Useful life of a CAT excavator

[sea2summit]

A Cat 307 popped up on CL near me with 4400 hours for what seems like a really/too good price. Any opinions on how many hours they should be useful for?

 

[Rustyiron]

Like any machine, it's all in the care, use, & maintainance of those 4400 hrs. Typicaly for an excavator, those hours could easily be only "half life", but it's also around the hours that some major components might start to need some "attention". Look for the normal issues (wet spots/dripping, u/c cond, pins, bucket, oil cond/levels, etc)
unless you feel it's worth having a mechanic survey it for you.

 

[newbury]

On equipment like that are the hours the time it was turned on or time it was operating at a certain minimum speed?

For example my B7610 - I take it to move a bunch of brush. I put the forks under the brush, lift it tie the brush, take it to the curb, repeat. Most of the time the engine is just putting along. I work for two or three hours, the clock shows one.

I run the tiller at full PTO speed for one hour, the clock shows one.

 

[EddieWalker]

At 4,400 hours it's past where a rental yard would want it because it's now at the stage where repairs are going to be needed. It's nowhere near wore out. At 8,000 to 10,000 hours is where most machines are too wore out to be productive. Still might be fine for farm use, but not to make money with. If the price is good, I wouldn't hesitate on a machine with that many hours unless you where trying to make a living with it.

 

[Code54]

That is a bit higher for hrs on a mini BUT as Rusyiron said a lot depends on the care. As a reference you will notice a lot of rental places often sell theirs off around 2K hrs - they are looking at max usage with no repairs and highest value.
With those hrs I would be looking at the final drives, pins, undercarriage, and slew bearing, etc. Check the tracks for cracks or damage, not just tread "depth". Parts are expensive and the labor is a killer on these. Nothing to spend a grand here and there on a part or two.

 

[Snobdds]

Yes on looking at the final drives and undercarriage real well. The hoses are probably about ready for some replacements. Look at the dipper arm for any weird twisting.

I'm at about 3000 hours on my 305 and it's about time for some new rubber on the tracks. Otherwise it's been a strong machine and I have done some pretty impressive things...

 

[moriboy]

At 4,400 hours it's past where a rental yard would want it because it's now at the stage where repairs are going to be needed. It's nowhere near wore out. At 8,000 to 10,000 hours is where most machines are too wore out to be productive. Still might be fine for farm use, but not to make money with. If the price is good, I wouldn't hesitate on a machine with that many hours unless you where trying to make a living with it.

I would agree with Eddie.

My dad and I bought this machine for farm work, 8500hrs. It's certainly not new but it has served us well for our projects. We looked at quite a few machines and found a number of machines with 12k + hours that still ran fine. We also found a few w/ 4K that were beat to death!