Grading Tractor and HD Box Blade vs. a small Dozer?

[TSO]

My newly acquired Ford 550 TLB was presented to me in much the same way... Not really looking for one but it fell in my lap. And indeed, will probably be a labor of love to restore it.

If the price is right, I'd say go for it. I'm like you, in that i will accept a certain amount of risk if i think it's worth it.

It's only money... Can't take it with you when you go

 

[PILOON]

I'm showing my ignorance here, but when you say the hydraulic pump is relatively easy to verify, how do you check that it's in good/bad shape?
Sort of along those lines, does Anyone know what the flow and pressure of this pump should be?

Dozer hydraulics have blade down pressure so you 'jack the front' off the ground and that confirms a whole lot.
Shut down the engine and if the front remains jacked up you have excellent confirmation. (don't crawl under)

Some leakage here and there is par and not reason to panic, usually a seal or O-ring allowing some seepage.
Dozer blade hydraulic response is not like a FEL so expect slower action, they are set up for power and not speed.

HEY, at $4000. (or so) what are you waiting for? a written notarized guarantee ?
that is providing there are no serous funny noises when you fire it up and test run.

That is 1970's like prices like when I purchased my AC HD6 and ran it for 2 years worked it to the tune of about $8-9 K and sold it for the same $4 K that I paid for it. (besides my own work)
My only repair was hose I snagged on a tree stump (and took a hot shower, LOL)

 

[fried1765]

Dozer hydraulics have blade down pressure so you 'jack the front' off the ground and that confirms a whole lot.
Shut down the engine and if the front remains jacked up you have excellent confirmation. (don't crawl under)

Some leakage here and there is par and not reason to panic, usually a seal or O-ring allowing some seepage.
Dozer blade hydraulic response is not like a FEL so expect slower action, they are set up for power and not speed.

Good idea!
And.... when the final drive fails in the next 50 hours,... you will at least know that the hydraulics are stlll good.

 

[PILOON]

Quote---I can only "assume" that replacement parts for this little dozer would be a lot cheaper than a larger sized dozer?

Not true, in fact could be the opposite.
A reality is more the popularity of any model, ex Caterpillar D6 and D8's could easily be 50% of all dozer population.
It costs just about the same price to machine a small part as a similar big one.

 

[EddieWalker]

You might want to go visit the guys at the parts counter at your local Cat dealership and ask about parts. Cat is probably most famous for carrying parts for everything they have ever built. I don't know this first hand, it's just their reputation. I would ask what a new hydraulic pump costs, clutches, starter and see if that's something you are comfortable with. My dozer has three hydraulic pumps. One for each track, and one for the blade. They are pretty much the same, made by a company called Sundstrand. Case will not rebuild the old pump, they will only sell me a new replacement pump for $25,000 each. Fortunately, when one of my hydralic pumps went out, I found a place to rebuild it for $4,000 with me removing it and bringing it to them.

One of the reasons you see old iron sitting around, rusting away is because the parts to get it running cost more then it's worth. I know of several excavators that you could have for free, but the parts to fix them are just too hard to find, or expensive to make it worthwhile. I also turned down a free John Deere 710 backhoe that was tore apart, and had been sitting for about ten years. Supposedly all the parts where there, but since it had been so long, nobody really knew where all the parts where or what condition they where in. Free is rarely the best option.

What is scrap iron selling for in your area? To figure out the value of this old, non running dozer, find out it's weight, and what it would get at the scrap yard. That's what I would offer if I was to tackle a project like this. Also realize that whatever you guess it will cost to get it running, double or triple that amount. Then look up what they are selling for and see how much more you will have into it then what they sell for in operating condition.

 

[bspeedy]

One of the reasons you see old iron sitting around, rusting away is because the parts to get it running cost more then it's worth. I know of several excavators that you could have for free, but the parts to fix them are just too hard to find, or expensive to make it worthwhile. I also turned down a free John Deere 710 backhoe that was tore apart, and had been sitting for about ten years. Supposedly all the parts where there, but since it had been so long, nobody really knew where all the parts where or what condition they where in. Free is rarely the best option.

What is scrap iron selling for in your area? To figure out the value of this old, non running dozer, find out it's weight, and what it would get at the scrap yard. That's what I would offer if I was to tackle a project like this. Also realize that whatever you guess it will cost to get it running, double or triple that amount. Then look up what they are selling for and see how much more you will have into it then what they sell for in operating condition.

That's a TON of wisdom right there! :thumbsup:

 

[fried1765]

That's a TON of wisdom right there! :thumbsup:

Agreed!
The OP should RUN away from the rusty old crawler sitting in the weeds!
It is parked in the weeds, because,..... it is ALREADY JUNK!

 

[jenkinsph]

You might want to go visit the guys at the parts counter at your local Cat dealership and ask about parts. Cat is probably most famous for carrying parts for everything they have ever built. I don't know this first hand, it's just their reputation. I would ask what a new hydraulic pump costs, clutches, starter and see if that's something you are comfortable with. My dozer has three hydraulic pumps. One for each track, and one for the blade. They are pretty much the same, made by a company called Sundstrand. Case will not rebuild the old pump, they will only sell me a new replacement pump for $25,000 each. Fortunately, when one of my hydralic pumps went out, I found a place to rebuild it for $4,000 with me removing it and bringing it to them.

One of the reasons you see old iron sitting around, rusting away is because the parts to get it running cost more then it's worth. I know of several excavators that you could have for free, but the parts to fix them are just too hard to find, or expensive to make it worthwhile. I also turned down a free John Deere 710 backhoe that was tore apart, and had been sitting for about ten years. Supposedly all the parts where there, but since it had been so long, nobody really knew where all the parts where or what condition they where in. Free is rarely the best option.

What is scrap iron selling for in your area? To figure out the value of this old, non running dozer, find out it's weight, and what it would get at the scrap yard. That's what I would offer if I was to tackle a project like this. Also realize that whatever you guess it will cost to get it running, double or triple that amount. Then look up what they are selling for and see how much more you will have into it then what they sell for in operating condition.

Excellent advice from Eddie here^^^^

 

[Sawyer Rob]

It looks like the OP has lot's of money to throw away, so I think he should by that dozer...

Besides those little Japanese guys that make all those OEM spare parts, they have to eat too!

SR

 

[GManBart]

Assuming that dozer starts, runs, moves through all the gears, steers left/right, will spin the tracks with the blade cutting into a big pile and will lift itself off the ground with the blade, $4K is nearly stealing it. Cleaning it up, going through it a bit and a paint job would raise the price to at least $10K in most places. I shopped for dozers for months and nothing under $10K was really worth looking at...all were very, very rough.

I have a D3B and they weigh right at 16K, so a touch heavier than you thought. The tracks, sprockets, etc look pretty good on that one. As far as steering clutches go, they were made with dry clutches, but many were converted over the years to wet clutches. CAT made a retrofit kit for them that wasn't terribly expensive, and I think it still available.

Short version, if it has dry clutches, just move it every month or so if you haven't been using it, and it should be fine. Parts availability is quite good, so I wouldn't worry about that. I did a lot of research on the D3B before buying one, and it was pretty universal that people praised CAT for supporting them decades later.

The amount of work you can do with one compared to even a large CUT or Utility tractor isn't even close....clearing a path, grading a piece of ground, etc will be much faster with a dozer.