SOOO, guess how my day went!!!!!!!!!

Post by **Lavoy** » Tue Apr 12, 2011 9:14 am

Maybe if the crawler had "swamp pads" I could have made it across.

On a more serious note as far as lessons learned, the day after I did this, two local guys 59 and 69 years old drowned beaver hunting. These guys had hunted the same river together for probably 40 years. Their boat lijely capsized less than a mile from the bridge they launched from. I have not heard that they were wearing life jackets. Even though the water would have been cold, they would have been a couple miles from one of their houses, or no more than a mile or two from somebody all the way along the river. The younger guy left behind two small children, and we buried the older guy's son when I was in college, so great tragedy for both families. Two funerals in one week is going to be a drag.
Lavoy

gus · Post by **gus** » Tue Apr 12, 2011 10:24 am

Lavoy,
Would the clutches be damaged that quickly? I would have thought if you got it out and back running they didn't have enough time in the water to soak up??

Post by **Lavoy** » Tue Apr 12, 2011 12:23 pm

The engine and trans were under water, so was not going to try and run it until they are drained and checked. With all that was going on, no time to work on it immediately. My brother is working on it now, got the engine and trans drained. Starter doesn't want to work too well any more, so can't really roll the engine over to check much, let alone start it. I would assume with moisture in the clutch housing for a week that we may be in trouble. Once it is running, we can play with it some and see what other damage there is.
Lavoy

Lu47Dan · Post by **Lu47Dan** » Wed Apr 13, 2011 2:42 pm

Lavoy, the photo you posted does not show up for me but other photos on the site show up for my. I checked it last night and tonight but no luck.

Dan.

Post by **Lavoy** » Wed Apr 13, 2011 3:01 pm

I think photobucket is down, when I look at my first post, it says something to that effect.
Lavoy

roadbuilder · Post by **roadbuilder** » Thu Apr 14, 2011 6:24 am

The bucket board has your photo under reveiw for violating terms of usage. Showing a little too much bare crack... er track!

Post by **Lavoy** » Thu Apr 14, 2011 9:03 am

My brother called yesterday, and the engine won't turn over very far before it locks up. Only thing I can think of now is it got a mouthful of water while it was still running and busted the crank.

Lavoy

Paul Buhler · Post by **Paul Buhler** » Thu Apr 14, 2011 4:07 pm

We used to rate situations like that in "pucker factor" units; the tightening within our body as things begin to go bad - usually quickly. Glad it ended without bodily injury. definitely an "OH! S**T" moment. Paul

doc40c · Post by **doc40c** » Thu Apr 14, 2011 5:06 pm

hi Lavoy, glad you fared better than the crawler! you probably bent a rod. It's just iron and replacable, you are not! Thanks for sharing! Maybe we can all learn something from your incident! Life is precious and bad (and good) things can happen fast! God bless. Randy from Michigan

digitup2 · Post by **digitup2** » Thu Apr 14, 2011 6:48 pm

I agree you don't realize just how bad the scenario can be till the dust settles .I was in a hurry to load the 550B up on the float one day so I loaded on a slight slope and the machine was steel on steel.As soon as it got flat on the trailer deck it started sliding I jumped off and rolled away from the trailer I still don't know why I cartwheeled away but I did .I noticed later I had landed a foot closer to the trailer than the dozer track had sliced sideways 6 inches into the gravel but doing that cartwheel saved my feet from being sliced off .That is just how close it can get ! I learned at least three things that day #1 never load on a slope #2 when you get in a hurry you aren't thinking straight and #3 This actually really is #1 I have three kids and a wife at home so I can't afford to make stupid moves like that NO ONE CAN Sorry to hear about your neighbors Lavoy I just lost a good friend up here that was a fire chief of one of our local volunteer small town brigades when the building they were trying to save fell in on him and an other young fire fighter It has been a tough couple of weeks in this area as well .Weather we are playing or working we got to make it home .Digitup.

Post by **Lavoy** » Fri Apr 15, 2011 7:57 am

Yeah, went to the prayer service last night, must have been 300 people or more. They had a combined service for both guys. Real typical small town deal. One was Lutheran, one was Presbyterian, but only church in the area that could come close to holding the people was the Catholic church 20 miles away so they had it there. For the sake of two life jackets, we probably wouldn't have been there.

As far as the swimming 420, so far two bent rods and pieces of pistons in the pan. Will know if the crank survived next week.
Lavoy

JD440ICD2006 · Post by **JD440ICD2006** » Fri Apr 15, 2011 8:17 am

Sorry to hear that it took out the engine. Basic fluid dynamics. Air will compress, fluids will not.

mapaduke@yahoo.com · Post by **mapaduke@yahoo.com** » Fri Apr 15, 2011 6:19 pm

Glad you are ok.They say that the new machines with ROPS and seat belts are safer but if that water was a little deeper and your seat belt was on????? I prefer jumping myself than to use one. Ron

Post by **Lavoy** » Fri Apr 15, 2011 7:09 pm

I don't think a loader would go all the way over in this type of situation, but I think a dozer would have increased the pucker factor even farther.
Lavoy

gus · Post by **gus** » Sat Apr 16, 2011 5:32 pm

Maybe we should all chip in and get Lavoy a life jacket...seems like a lot of water every year in ND

Do they make floats for a 420???

At least at this point, no one was hurt and we can chuckle about it

JDcrawlers Messageboard

SOOO, guess how my day went!!!!!!!!!

Lavoy's bad day

Who is online