First 10 hours in a CASE DL550 Minotour

Not sure if this goes in the Dozer heading or CTL.

I took delivery of a Case DL550 Minotour at the end of December. This machine has the rubber tracks, rippers, and Lexan windshield. I used to build a large driveway and large parking pad. Laid out 30-14 cy trucks of pitrun.

I didn't personally spec this, it was one the dealer had ordered. The biggest decision to be made is going with single steel grousers, triple grousers, or rubber. The machine largely comes with everything (guidance OEM is option). I ,after a lot of thought, was happy with the rubber tracks. The testing of 550 showed the rubber tracks were not far from single grousers in pushing ability, triple grousers were last. I felt that getting a high percentage of total push ability with rubber, is better than going with singles and having occasions when I couldn't use it at all. Time will tell if this was the right way to go.

I have little experience running a dozer. I rent then on occasion, but certainly not an accomplished dozer operator.

If you have seen any of the You tube videos on this machine. I can agree with many of the comments. Physically the machine is massively built, heavy duty is an understatement. The machine is very well thought out in all the ways that make it dozer. I was expecting it to take a while before I could hold grade without moguls. Some of the YT reviews said it may take days. Honestly, it took about 3 hours and I was cutting flat grade with it. The ability to totally tune this machine to exactly how you want it to respond really makes it easy to learn on. I really liked the ability to push using the 6 way verse a dirt bucket which is how I would have done this before, even being a Newb to dozing for grade.

The machine really puts the power to the ground (due to the fact it weighs around 18K). It has two power settings, base is 85 hp and it can be turned up to 114 hp. I tried both settings while pushing the piles. It pushed good at 85, but turning it up to 114 made a huge difference in that application.

So far, and its early of course. Here are the things that should have had more thought. The aux couplers that run attachments in CTL mode are .75 couplers. So when you buy the machine you must reduce down to .5 for regular flow and 5/8 for regular high flow. I made the dealer buy those two sets of the reducing couplers. My personal thought, they should come with the machine. The ag community has adaptors that go from Pioneer couplers to JD that are way small. This requires about 6" worth of couplers to accomplish the same thing, not diggin that. The next is the 14 pin coupler that allows the use of Enhanced high flow. This ties a couple of pins together to allow the 41 GPM and 4100 PSI. That should be included, still working on getting that resolved.

Working on getting 2D on it now. I may have a bit to say about this, but I will wait until all the facts are known before I say anything about that.

Overall, the machine is pretty incredible in its abilities. The ROI for me I think will be very good, much better than having a dedicated dozer of this size. I can doze and I can run it as a large CTL (the bucket is 1.25 CY). I have a very large project coming up shortly that was part of the decision to buy this. I am looking forward to really putting it to work. Lastly as I know some will want to know, the cost was about a third less than the 200k numbers put out on YT.

A member with the handle @pafarmer used to talk a lot about his Cats with steel tracks. Wonder if he's tried one of these.

Looks interesting. What is the time to swap between loader and dozer? Looks like it might be difficult in the wrong conditions, something you're not going to be doing several times per day.

It takes me about 3 minutes right now. I think as I get more dialed in, I can do it faster.

You forgot to tell us how much this new machine costs.

KSSS said:

the cost was about a third less than the 200k numbers put out on YT.

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OOPPPS lol

I'm interested in hearing how it works for you. I always like your posts. You seem to tell it like it is without being biased. The couple of videos I have watched they are mainly walking around the machine and talking about it. I'm curious on how far the blade goes up? Probably sounds like a stupid question but in my neck of the woods we have alot of terraces. Years ago they built alot of bench terraces that are now being converted onto narrow base terraces mainly because the bigger equipment they have now doesn't fit the older terraces. Anyway, converting these is done from the top side and using a loader with a blade on it seems to work the best. There is not much dirt that actually gets moved doing these conversions so using a 963 or a 977 is overkill to say the least. Thats why this DL550 caught my attention. I'm just not sure if the blade would go high enough (3.5-4 ft)?

Sounds like a good purchase, I hope it works well for you. When I first saw it at conex 6 years ago I thought it was a great concept for the right applications. I would also think that rubber tracks make it more useful in the long run. Just not sure how they will hold up to the weight of the machine. Got any pics?

congrats @KSSS !
I think your choice of tracks was absolutely right. So many times you have to run from dirt to pavement and not having steel and getting the side eye from the road owners is priceless.
This thing would rock on small developments with the pavement and curbs in early and needing tuned up.
There is money in snow removal and this thing would do those jobs where it has to be trucked out.

Congrats on the new iron!

I second Sky on the rubber tracks at least if I bought one. The beauty of a CTL is being able to cross finished surfaces coupled with the brute force the 550 has can be a very handy piece of iron. Outfitted with GPS it could easily handle final parking lot grade and backfill curbs.

Saw one last year at Conex but didn't spend much time as we were headed to the Trimble booth.

$135K +/- isn't a bad price for how much machine you got.

Keep us posted and throw some pics up.

Wouldn't be much price difference between this and a new 299 cat?

So it looks like the loader arms still control the up/down of the dozer blade? With the rear of the dozer blade sub frame pinning in toward the center of the machine?

Either way, it looks like a great multi use piece of iron, and I think the name of the game for a while might be "whatever works" to make $$$$.

bam1968 said:

I'm interested in hearing how it works for you. I always like your posts. You seem to tell it like it is without being biased. The couple of videos I have watched they are mainly walking around the machine and talking about it. I'm curious on how far the blade goes up? Probably sounds like a stupid question but in my neck of the woods we have alot of terraces. Years ago they built alot of bench terraces that are now being converted onto narrow base terraces mainly because the bigger equipment they have now doesn't fit the older terraces. Anyway, converting these is done from the top side and using a loader with a blade on it seems to work the best. There is not much dirt that actually gets moved doing these conversions so using a 963 or a 977 is overkill to say the least. Thats why this DL550 caught my attention. I'm just not sure if the blade would go high enough (3.5-4 ft)?

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I will take a pic of the blade elevated all the way up with a tape measure and post it.

Tags said:

Sounds like a good purchase, I hope it works well for you. When I first saw it at conex 6 years ago I thought it was a great concept for the right applications. I would also think that rubber tracks make it more useful in the long run. Just not sure how they will hold up to the weight of the machine. Got any pics?

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I am guessing that track wear will be faster than a typical 11K CTL. The tracks are considerable longer but I have to think the weight of the machine will have an impact. I considered all of that, I just didn't want to be held back by the single grousers in some environments. Like I said, I will find out what the correct answer was, hopefully I made the right decision. I haven't take any pics yet. This will be going out on a project in a couple weeks, I will get some great dirt pics on that job.

crane operator said:

Wouldn't be much price difference between this and a new 299 cat?

So it looks like the loader arms still control the up/down of the dozer blade? With the rear of the dozer blade sub frame pinning in toward the center of the machine?

Either way, it looks like a great multi use piece of iron, and I think the name of the game for a while might be "whatever works" to make $$$$.

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I think price wise it compares very similar to a 299XE. The right handle controls the up and down of the blade, left and right on that handle controls the left/right angle of the blade. A two way switch controls the blade angle. Float, blade shake and on/off for grade control is also on that handle.

I didn't mention it, but it shifts like a dozer, its got 16 speeds (that can also be changed on the console) that are controlled on the left handle, so you be in 4th gear moving forward and up to four gears faster going back you can select on the console. When you switch to ISO, it runs just like a typical CTL, straight hydrostat. The added bonus is you make it back up like a dozer with asss of the machine responding like a dozer or like a CTL whichever you prefer.

Yea, the idea of fits well with what I got going on. I think the ROI will be high, I will run my mulcher off of it as well.

Here are some pics. I pushed 750 cy of material up on a 200' push. I had to rip it to get through the frost but got that much pushed up in 6.5 hours. I have to push up 5K yards, so got some work to do.

How is it doing in regards to the washboarding that YouTube says it does? Is it possible to grade and cut freehand without grade control? That’s my biggest concern for one of those in my operation

Yes it is. Earlier in this thread I was laying out a 700' driveway and parking area, laid out about 30 trucks of pitrun. I was able to hold grade after about 3 hours. I have not found it that hard to hold grade with. The more time I spend in it, the more impressed I become. I wish I had single grousers for this particular job.

KSSS said:

Yes it is. Earlier in this thread I was laying out a 700' driveway and parking area, laid out about 30 trucks of pitrun. I was able to hold grade after about 3 hours. I have not found it that hard to hold grade with. The more time I spend in it, the more impressed I become. I wish I had single grousers for this particular job.

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Pushing hard or ripping in that rock looks like it would make for a lot of wear on the rubber tracks.

Yes, its not an ideal place for the those tracks.

I'd be really interested to see one of these DL550's run next to a new Case 650M dozer or even an older 550H. In theory the performance 'should' be close, but I haven't seen that comparison made yet. I feel like it'd be hard to get used to the seating position for anyone that has considerable seat time on a dozer, if someone dropped one off here I'd be glad to give it a try though....

Yea, I would like to see that as well. Having nothing to compare it too, I feel good about the level of performance. The machine was bought with this particular job in mind. I was concerned that the machine wouldn't be able to push as much material as I needed it to and I would have to rent a bigger dozer. While certainly a bigger dozer would be faster, but if i can keep up this level of progress, I have nothing to complain about.