Difference in Cat and ASV MTL's?

[Tigerotor77W]

Originally Posted by dozerman21

This picture is a perfect example why every OEM should use overhead doors and not swing out.

Or we could all just buy JCBs/Volvos.

In all seriousness, the cab door has got to be one of the most discussed single points of contention on this forum... maybe there's another option: make a door with a four-bar linkage that still swings open, but when open, is inside the cab between, say, the left screen and the left joystick. Hmm.

[jimmyjack]

ummmm ...........no

[nedly05]

LOL, ya I hafta agree on that one, I like the thoughts of the door sliding up myself. Thanks for that pic jimmy, post more if you have em!

[ProTouch Groundscapes]

Nedly, heres a vid of mine playing in the snow. these are the original tracks and are pretty worn out.

and yes ive greased the machine since the pic was taken!

[stuvecorp]

Originally Posted by dozerman21

This picture is a perfect example why every OEM should use overhead doors and not swing out.

Originally Posted by Tigerotor77W

In all seriousness, the cab door has got to be one of the most discussed single points of contention on this forum... maybe there's another option: make a door with a four-bar linkage that still swings open, but when open, is inside the cab between, say, the left screen and the left joystick. Hmm.

I am coming around to the roll up door as it is such a pain sometimes with the swing out door. If it could be done so it wouldn't rattle when it's up and seal the cab good and not make the cab two story tall.

[Tigerotor77W]

I promise, this will all make sense...

Sooo... every year, the U of IL has a thing called Engineering Open House. It's geared toward K-12 students (to get them to look at the really cool projects students work on), but Cat's a sponsor and they bring down a machine.

This year, they brought down a 279C with an industrial grapple. They drove it from a dealer about ten miles up the road... it's a 2-speed, so the guy drove it in high speed, but needless to say the planetaries got pretty hot. Not burning to the touch, but hot enough that it hurt if I left my hands on them. The track looked all right -- some rubber coming off the steel imbeds, but that's to be expected when roading a machine for that long.

ANYHOW. The reason I brought this up is that I took a peek under the machine just to see what the keel looked like, and I was shocked to see the amount of ground clearance it had. I didn't have a ruler with me, but I found a long stick and kept breaking it until it'd fit under the chassis without bending it at all... and lo and behold, the thing has about 12" of ground clearance (i.e. Cat's specs for the 279C are wrong). I don't know if this holds true for the MTLs and SSLs -- and that all the ground clearances are somehow undervalued by a couple of inches -- but certainly it makes me happy that there aren't only 9 inches of ground clearance on a CTL.

Moral of the story: the ASV only has a few inches of advantage over the 279C (and presumably the 277C), not the 8 that I was originally fearing.

Second moral: bring a tape measure with you if you demo the 277C.

[bobcat_ron]

Then Deere has the lowest, at 8", Deere sucks.

[DeereMan85]

Originally Posted by bobcat_ron

Then Deere has the lowest, at 8", Deere sucks.

There you go pulling stuff out of your a** again. 9.8" medium frame, 10.4" large frame.

[Stick Pro]

After reading this i had to go out back and measuer my 289C i had 12 inches in the rear of the machine, but then i went to the front and i have a 9 1/4 inches. Still would not trade this machine for anything.

[Caterkillar]

They drove a track machine 10 miles on the road????