getting dirty in texas

[usa]

[/img] New guy here, and i got to say ....lots of info posted... it's good to be here.

[shinnery]

Welcome, it's an interesting site. TEXAS is a fair sized place, can you narrow it down a little? LOL
Bryce

[usa]

I'm in Lytton Springs....what seems to be the flooding capital of Texas. I'm currently building a house out here and these are some pics of the 420c working the mud..........its good to have traction!! LOL[/img]

[shinnery]

Well I am about 270 miles northwest of you. It has been above average wet around here, no flooding though. I think we are about one inch above our yearly average (28") and it is the first week of August. Our average temp. this time of year is 95 and we haven't hit that yet either. Usually several days well over 100 by now.
Bryce

[usa]

[/img]

[usa]

I have been reading all the posts here.....and well Lavoy is trully a wealth of knowleage. But there is one Big problem that i have not seen a post on. POISON OAK!!!! it sticks in the tracks and brings it right up for you to enjoy up close. ................holy hell im fubar now!!

[Stan Disbrow]

Hi,

Oh, yeah. The tracks do that with rattlesnakes, too. I used to live in an area chock full of timber rattlers. They were easy to avoid, all one had to do was go thru the woods on a crawler. They scarper off.

However, one day while wandering thru the woods to get some firewood, I ran over an old, long dead tree laying across my path. Well, about the time the crawler high-centered on the thing, it shattered. I thought nothing more about that, until I noticed some odd things sticking between the track pads. They moved. A Lot. And, there were a lot of them!

Seems that the log was hollow, and full of things Best Left Alone. I was *very* happy that I was on my JD350 and not the 420c, as the 350 offers a lot more steel between the upper side of the tracks and the seat!

I did a rapid return to the barn, and then dismounted across the hood and over the blade. I then grabbed a brush axe and *carefully* circled the machine looking for stragglers. There were a few, but they were no longer in the best of shape. I fabricated a 'snake grabber' to remove the carcasses, which wound up in a fairly deep hole.

I returned to the woods later on that day, but took a different route!

Stan

[usa]

That's the best story by far.....LOL ...........ah wait a minute... i don't think i want this tractor any more. I thought doing the off camber stuff would kill me but snakes in the tracks yikes!!

[Lavoy]

Hey, if they were boring, eveyone would want one!
laovy

[Stan Disbrow]

Hi,

My personaly favorite is when plowing snow that has ice under it and the machine suddenly does a 180 with you on the business end of the whip. Then, you get to hang onto a steering lever with one hand while hanging your arse out over the tracks which are still spinning.

Coming in a close second is when you have plowed the snow, but the ice is still there, and you manage to slip 90 degrees while on a slope. Now you have lots of ice skates all aimed downhill. The machine takes off sideways faster than a rail dragster, or at least it seems to!

That puts the snakes in third place with me.

Note that all these things happened to me when I lived in the mountains of upstate New York. Now that I'm in a river valley in North Carolina, all I really have to worry about is making myself a soft spot and sinking into the muck.

Do Cottonmouths hole up in hollow logs like Timber Rattlers do???

I might have something else to think about if they do!

Stan

[digitup]

We have a rattler that is as potent as a bee sting up here and little brother had one flip up on a flat deck dozer off the tracks .I had to finish that job and all the ones in that area after that .You want one to etch in the old memory . The local JD industrial dealer from years gone by sent out a sales man and a repair man to check out my old 550 I was trading in .And in doing the checking out on the side of the county road the repair man decided to put it into gear while standing up Lost his balance then slipped on the flat deck letting go of the decelerator .At wide open in low gear at this point he started to run on the track he dropped off pulling the shifter towards him into high gear forward and full throttle across a busy highway. I looked at the sales man and told him that he just bought it .As transport truck came smoking to a halt just feet from a 550 Deere on a mission all by its self across a intersection .I traded that one to a salesman that was a bit red faced and a repair man with a few sore spots . Darn d good thing 550s only did 6 mph I had a hell of a run trying to catch it . I probably couldn't even run that speed let alone fast enough to catch it today.[Wife says it s too much beer!] .They cut an even better deal to save embarrassment and restore the customer relations that day.Digitup

[Rex]

I was working the back side of a ridge running off one of our hills here. The front side was steeper and dropped down to a big open basin. The D2 was sitting on her arse pulling straight up in 2nd gear. When I got to the top of the ridge the nose of the crawler dropped down I looked out over the basin straight into the cockpit of a cessna 180 - he was close and below me - I could see his hands on the controls. I pulled back on the left clutch and dumped the left brake but 2nd gear is way too slow I glanced behind to make sure I didnt catch the disc drawbar Vrooooom I saw a wheel just clear the exhaust and copped the full blast from the propeller.
I often wondered what the headline in the newspaper might have been.

[Stan Disbrow]

Hi,

Well, first off, did you have a Pilot's licence for that crawler? Sounds like you needed one!

Either that, or *he* needed a Crawler licence instead for that Cessna....

Yep. The headlines: Crawler crashes into Cessna at 1500 feet!

You think the story is wierd here, just imagine the story as told in the clubhouse back at the airfield! 'Well, there I was climbing up over Deadman's Ridge, and I almost clipped this crawler that popped up out of nowhere....'

In think we need a Crawler Stories section of the board, although this certainly comes under the heading of 'Tell', doesn't it?

I used to be the poor guy that got to operate the dozer for forest fire fighting in my area. That could be fun, as well, given that the standing dead trees are bruning like roman candles at the time. The dozer is used to make firebreaks.

My favorite has nothing to do with operating the dozer, though. It has to do with operating the chainsaw to take down said roman candles. You know - the gasolene powered saw. I always loved handing the gas can to a rookie firefighter and saying: 'follow me'. He'd say: 'where we going?'. I'd reply: 'into the middle of this mess to cut down burning trees'. He'd say: 'Carrying a *gas* can?!'. I'd say: 'Just don't set it down and you'll be OK. Oh, and don't stand too close to me, these thing shower hot coals.' He'd say: 'Don't worry about that!!'....

Of course, if one didn't fell the candles first, the fire breaks would be worthless as those coals can fly a l-o-n-g way.

Stan

[digitup]

I was talking with my older brother today and he had mentioned about the one I had pulled on him .He now manages all the floating but then he was just starting to do some of it . I sent him to get a 450 D with the big float and added some advise . When heading on that float with that dozer aim it well hold on and don't let off the throttle no mater what happens till she is on the deck .Keep her rolling and it will land on the deck Dad added. He had just got home from the army a week or two before this .So he was just getting back into the swing of things .Dad kind of looked at me and laughed silently unnoticed by Paul and off he went to do the job . Two hours later he is back and seems he had an audience when he landed on the deck .It was on the back sprockets for some time and landed right side up . He says to me Don t you ever make me do that again !!. The customer that he picked it up at said the 450 walked a foot onto the deck with the blade 8 feet in the air .Paul never trusted me for weeks after that .Digitup.

[usa]

All great stories, I hope i don't have one of those too soon!