CAT 25M?

[Gavin84w]

I visited Rons workshop when he was building this last March while attending Conexpo, His stuff is built with 1 thing in mind, functionality for the purpose at hand, up close and i don,t mean to sound disrespectfull to him in any way as they let me have a good look through the shop with good friend Ken of SoCal Earthmovers but the work is just done to it, by that i mean if it needs a hyd cylinder there, well go cut one off something down back and bring it up and get it on.

I loved the "hot rod" ness and thinking outside the box that he has and i likened him to being a modern day "Buster Peterson"

From what i remember the rear end is 2 988B rear frames that were cut a couple feet back from the centre artic hitch and the 1 turned 180 degrees and then weld them together, this then gave the rear section of the grader 2 oscillating axle. The trans (again 988B) was dropped in between the 2 rear axles and driveshafts then went to each diff centre and i think 1 diff centre had to be turned 180 so both would drive forward when in fwd gear. The front frame was a mixture of 235 excavator boom and 834 nose right up front mounted to a 235 slew ring that would allow the 834 front to oscillate and it was then tied in on the original artic joint of the front frame and 2 cylinders provided steering. This was later scrapped and a more traditional front end you see on it now.

It was a real priviledge to see this i tell you.

Almost forgot, it was a 988B cab and was full joystick control sorta like an M series.

[Andrea1981]

Here links to pictures from this interesting big grader:
http://www.socalearthmovers.com/gallery255.html
http://www.socalearthmovers.com/gallery256.html
http://www.socalearthmovers.com/gallery257.html

[Dah]

What are the advantages of all that effort over buying a 24?

[brandencarter644]

The CAT 25M, huh? This isn't just any Caterpillar model. In fact, it's a unique device assembled by an expert contractor. They undertake earthmoving in Canada and manage an engineering firm in the United States. It's kind of cool, right? It's as if they opted to construct the specific tool they required for the task themselves. And based on what I've heard, it's performing flawlessly. Who knows, perhaps in the future we'll see more unique designs like this one!