Originally Posted by J Hall (Post 5692)

I got out for a while on the new dirt pile I had hauled onto my lot..I took a photo before I broke down again...
The clay brought in is full of clay balls that are imbedded just under the surface..I think if you look close you can see a couple on top of the ground..Well I tied into a big one, Scale wise about 10 feet across and 5 feet in diameter, sorta shaped like a big potato..It was near the edge so I went after it..Once I got it disodged and up out of the hole I made the mistake of not filling in the hole so the tracks went down on one side..Almost got stuck...In so doing I filled the tracks with dirt trying to squirril my way out and the clay filled into the links and really got packed in with the sprocket teeth,, Who hasn't done that with a real dozer from time to time...?? Well. a real D8 has a recoil spring built into the track roller frame that allows the idler to move back when just this sort of thing happens.., a small feature I forgot to include on the build..

It stalled the track a couple of times both going in forward and reverse, and then things went very silent..Those little window motors have enough torque to pull apart a #15 steel roller chain..A fairly easy fix, but the power exerted surprised me..

But it was a nice day and it was great to get out and play..