New twist on a beat to death topic

If you were specing out a machine for your personal purposes. What kind of test would you want to put the machine through to make sure it would met your particular needs. Ex: The road to our tiny cabin (shed) is windy and alot of short steep grades so I would have to test the machine for steep climbing ability in low moisture powdery conditions.

Cletis

I am in WI. for our conditions and my intented use:
a D-Dent track would be specified. as well as trailer ability. Road Gear. Gasoline powered.

In the Grooming duties:
A Blade.
A non D-dent track.
Diesel or low gearing
HID lighting
winch

Around here it has become sort of strange. like foot wear I seem to have accumulated a snow machine for each of the task I do. I am not sure there is a Perfect one for all uses cat.???

mike

What is a D Dent track?

Cletis

This is a D-dent grouser bar.

Why would a D dent track be desirable?

Cletis

Not sure why but here in Wyoming all I have every seen the FS using for grooming are Tuckers. The steering must be sufficient enough for grooming through the timber.

Cletis

Cletis said:

Why would a D dent track be desirable?

Cletis

Click to expand...

Long wide grousers pay hell on ice and frozen ground. D bent grousers put the weight of the machine on the road surface directly, making use of the track width when the snow becomes deep enough to warrant some lift.

mike.

And to the tucker comment:

Around here(lots of forest and trees) tuckers fall into two camps those who love them for the steering, and those that hate them for the same reason. As I can drive and not just aim vehicles, I fall into the former.

in wind blown conditions which we have a lot wind up here, d dent tracks work well as do a shallow flat grouser like the snow trac uses, i would not go buy a snow master because the tracks are too wide for these conditions and grouser repair would never be ending. I generaly don't like any thing about the bv 206 too many years working with them in the national guard, if uncle sam can't afford to keep his fleet running a can't either, bit one thing i can say about them is that they have one of the best all surface tracks i have ever seen. if you were getting some thing like a moderen machine i would look at a full rubber track like the bv206 has

Drop-center grousers will also perform like crap on ice once even slight inclines are introduced. Only way around it is to add traction devices... spikes, etc... to either straight or drop-center types.

redsqwrl said:

Long wide grousers pay hell on ice and frozen ground. D bent grousers put the weight of the machine on the road surface directly, making use of the track width when the snow becomes deep enough to warrant some lift.

mike.

And to the tucker comment:

Around here(lots of forest and trees) tuckers fall into two camps those who love them for the steering, and those that hate them for the same reason. As I can drive and not just aim vehicles, I fall into the former.

Click to expand...

Mainer said:

Drop-center grousers will also perform like crap on ice once even slight inclines are introduced. Only way around it is to add traction devices... spikes, etc... to either straight or drop-center types.

Click to expand...

An example of the carbide spikes I'm referring to... about 1.25" exposed. Weld-blocks go onto grousers then you can remove the spikes by knocking them back through. Have to be careful not to get too aggressive with them... you nip out your cat too much and she'll put your eye out. So I've varied the block depth and staggered the pattern to give options based on conditions and ensure I'm grabbing 'Virgin Ice' with each bite of the nip. Put them on the drop-center and you'll climb a glacier... as long as you have a cat heavy enough to drive home the spikes... like a 6-series of course. No, that's not a seed to go on a 'float-rating rant' but I know the float ramblings will come from certain 'float police' ... If you're going to build a smaller gentler cat or want a more economical solution then you may just get away with welded rebar or angle iron, etc... but then removing them is obviously an issue if conditions are light...and if you ever go on black top or a trailer with expanded sheet then it gets hairy. Could get into other bracket/clamp designs but these are pretty slick. Could also look at the smaller cousin of ice picks for sleds...depending on your configuration.