Frozen crawler

[country53]

I was using my crawler in a muddy area and it was around 40'F. I parked it when done. Now the temps are below freezing and my crawlers tracks are frozen to the ground and itself. I was wondering how You guys that live farther north than me prevent this from happening ?

[clarkwd]

Park it up on a couple logs or planks.
Bill

My brother said the worst job he ever had was putting a track back on a dozer in a swamp in the winter when he only had a couple hours before it all froze in.

[dmlinton]

I always park mine on a couple of planks in freezing weather. If caught out in the bush without the planks, any bits of wood from a pile of brush to post sized trees will keep the tracks up out of the soil.

Regards,
Dennis

[JR]

You think you had a problem last winter I was scalping brush off a real wet area that was frozen over when I broke through the top layer that was about 6" frozen and the rear end sank like lead up to the winch in the mud. Now this was mid January and that nite the weather went to 10 below. Couldn't winch it out because nothing to hook to. Next day might as well been parked in concrete. Had to get my generator and electric jack hammer and spent hours breaking the tracks loose from the ground.. Got a friend nearby with a skidder to hook on. Finally broke loose with about two extra yards of dirt stuck on the rear end. Glad I haven't had a big problem yet.
JR

[digitup]

Keep the tracks cleaned out and park it on logs or old tires to get it up off the ground .We have an huge old parachute and a propane torch three stove pipes and a brick .This is all you need to thaw out a dozer at any temperature,Throw the chute over the dozer leaving the back end of the dozer open ,put the pipes together and under the dozer from the back toward the front laying on the ground .take the torch light it and set the brick just into the end of the pipe.Put the torch on the brick and blast away it will worm the dozer up in an hour or so then clean off the tracks and go back to dozing again keep the chute back from the heat a bit or you will have fried Deere I have not done this to my old gasser nor would I recommend this action around a gas engined crawler .Digitup

[olrobk]

I power wash mine after getting in mud if there's a chance it might get really cold. You all will probably think that's overdoing it but I worry about all the machinery getting "cast in place" by a cold snap. I'm afraid if it turned into a solid frozen block of ice, that it would tear itself up trying to move. I'm wondering about spraying the tracks and chains with WD40?? That would seem to be a great coating to make surfaces slippery and water resistant.

[digitup]

When we go to the city with one of the new 550Js we spray on a small bit of diesel fuel every couple of hours dirt releases better some of the guys use salt on the undercarriage but that is to much corrosion for a 14000 dollar machine as far as I am concerned Digitup.

[Howard Yoder]

Always make sure your top roller is turning when you get it loose or you will have a flat spot on it.