What did you do with your Power Trac today?

[woodlandfarms]

Woodland farm, you mean the ends of the steering cylinder?

One end of one steering cylinder is shot, but mainly the ears that hold them to the chassis are wallowed out.

 

[woodlandfarms]

I keep forgetting all the little things I have on my PT. I had a load of rock coming and my dump trailer was in the way. Jumped off the tractor and headed to the truck... And then it hits me... WTF... I got a swiss army knife. Just swap the bucket for the trailer hitch thingy you made you idiot.... While it is a bit goofy and you gotta think through each move, it honestly took me less than a minute to get it out of the way, would have taken a half hour with the truck and my inexperience...

 

[m5040]

Nice flat ground. The other day I did basically the same thing, only it was to pull a trailer backward up a steep hill. Everything went fine and when I went to change the implement, I noticed THAT I FORGOT TO LOCK THE IMPLEMENT ON. That was because I put the tow adapter on by hand with the machine's engine off, so I said to myself the I will lock it on later when I go to use it....not.
Gotta keep your wits about you, if you see mine let me know where I left um.

 

[MossRoad]

I keep forgetting all the little things I have on my PT. I had a load of rock coming and my dump trailer was in the way. Jumped off the tractor and headed to the truck... And then it hits me... WTF... I got a swiss army knife. Just swap the bucket for the trailer hitch thingy you made you idiot.... While it is a bit goofy and you gotta think through each move, it honestly took me less than a minute to get it out of the way, would have taken a half hour with the truck and my inexperience...

Yep. I keep a trailer hitch in my 2" receiver welded to a QA plate handy. I have a car hauler trailer that's too long on my Suburban to get into the back yard. So I ditch the Suburban and pick up the trailer hitch on the PT425 and move it where I need it. Works great and takes a whopping 15 seconds to ditch whatever attachment is on the PT and pick up that hitch. I also use it to move my log splitter and a boat trailer. Fantastic!

 

[ponytug]

Ditto, I find that there are parking jobs that I can do with the PT that I can't do with a vehicle. Move a trailer around the acute corner of a "Y"? Easy peazy.

I didn't think I would use the receiver much, but it certainly earns its keep, many times over.

All the best,

Peter

 

[MossRoad]

I learned about pushing trailers when I worked at the airport back in the early 80s moving airplanes. You face the plane you're towing, so you have to look over your shoulder. However, you're also facing the plane you're pushing into the hanger. So much easier to see what you're doing VS backing up a trailer!

 

[cqaigy2]

Getting things ready to move some rock.
Checking motors are tight.

Now some spring cleaning.

Put this right where i can kneel on it, and know i'm still alive.

Now for some grease on stirring ram.

First load of rock, for rock wall. I'm guessing a few hundred pounds, PT want's to pucker when cranked all the way.

 

[m5040]

Some smart guy once said "take care of your equipment and it will take care of you", or something along those lines.

Good job.

 

[PowerTracManiac]

How to properly use your Light Material Bucket-LOL!
With the blockwork done on the house project, its time for some site cleanup.

 

[joshlee]

Getting things ready to move some rock.
Checking motors are tight.
View attachment 700098
Now some spring cleaning.

View attachment 700099

View attachment 700100

Put this right where i can kneel on it, and know i'm still alive.
View attachment 700101

Now for some grease on stirring ram.
View attachment 700103


First load of rock, for rock wall. I'm guessing a few hundred pounds, PT want's to pucker when cranked all the way.
View attachment 700104

Those are great pictures. I was wondering if your machine came stock with the steering cylinder underneath the footplate?

 

[cqaigy2]

Those are great pictures. I was wondering if your machine came stock with the steering cylinder underneath the footplate?

Thanks!

Yes, the steering ram under the foot plate is stock. The 422 only comes with one, on the left side. I believe the 425 comes with two, one on each side.

 

[joshlee]

Got it. We learn something new every day.

 

[BigDaddyEureka]

Thanks!

Yes, the steering ram under the foot plate is stock. The 422 only comes with one, on the left side. I believe the 425 comes with two, one on each side.

Yup - the 425 comes with two.

 

[Goose1776]

A couple of days ago moving brush piles
While the PT grapple, isn’t the greatest design, it works well on the 425
I also used it to pick up and move a bunch of old tires, that at some point I’ll bury into a mound for my shooting backstop berm.
(Note, that I won’t be shooting tires, they will be covered, they will just help with fill)

 

[m5040]

Beats working. Nice pic

 

[PowerTracManiac]

Finally making progress on house project. The outrageous wood prices held me up for months.
Backfilling/grading with the PT1460-careful not to bang the foundation.

 

[joshlee]

View attachment 707461
A couple of days ago moving brush piles
While the PT grapple, isn’t the greatest design, it works well on the 425
I also used it to pick up and move a bunch of old tires, that at some point I’ll bury into a mound for my shooting backstop berm.
(Note, that I won’t be shooting tires, they will be covered, they will just help with fill)

Those grapples are awesome

 

[ponytug]

Had some fun today. I had called our well drillers about some issues that we were having with our check valve on the pump (down the well). These folks had drilled the original well forty years ago and we were still on the original pump. The well drillers turned up today to do the work.

By way of back story, our well is only about 120' from the main road, probably thirty feet up from the road. Now, these folks did the original well, so they have all the details on file. We had our first quarter of an inch of rain yesterday, and the little soil we have is 100% clay.

Now we have an "atmospheric river" storm forecast for Sunday that is supposed to drop 10-15% of our annual rainfall overnight. If it happens, and we hope it does because we are in a drought, our clay soil will be "slicker than snake snot" as a rather genteel elderly lady once described it to me.

Well, the drill rig that turned up is on some beefy pick up like setup with a Cummins in a Sterling truck. However, it has highway tires on it, with no AWD, and no diff lock. It can't even cross the swale by the side of the road. Ok, to be totally honest, it got one wheel across. But that was all she wrote.

These guys are well drillers and know the area, and I am wondering what the heck the foreman was thinking sending the team out on this rig.

So, I get out the PT and the 4N1, scrape a ramp into the road edge, compact it, and then move some soil down for a nice ramp up to the well. Compact that, too. The truck makes it off the road on to the property, before it then spins and slides out on the greasy clay layer which is all of an eighth of an inch thick. These are hard highway tires. Nothing doing. So, I grade a road to the well for them. They are still spinning out.

Crew lead to me "Hey, this is a really heavy truck, so I don't think that we will be able to do this today. So, I am just going to call the foreman and call it a day." I am thinking about the chances of getting the well serviced before May because of the clay soil and rains, and I'm getting nervous, not liking my odds.
Me: "How about I put chains on my tractor and pull you up?"
Crew lead: "Hmm"
Crew member #2: "Hey don't we have chains?"

So I chained up the PT to the truck as an initial try, thinking that I could always add tire chains to the PT if it came to that. Turns out that it didn't even require chains on the PT. The 1445 pulled the 25,000lb truck up to the well without even spinning out. 3,500lbs on four hydraulic motors generated enough torque to make it.

There was a small hitch just as they were getting the pump to the surface, when it jammed on something, but eventually, they were able to free it. I always feel like down hole well issues are voodoo like because there aren't a lot of options, or space to service any of the options. The pump looked brand new coming out of the well, which was a relief. The huge news was that the water table is unchanged in forty years, which being on top of a hill, after some really big earthquakes, and two years into a major drought, is rather good news. Folks lower down the hill that I know of have low flow wells that go down 7-800'.

The only bad news was that they pulled the wrong notes and thus brought the wrong size and wrong HP pump. Arrgggh!

Repeat performance tomorrow with the PT-1445. I will try to remember to bring a camera. Fingers crossed!

This tractor has earned its keep so many times. Thank you, thank you, thank you Power-Trac.

All the best,

Peter

 

[ernemats]

Hope you did not get the rain flooding they were showing on tv

 

[joshlee]

I think about getting a 1445, but I already have so many things set up for this 1430 with the attachments and all.
It might just be me, but you don’t hear as many people talk about the 1445 as other machines, again, that’s only what I’m noticing on Tractor’s by net.