In the 1960's we lived very rural on a farm with gravel roads everywhere. Remember very well me as a small boy watching the townships red Austin Western grader do these roads. The driver always stood up while operating it. These days those same gravel roads are all paved.
Another great vid!! We need more operators like you. The gravel road i drive is so rough.. and the grader hand just 4th gears it not cutting out the wash boards never seen a crappy hand till him.. lol
Great Vid - again! There are all levels of experience out there utilizing your vid's. It's great you are willing to share your skills and knowledge, it's very much appreciated ! One tip, you should show the "gauge" on the right side, that shows your saddle position with this VId - you'd be surprised how many don't even know it's there or what it's for ...... Thanks Again and keep the vid's coming
Your welcome and thanks for the tip I honestly didn’t even think about showing the gauge on the right for the different pin holes I will definitely do that glad to hear you enjoy the videos I really enjoy sharing my knowledge and helping other operators become better.
Great video man you have some nice gravel roads. Here hey don't top dress the dirt roads you can't call them gravel roads because they are built with sand stone shale and once the top layer breaks down where it's nice to drive on and not to heavy of rock it turns just like concrete. Great video keep up the great work.
You are blading a narrower road than I’m used to, my two lane roads require 3 cutting passes across followed by a 4th 1/2 cut 1/2 spread pass starting to bring the material back and then three more spreading passes to lay the material back out across the road. Also our roads mix rocks into the material and if you spread with your mouldboard tipped forward the rocks will catch and drag under the mold board creating drag marks down the road. We cut and spread with the moldboards pretty much right back as any oversize stuff we pick up will then just roll down and off the end of the mouldboard instead of dragging down the road underneath it. Just different circumstances is all.
Yep everyone has different road widths and different materials to work with I did this video as just a guide to give new operators an idea how to set there machine up thanks for the comment thanks for watching
Thanks for the video! I have used your instructions in the past to improve my grading, which improves our roads and shortens the time it takes to get across them. And, once again I came away with something else I'm going to try. How do you like your LED lights? Are they worth it? (I assume they cost more)
Your welcome and happy the videos are helping you become a better operator as the LED lights I absolutely love them they are more money but well worth it definitely won’t have another machine with out them.thanks for watching!
Been wanting to upgrade our 672G to LED, called Deere asking how much for the kit. They said around $800 for a "kit" so the parts guy went to the back to see what the kit was. A single light. Looks like its going to be aftermarket, as I like grading at night. Looking to swap out to a newer but used 872GP, so been waiting on that.
@@coolhanddruid yeah the LED lights definitely are not that cheap but well worth the money and I’m pretty sure it’s cheaper if you order a new machine with them on it and going from a 672 to a 872 will be a big change spent a few hours on an 872 was impressed with it.
My maintenance windrow is all lose material and it might hold back some water but it generally just runs right through it in my opinion having a maintenance windrow had a lot more good points then negative so that’s why I leave a maintenance windrow
Thanks, Please keep the awesome videos coming. The information you’re sharing is very helpful for the beginners and even the experienced operators. Thanks again.
Hi Graderman I am new to running grader and one of the problems I am coming across is the roads I am dealing with have been built with dozers and frontend loaders, so I have many undulations in the grade what I want to do is cut the highs and fill the lows. I am not sure how to get started taking off the tops of the highs without stalling out or high centering the machine. I am using an older Komatsu 655. Thanks for any tips you can provide.
My recommendation for you would be to cut one side of the road bringing your windrow to the middle then cut your windrow from the middle to the opposite side you started on just take it slow and only cut what your machine can handle once you have it windrowed up you might have to cut it again doing the same thing then start relaying your big windrow down leveling out your top hope this helps you out good luck.
Hi there how are you? Juat had a quick question for you. I was juat wondering what camera it is that you use when you are in the grader and show the operator views. Thank you
Our gravel roads in my area here are very high traveled lots of agricultural in my area they use the gravel roads to get to the main county and state paved roads we have to maintain them every week or every two weeks we average around 100 too 250 vehicles a day so they require frequent maintenance hope that explains it some thanks for the question and thanks for watching.
I work for 5 different townships who all own there own grader and yes I am very lucky I have lots of different attachments to make my job a little easier happy you like the videos thanks for watching.
I notice on this machine you have a blade extension, do you have them on all the machines you run? we do NOT have them here, IF you have a machine that does NOT have an extension would there be anyway you could do a video on how you set up and how you blade with that machine? And if you are bit able to do a video like that would you be able to tell.me how you suggest set up the machine without the extension? I also shoot foe the 23 to 24 or 25 foot width I am in nebraska and we can NOT go against traffic. Thsnk you so much I use a lot your technique and it.helps a lot.
All my machines have a 2ft left hand extension on them even with out having the extension you would set up the same way except for pulling in on a 24ft road your going to have to make 2 passes to get it across your center line if I could make a recommendation for ya get a extension for your machine especially if your roads are 22 to 24ft wide will make you way more efficient and less passes on the road that sucks ya can’t go against traffic like I can here but got to play buy the rules hope this helps ya out if ya have other questions ask away
I wish we could go against traffic, I think it's actually safer for everyone bc the view for everyone is better, also from what I have heard our county won't do extensions
I would love to Be able to get across in 2 passes it would save so much time I only get about 6 miles done in an 8 hour A-day and we have about a 40 mile route And I barely get 6 miles done in A-day
@@ericscheer2024 wow that’s crazy if ya go back in my videos look for gravel road manual you will find a video of the handout I use for my hands on motor grader training it shows the difference between 14 and 16ft moldboard and road widths I’d show that to the boss and explain why a 2ft extension would be so much more efficient and cost effective hope this helps.
How often are you grading the same road? Do you simply spread that "maintenance row" back over the next time you come trough instead of having to grade both sides of the road?
I’m try to get all my roads done for suer every two weeks and some of my higher traffic roads like this one every week if needed and yes if the road is in pretty good shape I just take my maintenance windrow across using it to maintain my crown and get the wheel tracks out of road thanks for the question and thanks for watching.
@@graderman140m That makes sense. Since I'm on a dead end road where only traffic is US mail and occasionally UPS my road probably should not be graded that often :) Wondering if contractors feel obligated to grade a road even if it doesn't need done or what? Person doing our roads never just spreads the windrow, always grades both sides fully even when there is no road damage from vehicle traffic.
@@davidb.5544 I have a couple of roads that long as there in good shape and blading it would do more harm them good I will just leave them till I need to hit them if that makes sense. Sounds like you live in a great spot lot of my roads see 100 to 200 cars a day on them so definitely busy roads.
Hi there just a random question for you, just curious, out of all the different graders thst you currently run, which one is your favorite and which one is the most mechanically sound? Thank you
Hey there and my favorite machine out of all of them is the cat 140M3 to operate and as far as which machine is mechanically sound I’d have to go with the 2019 140 with the rack controls in my opinion less electronics less to go wrong but as far as ease of control and operator comfort I prefer the joysticks over the rack and steering wheel hope this helps thanks for the question.
I agree on the joystick 100% I was just curious we have some cat 140 m2, I run one of those for the county and an m3 for precinct and then we have 1 guy trying a John deere with the joystick controls. 720Gp I believe. Mine is a little ways but not two far from being replaced a few years but not to many so I am just finding out what guys like. Thsbk you for your opinion!
@@ericscheer2024 I’m not a fan of the Deere joystick controls and I did like the Deere machine I operate but have had a fair amount of down time with it and this winter for snow plowing with the Deere compared to the cat was a complete embarrassment in my opinion I could run circles around the Deere in my cat machines
Morning I have a question I was just wondering wondering what tips do you have for grading A road that gets severely wash boarded even in drought conditions like we are in our county does not have a water truck and I have the Crown very close to that 4% but there is an area coming off a pavement to 4 Residential driveways plus 3 field driveways Allen all in about a quarter of a mile any suggestions you have would be wonderfully appreciated play appreciated thank you
@@ericscheer2024 unfortunately when your in drought conditions and you have washboards like that you got to cut them all the way out so you can’t see them anymore and then relay everything to a 4% crown I’d say your not the problem of the washboards it’s mainly poor material on the road I’m guessing has a lot of rock and sand in it which stays loose all the time I use 3/4 minus surfacing gravel on my roads and it has a plasticity of 8 or 9 and that means it has a lot of clay in it so it sticks together hope this helps you out thanks for the question.
@@graderman140m it is so garden here that you can't even cutbthe roads. It's been that way since probably about August. Which it's weird bc a grader dint stand a chance at cutting right now, you might as well try and cut pavement. And yes a lot of the material here is sandy. I have tried to get the county to get bust the next size bigger gravel, ( B gravel i believe is the name of it) even.show them where one of the precincts close by uses the bigger stuff qnd it seems to work wellbut the response I got was "yea but you can't satisfy everyone " and also " yea but its too expensive "
@@ericscheer2024 unfortunately that’s a common response good material is expensive but crappy material is cheap but also requires a lot more maintenance it’s a double edged sword if you have high traffic volumes especially trucks it’s worth the money putting down the good material.
its called a winrow NOT a rinrow. also only cutting one lane and spreading the gravel over the other will make the imperfections in the lane not cut, worse over time as all imperfections will come to the surface. also to improve your apex crown cut half your crown track when kicking down. otherwise you have a rounded crown as can be seen in this video. with out a sharp apex on the crown you will have three wheel tracks as opposed to 4, two in each lane. traffic will crowd/ride the crown because its basically flat. thats called a parabolic crown the road is rounded as opposed to an apex profile where right angles/ straight slope of grade are present.
I’m glad you got everything figured I have my way of maintaining my roads obviously no one does it the same because of different areas we are in if you don’t like the information I’m sharing I suggest you don’t watch.
@@graderman140m no need for offence. we work in an industry where skill level and expierance level is decreasing. since we all serve the public and strive to apply industry and adopted standards adding to your information was not intended to be a slight on your skill level. just adding information that some may deem helpful. the adopted standards nationwide apply every where as a gravel road is a gravel road, its the operator by his means/habits of work that produce a parabolic or right angle of slope roadway not location. as you replied "my way" if you would concider this. would it not be helpfull to include industry standards as those with less skill levels my have difficulty when seeking a new position because they have adopted the my way position as opposed to adopting industry standards and best practices. we are all on the same team my friend, and we can all learn from each other to continue to produce the very best standard of product for those we serve
@@lonevoice7935 I don’t have parabolic crown in my roads I use carbide edges so blades are always straight I also work for my state LTAP and they have me do all there hands on motor grader training for them so I would think that I would be doing my roads the right way if they hired me to teach for them so I share the way I do it and what I teach when I do my LTAP training.
@@graderman140m carbides have nothing to do with weather or not you have an apex or parabolic, that is unless soft cutting edges are wore. if they are wore you will have a parabolic at the quarter crown i run all including bullets depending on the task at hand. a parabolic will always have only three wheel paths from traffic. an apex will have 4. on a 24 + foot two lane gravel road. parabolic crown causes traffic to ride the crown. i quarentee you if you cut the front tire track in half on your kick down it will produce a nice apex try it you might like it. good for you that your at the top. do you have a video showing proper back slope with a 8 foot flat bottom ditch with a 3-1 or so foreslope? id like to see your work
I pull in on the left side and right side depending on where my maintenance windrow is at in South Dakota we’re allowed to blade against traffic so I can be on the wrong side of the road
@@brandonpadget5515 I don’t have any dirt roads all of mine are gravel but I used to have to blade a few dirt roads and I pretty much just bladed it like normal and put all the weeds and grass in a windrow off to the side