fact a time or two. 1-3 foot round-rock slides or rolls real easy and just rolls right over the top. Slab rock slides some, and if you have loose sand and gravel with it can just slough over the top or around the side. Slot-dozing boulder piles will almost always push some rock in from the sides, got to keep your eyes open. The 1-2 foot stuff is the worst I think, as it can get just where you don't want it the easiest. The lava rock south of Grand Junction, Colorado is bad to work in. It's round and light, and is quite often in gravel or a very powdery sand, almost a dust. It rides up easy on top of the dirt and kinda goes where it wants to then, often over the top of the blade and up against the grill. Sometimes it breaks, and sometimes the dozer breaks. We built the guards up a couple extra feet on all the dozers on this job. How many here have tried to straighten badly bent or dented Cat D8 or D9 grills? Not so easy is it? That is some special steel and it's tough. Lots of heat and a big sledge hammer don't hardly get the job done, it's best to use a powerful press instead. A lot of D8H's and K's and D9G's and H's had all kinds of stuff welded to the exterior of the grill to help keep them from being bent up. Sometimes that helped cause more damage when a small boulder would catch under the edge of one of those ad-on pieces and rip the whole grill off the tractor. Steel slag is bad to push or just to work in period. It's exceptionally abrasive and dusty for one thing. It's also prone to having a considerable amount of steel still in it and some of that stuff is sharp as a razor. I've seen Cat and Fiat-Allis grills and dozer faces sliced as neatly as a piece of cheese from it. Also hoses and roller frame guards, it just slices them right off the machine. Nasty stuff, and as slag processors generally work at least two shifts, the operators can't see much at night, so don't even see the damage till they get off for a while on break, or the dozer quits moving because a long sharp piece of steel slag has gone up through the belly pan into the engine or transmission. Worst of all are the slag balls and skulls. The balls are 6-8 feet or more in diameter, weigh up to 20,000 pounds, and will roll off a face right over a dozer hood. The heavy skulls are out of the ladle bottoms and are shaped kinda like a mushroom. They slide easy if on the rounded part and again, if they come off a face any distance at all they will displace part of your dozer in a bad way. So don't feel bad Dozerboy, you are but one in a long line of catskinners that have had rock trouble, and you for sure won't be the last.
Straightening bent metal. I have always either used wood blocks and a dozer and its blade, or an excavator to straighten bent parts. If they are thick then some torched releif slits, and weld to fill, yeah its not fun.
Hasn't happened to me - YET. Hi, Dozerboy. Don't feel too bad about that. I can't help wondering how many of the guys who gave you a hard time have done the same thing. As Dozer D575 said, clearing heavy timber is the roughest work on a dozer, followed by hard rock. I have yet to spear or otherwise damage a radiator, either with timber or rocks, or for that matter with anything else, but I have to admit that there has been a bit of luck involved in that at times too. Eternal vigilance is the price of freedom - and of undamaged machines.