Cat 12G horsepower upgrade or other options

[OzDozer]

Queenslander - And there's buyers premium on top of those bid numbers! The reason is simple - there's a major shortage of quality brand name, good condition, moderate hour plant and equipment.

There were bottlenecks in supply during the pandemic, and this has led to owners keeping equipment for longer, and the reduced amount of equipment coming onto the market is generally in poor condition.

Add in substantially-increased prices for new equipment, and this seriously impacts used prices.

Plus, it seems like there's no lack of money out there for the good gear. 4 bumper grain seasons in a row, good commodity prices, handouts to businesses during the pandemic, and general Govt largesse by way of extensive spending on projects, has all added up.

You're struggling to find a decent 2 to 3 tonne brand name truck with reasonable kms, anywhere. Any that do appear, sell for huge dollars.
I have a client looking for a 2-3 tonne traytop, and I'm getting depressed at the level of junk on offer, the selling prices at auction, and the private asking prices for the few reasonable-condition small trucks, that are available.

 

[Queenslander]

I just have trouble getting my head around the reason for a 35% premium for the older machine.
Both graders were owned by the same outfit, were well maintained and had comprehensive service history.
The M had new heui pump and injectors several thousand hours ago, a few minor electronic glitches but otherwise relatively trouble free life.
Older grader has been similarly trouble free but nothing rebuilt, no grade control etc.

 

[Nige]

I think it's very much a case of "give a dog a bad name". The early M-Series were shite, to put it mildly. Cat was upgrading software what appeared to be a weekly basis, plus there were loads of major mechanical upgrades as well. If the upgrades were done all together an M-Series would be in the shop for a solid month. Yes there was that much work involved.......

Having said all that......... I wouldn't be against a used early M-Series provided that: -
1. All the factory mechanical updates called out for the particular S/N had been performed.
2. It had the latest available everything in the electronics, including stuff like the electro-hydraulic actuator in the steering valve.
3. I had people in my maintenance crew who understood the electronics and were capable of looking after the machine.

 

[OzDozer]

In general, owners here are preferring to buy older equipment that has less complex and troublesome electronics, and low levels of emission equipment.

They will prefer to buy this older equipment and rebuild it, because it's easier and cheaper to rebuild and has a higher level of reliability.

Equipment produced in the last 8-10 years has a bad rap for higher operating costs, and lower availability.
This stuff is called "big company equipment" - because the big companies buy this stuff, run it for a couple of years until it starts giving trouble, then they quit it and buy new equipment.

 

[JAJ]

I think it's very much a case of "give a dog a bad name". The early M-Series were shite, to put it mildly. Cat was upgrading software what appeared to be a weekly basis, plus there were loads of major mechanical upgrades as well. If the upgrades were done all together an M-Series would be in the shop for a solid month. Yes there was that much work involved.......

Having said all that......... I wouldn't be against a used early M-Series provided that: -
1. All the factory mechanical updates called out for the particular S/N had been performed.
2. It had the latest available everything in the electronics, including stuff like the electro-hydraulic actuator in the steering valve.
3. I had people in my maintenance crew who understood the electronics and were capable of looking after the machine.

Thanks everyone for your input and opinions, as always greatly appreciated!

Nige what is your opinion of the 140H series 2 for electronics compared to series 1 and how would a 3176 engine compare reliability wise to a 3306?
I have heard mixed opinions on the engine but I have never had anything to do with them.

As OzDozer said I am very much of the keep electronics to a minimum but series 1 H graders seem to be getting held onto or have lots of hours. Then as everyone has said prices are through the roof!!!
This series 2 one I found only has 9500hrs and has been fitting with a new millimeter gps system 12months ago so that leads me to believe it hasn’t done lots of hard work.

 

[.RC.]

In general, owners here are preferring to buy older equipment that has less complex and troublesome electronics, and low levels of emission equipment.

There are also zero legal restriction's on engine emissions in off road vehicles/equipment in Australia. It is only registered cars and trucks that have to be compliant with emission laws.

Cat could still sell any new 3306 powered piece of equipment here.

 

[JAJ]

We’ve got a CCA 140H, it’s been a rock solid machine.
I am confident that we could get more for it now than what we paid for it ten years ago.
This auction is running at the moment…the H clearly outbidding the lower hour M series.

https://www.pickles.com.au/trucks/item/search/-/listing/listSaleItems/5339#!/result?q=ProductType.Earthmoving and Mobile Plant.&sort=Product_Type_Sequence

Had forgot about Pickles… there is another one coming up this morning but it’s a series 1 with 13,200 hours I think it said. Wish I’d had a chance to go look at it! Pics don’t look too bad, will be interesting to see what it makes!!!

 

[JAJ]

There are also zero legal restriction's on engine emissions in off road vehicles/equipment in Australia. It is only registered cars and trucks that have to be compliant with emission laws.

Cat could still sell any new 3306 powered piece of equipment here.

Really!?!? That’s very interesting! I have seen a couple of new K series and also I think a I remember seeing a GC grader with the 3306 in them. The GC badged machines are all made in China so not sure how they would go??
That being said a mate was showing me his 950H loader is made in China. Everyone told him don’t buy a 950GC as it’s made in China… so he didn’t and ended up with made in China anyway haha.

 

[JAJ]

Just rechecked the new spec sheets…. They both have C7 engines now, bugger!

 

[Blue-Fox]

Haven’t been back here for a while, so thank you to all the reply’s
I may have found a 140H series 2… still looking for a 14. What do people think of the series 2 H with the 3176 engine?
I have been looking for a 3306 engine if I stay cat but they are getting harder to find! If I had to go to a series 2 H, would I be better just going straight to an M series?? The computers and wires everywhere in the front end in the M scare me for where we live and work but there is no way around that if you can’t find an older H with low hours I suppose.

The John Deere graders look very interesting too. A 770G or GP looks to be a big jump on paper from a 140 Cat. Even the 672G might be better suited?

The H series are a big step up from a G, to more modern hydraulic control but comes with a bit of complication as well. Closest you’ll get to a G series reliability. I was looking for a couple H series cats and they want too much money and no Cat dealer close by so
I went with a Deere 872D and it’s a hell of a machine. It’s got 13k hours on it but you’d never know it. Def happy with it.

 

[.RC.]

Cat have been in China for decades. About 20 years ago I bought a thermostat from Cat. The box said Made in USA, the thermostat said Made in China, so I guess the cardboard box was made in the USA. Maybe all Cat USA have left is a small building churning out aluminium ID plates they stick on machines with made in USA on them. The rest of the machione is made in China.

As for the H series graders. No doubt it got fixed quickly, but I remember when the local council went from 12G to 12H, the H series liked to snap axles with the 17.5X25 tyres.

 

[JAJ]

As another option… a 16G I have just seen. It would be probably too big for most of the run of the mill work we usually do but should be good for pushing up big banks, and a heap cheaper. I haven’t operated a grader that big so I don’t know but I suspect it would just be too big and awkward???

 

[Queenslander]

Had forgot about Pickles… there is another one coming up this morning but it’s a series 1 with 13,200 hours I think it said. Wish I’d had a chance to go look at it! Pics don’t look too bad, will be interesting to see what it makes!!!

Two days left and no bid yet.
Looks like reserve is 100K.

Queenslander - And there's buyers premium on top of those bid numbers!

9.90% in this case.
That makes the tier 2 machine a $261500 grader.
I could probably be persuaded to part with ours for a little less than that.

 

[JAJ]

So bit of an update.... I have purchased a 2012 Cat 140M. I was going to wait till I got it home and post a pic but it has been a few weeks waiting and wont be till mid next week now.
I looked around at a few and this one was a bit of a last minute find, hoping it will prove its self to be good value for money. Looking forward to getting it to work and getting the hang of the joysticks!!!
Fingers crossed there is not to many teething dramas to sort out with it once it goes to work, Cat tells me according to their records it has all the updates done and it was an ex government machine so hoping it is good to go.

Thanks for everyone's opinions and input.

 

[JAJ]

So another update…. The new grader isn’t going well so far.
It came back to a mates place closer to home and I was going to pick it up from there. We reversed it off his truck (seemed sluggish engaging reverse) and was going to load it on mine. I thought I’d see what was going on with the sluggish engagement and it seemed to be sluggish in a couple of the forward gears as well. Figured it may just need a fill calibration as the dealer rebuilt some gears in the transmission. It wouldn’t get up to temp sitting in the shed so I drove it around for a while to get it up to temp so it could do the calibration…. In the process 2-3 forward started slipping and reverse stopped completely. It even started creeping forward in neutral…. With your foot on the inching pedal!!
The dealer is sending out the mechanic that did the transmission repairs tomorrow to troubleshoot it, so see what he works out. I put it up on blocks to do some pressure testing to see if we could work it out over the phone and apart from slow engagement and disengagement of a few of the modulation valves it seems there wasn’t any valves with pressure that shouldn’t be. But the gauges I had access to weren’t small enough so there could be still some there. Hopefully when I go back tomorrow with the mechanic we find it’s just in the modulation valves.

Would be interesting to see what the guys here that are familiar with the M series think.

 

[Nige]

First thing you should do IMHO is ask the dealer guy to hook up ET and download a Product Status Report (PSR) in Adobe pdf format, then post it here. It will be interesting to see what it shows as regards the ECM software (there are a few, 5 or 6 IIRC) being up to date.

EDIT: TBH if the dealer service dept has any sort of decent protocols then first he ought to hook ET up to the machine before he touches anything else.

 

[JAJ]

Yeah he is coming with laptop to plug in and see what it says. Also with some other clutch modulation valves if needed to swap and check if that is the problem. We are hoping the drama is in the valves and a calibration.
I will check in regards to the ECM software. I spoke to Caterpillar about that re any updates and they said that it was all up-to date as per their records, just via the serial number (not plugging in).

I’m piecing the story back together from multiple sources and I have a hunch this might have been the cause for the trans needing a rebuild in the first place. Or at the very least similar symptoms. Starting to sound like they fixed the damage and the cause they found for it wasn’t perhaps the cause. Anyway that is probably jumping the gun, but it will be very interesting to see what we find tomorrow!!

@Nige at the very least I’ll get some pictures of the screen if I can’t get a pdf version.

 

[Nige]

at the very least I’ll get some pictures of the screen if I can’t get a pdf version.

Won't be much good mate. The full version will be about 20 pages.......

Apart from that you are the customer - you are 100% entitled to a copy. It's not a document that is confidential to the dealer. If he jibs at giving you a copy call his boss and dob him in.

 

[JAJ]

Won't be much good mate. The full version will be about 20 pages.......

Apart from that you are the customer - you are 100% entitled to a copy. It's not a document that is confidential to the dealer. If he jibs at giving you a copy call his boss and dob him in.

Yeah ok, I’m new to how ET works… got a quick demo and got to have a play with it for a few hours the other day but still working it all out.

Yep I will make sure I get it then! I think he will be ok about it… he is personally responsible for this one and he’s making stuff happen to get it sorted out quickly. I just hope it doesn’t have to go back and get pulled down again. But they are saying they will fix it no matter what, so just have to wait and see what happens tomorrow.

As soon as I get the PDF I’ll put it up.

 

[Nige]

Acksherley if he does it by the book he should download a PSR before he starts to do anything and another one when he finishes, so there is a “before” & “after” record of how the machine was set up electronically.