Anybody else obsessed with heavy construction equipment?

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After I found out that some of my life passions (collecting and restoring antique and vintage TV sets and audio gear, and my passion for storms & sirens), are very common amongst Aspies, I wonder about heavy equipment.... Since I was too young to speak, I was mesmerized by watching bulldozers and other heavy equipment working. I used to beg my mother to take me to a nearby school which was destroyed in the 1971 Sylmar Earthquake in California, to park and watch the wrecking ball and dozers busting up the debris and loading it onto trucks. I was 3 at the time. Ever since, I've been fascinated with the feel and the power of heavy equipment, and have always wanted to operate a big machine (not a farm tractor; I mean a BIG machine like a Caterpillar D9, etc.)

Anyway, fast-forward 40 years, and now I'm VERY tempted to buy one (a 53,000-pound Caterpillar 963B track loader with grapple bucket and rippers), that is available and somewhat in budget (depending on how you look at it). We have a use for it for awhile on our avocado ranch, which is only about 60% groomed and planted, but honestly we could just hire a machine & operator much easier than buying the machine and training (or hiring an operator for the skilled and tricky maneuvers). But I have this burning desire to have that machine!! !! It's in the hands of my wife, and also our tax lady, to see if it would be TOO infeasible. If not, I'm going to contract to buy it later this week . This would not be the first wild & crazy thing I've done from a childhood obsession... I was addicted to the routine of the old Cold War air raid sirens being sounded every last Friday of the month in Los Angeles, which was stopped in January of 1986. It was like part of my life was missing. So 20 years later, I got tired of not hearing that monthly air raid siren test, so my wife and I got in the truck, and made a 6000-mile roundtrip to Milwaukee and picked up two Federal Thunderbolt sirens which I found on eBay. I restored and installed one of them at our house; all 1300 pounds of it!

Anyway, I'm just curious if anyone else has this "thing" for heavy equipment, and if so, have you been driven enough about it, to own one, or get a job operating one?

Charles

Go for it, Charles! I say that is what life is all about. Just first have a mechanic take a look, if necessary, to be sure it is in reasonable condition, and then later sell it and likely end up at least "breaking even" in comparison to just hiring a contractor who is going to charge you enough to keep his own machine running anyway.

Oh, and yes, I have also always been fascinated by heavy machinery. My all-time favorite was a small Caterpillar track loader with individual levers for left-right steering clutches and brakes, and then still having overall clutch and brake pedals, a manual transmission, throttle lever and all the bucket controls ...

Whew!

Loved it.

Have you ever looked at the dumptrucks they use in the Alberta tar sands? They're the size of a small office building.

I certainly used to find some of this stuff fascinating, but not so much I ever really cared to own one. Plus things tend to be so loud around them.

Yes, and I bet those drivers are sitting in some pretty nice cabs with all the creature comforts!

Too much of a wrong kind of noise can really bother me, but the sound of a well-oiled machine can be soothing.

When I was really really really young, my grandfather owned a farm and two or three tractors - well, one was half-and-half. I was totally fascinated with these machines. One was an old red thing, and another was about two feet taller (gigantic to me at that age) and a green John Deere thing.

Who wouldn't want to own one of these?

I have driven a Euclid about half that size, but it was old, loud and nasty.

I can remember simply being fascinated by any heavy equipment that had large Treads. Heavy construction equipment as well as Tanks in WW2 museums.

Also in recent years I've done work driving 18 wheeler which is quite an experience. Typically the full length is 70ft and if filled to maximum allowed capacity you have a combined weight of 80,000. Most of the trucks I've run with hold 200 to 300 gallons of Diesel fuel. You can often drive through a couple states before needing another refill.

It can be a strange life being on the road that much but there have been times I felt privileged driving big Freightliners, Internationals, and Volvos. I also think it sounds cool when the truck is building speed and you can hear the wine of the Turbo intake.

Yes, certainly ... but please, please do not later use your Jake Brake anywhere near my house!

most loud noises bother me. but I love the sounds machines make, especially a big turbo-diesel spooling up.

I'd love to have a bull-dozer, not that I really need one or have anywhere to put one.

I don't know why some people do that or leave it on all the time. I've even heard it come from people just inside the truck stops.

I only use the jake break in the Mountains or grab a low gear.

OH YES ... I love that turbo spool-up sound. I took the mufflers out of my Toyota turbo-Diesel pickup, and also put an open-element air cleaner on it so as to really hear that turbo. Sounds like an 18-wheeler! I did that on a turbo-Diesel Camry also, but it seemed too weird, so I put the muffler back in.

It's looking like I'm going to make the call today and arrange to buy it! I need to check a couple more details having to do with a California certification for the emissions, for if/when I want to sell it. Some machines which don't meet a standard, can't be used "for hire" in California. That really limits the buyer pool, and kills the value, as it costs $1000s to ship these things, and one not certified would probably sell better in another state or overseas. I might still buy it even if it doesn't meet that emissions standard, but the seller will have to bargain on the price more.

The more I think about it, the more it makes sense (or the more I'm rationalizing it, LOL). We have what is now 5 acres of badlands, after some freak rains sent tons and tons of dead trees and rocks down the creek onto what used to be my motocross track, and it still is dammed up by the debris, and needs to be completely flattened out and re-graded.



I wish other truckers were so polite! They use the jake brake right down in front of our house, because there's an S-curve to cross a parallel railroad track. They can see that there are houses here; not many, but one house is reason enough not to jake brake at 3:00 in the morning! We do live on a state highway, so I guess I can't really be too upset about it.

Charles

Yes ... but then I must still admit I used to really enjoy rolling into a construction site with my old Detroit diesel backing down in a lower gear! The truck I was driving at that time was an old Autocar mixer that had been re-fitted with a dump box, and I finally stopped doing that after a supervisor with his back to me had to go change his underwear ...

I hope it all works out for you!

I am fascinated with all kinds of machinery big and small.
I almost bought a late fifties Oliver crawler just to play with
not sure I should have not bought it. I am sure I would have
only pulled it apart to find it was not worth fixing ( it needed clutch work)
and then I would have had to pay big bucks to get it taken away.
But oh well.
It has been a long time since I have heard the name Euclid
as a child they were the biggest trucks around.

And then there is steam locomotives they are awsome!
Trains were my first obsestion.
now they are once again becoming the number one obsesetion
I am building a scale model of the Jupiter
Before I was DXed I would just have to tell people if you
have to ask why, then you will never understand.

That would be cool if you do get a big Crawler kx250 ! !

Same here ... and then later I used to just love riding alongside on my scooter whenever possible and swapping sounds with the engineers! The crack of my open pipes could cut right through to them, and then the steady rumble coming from the train engines fit right in with my bike's vibrations.