Any young blood on the track shovels?

[Loaderman2]

You say young operators I am 27 I have been on a loader since i was 1 yr old and operating them since i could touch the pedals. And yes we are a dieing breed. Not to toot my own horn but most of the foremans cant show me nothing that includes runing a job to most of them were I am from are right out of school with some degree and they think there a expert. I learned on a 250 Int C model loader that was wore out beyond all repair and still could hold a grade with in a inch thanks to my dad who was a loader man of 45 years that gave me some tips. Yesterday I was told that I could not fit 3, 12 foot metal pipes on a uhual utilty trailer that was 10 foot long so I bet the forman100 dollors that I could he said deal so I tracked them down and rolled them up like a paper towel roll and put them on the trailer he gave me the money and walked away hurt and it was the talk of the job that afternoon. So young or old we all had to learn some where an from some one. So as a dieing breed we all need to keep doing things to make be noticed still.

 

[Loaderman2]

I have been running a 963 my company will not buy a 973 I have run a 973 and like them better than a 963 and can do what a 963 does with a 973 and I told them that and also showed them that. I have ben on a loader full time since I was 18 I am now 27 and have ran jobs as a foreman since I was 22 but where I work to much stress so I went back to my loader. I wish my company had 973 loaders.

 

[dirt digger]

started running a 943 at 18 and am now 23 and i like to consider myself pretty decent. I got out of equipment operating about 4 months ago to pursue more of a construction management job which i still think about sometimes but I will still do work for my old boss on weekends...

I am best on a 943 with v-shift and 2 lever bucket but we also have a Liebherr with joysticks and a 955 with powershift...the 955 I would consider myself least experienced, the liebherr is just a dog anyway but that 43 is a blast to run

 

[cat980]

17 part time operator on a 977 now thats some old school

 

[dozerrdude16]

can anyone help me post a question i did 3 test posts how do i post?

 

[shooterm]

I ran a 1155 as one of my first crawler loaders and hated it. I dont think I had a good example as my first go at it. Tracks was way to narrow for sand/hardpan we used them in.

 

[handtpipeline]

When I was 14, we had a rock job. It was a 12" gas line, It wasn't really a city job, but it was if that makes sense. It was in "town", but not heavily populated at the time (East Tulsa), so we had the ditchline drilled and shot, then excavated with a Koehring 666d, a 225 Cat, and a 266 Bantam. Come cleanup time, the jagged pieces of limestone were ripping backhoe tires apart on a daily basis, loading the leftover debris in a dump truck. So dad decided we needed a track loader. He found a 175C, (I think it was about a 1977 model). The undercarriage was completely worn out, and half the cutting edge was gone off of the dozer blade part of the 4 in 1 bucket. We finished the job like it was, then put new undercarriage under it, and fixed the bucket up. I never ran it much myself, I mostly always ran either a hoe or a sideboom, but it wasn't bad to run. One thing I didn't like, it had lever steer. I've since ran a 175c and a couple of 977K's that had pedal steer, and liked them a lot better. I finally sold it in 1998, we just never used it that much. And I HATED hauling the thing, we should have put new pads on the rails when we did the undercarriage, the pads were worn so bad that you couldn't hardly load it over a dovetail without helping it up on the trailer with the winch on the truck. It was easier to use the double drop 3 axle and just side load it. I never could really grade well with the one we had, but the other 175C i've ran I could grade halfway decent. I think mine was too nose heavy with the 4 in 1, and the small counterweight it had. the other one just had a GP bucket, and wasn't nearly as nose heavy.