Got the Bulldozer Going and It Was a Log and Not the Seat Spring

Monday June 17, 2019 Guerneville CA.

Time to find out what’s wrong

Once I got it going this morning I went outside and aired up the tires on my quad runner. Seems they always go flat after a bit. I got some tools together and headed on up into the hills where the bulldozer is parked to find out what is locking up it’s track brakes.

Here’s the work area where I’m going to work on the dozer.

It ain’t the spring

I looked under the seat. You can see the seat spring that fell out of the worn out seat. A pack rat has been eating acorns and had a nest in here for awhile. That spring isn’t causing any problems but I thought another one might be but I was wrong.

It’s this little log

I got a flash light out so I could see down in the dark by the brake peddle linkage down through those pipes and I spotted the end of a piece of wood that looked like it was jamming the brake linkage. I tried to pull it out from the top but it was stuck.

The little log is hard to see. It’ straight under the end of the spring right in the middle of this picture.

Take it out the bottom

Well if I couldn’t get it out from the top I decided I’d have to get it from the bottom an prepared myself to crawl under there, but.

I was fortunate that I could see the end of the problem from the side. There’s a broken off little log stuck in there, you can see the end of it. Looks like a tree limb jammed in there and broke off as that’s the only way a piece like that could get jammed up there like that.

Getting the stick out

I got my big screw driver out so I could pry on the wood piece and was able to get it to fall down and out after a bit of toiling.

Here’s the nasty little culprit that caused me so  much trouble.

Might as well do some work

I put the tools away and started up the tractor to let it warmed up and then started down the road leaving the quad runner there as I couldn’t drive them both. :O)

I cruised down the road touching up anything that needed it going through here.

And down through this area of the forest.

Through here, the road was in pretty good shape for such a hard winter.

Moving up the quad runner

About half way through the road I stopped and walked back to retrieve the quad runner where I left it. I thought it would be good to move it now so I wouldn’t have to  move it so far later, but it didn’t matter as plans change.

Walking back to the quad

I took a short cut to get the quad up through this old dirt bike trail.

I rode the bike past where the tractor was to this spot which I hoped to walk back up to later. From there I had to walk back to the tractor where I’d left it.

I hiked back up this road to get the dozer and continue on.

Headed to the bottom of the hill

I worked my way with the dozer all the way down to the bottom of the hill going down this ridge past where the quad was parked.

One more hike to do, but

I parked the dozer at the bottom of the hill and started to hike back up the hill to retrieve the quad runner.

I started up this hill and thought this little hike is really going to wear me out so maybe I’ll get the quad runner another day and turn around and walk back to my house which wasn’t up hill and maybe a mile away.

One more job to do today

When I  made it home I knew my brother Tom had some electrical stuff he wanted to me to look at so I walked over to his house and we hopped in his golf cart to go do the electrical stuff which was fairly easy and not too hard to do.

I rested up and later went outside to putter a bit.

Chicken nursery has 4 hens sitting

I watched the chickens for awhile. Here’s the nursery. I have four hens sitting in boxes in here and a few little peeps running around too. That peep on top of the box has a bum leg it’s favoring but seems to be ok. Eventually it dived into that box with a momma hen sitting on eggs. It seemed to be ok with her even though this wasn’t her chick.

That pretty much wraps up my day for another good one. Fixed the dozer and got some work done too, great. :O)