A couple of my cousin's toys......

A cousin of mine has an earth moving company, everything from grading roads, building dams, taking out trees, etc. This last week, our next door neighbor had one of my cousin's men removing some trees and redoing a waterway just north of our house. So I called and asked if he could spend a day or so in several acres of those dumb thorny locust trees behind my shop. He could.

He isn't done, but the equipment is parked for the weekend.

I'll give my cousin credit, everything he has and has done he did on his own. After he graduated from high school he drove a truck for a year or so and got drafted into the Army during the Korean War. The Army made a heavy equipment operator out of him and he spent most of his hitch in the Army building roads in Korea. He played it cool, saved his money, and when he got out of the Army he bought an old dozer and road maintainer and hung out his shingle. He married respectably and the whole thing took off from there.

He's some six years older than me, and by now has pretty much turned the business over to his two sons. He's also acquired about 150 old tractors to play with.

Not as easy today from humble beginnings I would have to think, insurance alone is very high. Outfit I worked at many years ago had a pair of PC400's. They seemed like good reliable machines. I've ran PC150's, 200's, 300's and 400's at different times. Maybe its the photo, but the boom sure looks longer than the standard size. That one must be set up for long reach. There was one working in the old reservoir causeway here in town this winter, it had the really long boom and stick. Never ran one of those, seems you need binoculars to see the work LOL !

" I've ran PC150's, 200's, 300's and 400's at different times. Maybe its the photo, but the boom sure looks longer than the standard size."

I have also and yes that boom looks long
.
That is a good position for greasing at the end of the day but for parking, storage I always extended every thing out, its called "hiding chrome"

Nice looking equipment!!! There were several fellows around here that did the same thing as your cousin. One built a welding/ repair business after learning in the service how to weld. Another started his own bulldozing business too. I can remember him having a D-2(????) to start with. It was small enough he had a trailer he pulled behind his pickup to move it on. Then for year he had a tandem straight truck he would crawl his dozer up on the back off. I do not remember the size of the crawler. I do remember he could see grade well. He rarely had to set a transit up to make the water drain correctly.

It's nice to have someone in the family with all that stuff. Stan

That caught my eye also. No reason to tuck it all up like that. When the hoe on my TLB used to have to stick out of the barn, I collapsed the cylinders.

He has at least one with a longer boom than that, but I don't known the make. It's a light tan color.

This fella must be made out of pretty good stuff , KWV ! I new several Korean War Vets .but sadly they are all gone now. Good for him to keep on doing what he loves to do.