Excavator

[Turkish]

Absolutely.

I cut new trail for the first time with a large mini, and that is 100% the tool for trail making and trail fixing.


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Tell me more. I’m about to have an operator and a 20k # Cat machine with rubber pads for a few hours. He’s clearing a small spot for a pole barn and campsite the first day. Was thinking of one new perimeter trail in young timber for the next day.

ETA: for comparison, do you have experience watching or using a dozer doing the same work? That’s the most common method in these parts.

 

[SD51555]

Tell me more. I’m about to have an operator and a 20k # Cat machine with rubber pads for a few hours. He’s clearing a small spot for a pole barn and campsite the first day. Was thinking of one new perimeter trail in young timber for the next day.

ETA: for comparison, do you have experience watching or using a dozer doing the same work? That’s the most common method in these parts.

When I did mine, I just crawl forward in the direction I want to go, and pop and pull everything out of the way as I go. Every so many yards Id stop and back drag what I just cleared. It’s like laying the new trail in one pass, clearing and smoothing.

I did it with my phone compass in my lap. I’d pick a heading and a marker tree ahead and just blast my way to that point. This winter, I’ll go back and cut up the slash I threw out of the way and pile it for burning.

I don’t have any dozer experience. If low ground isn’t a concern, it’s probably not a bad idea to take some dirt with you. The hard part with having an operator do it is you can’t sit on his shoulders and direct every step. But maybe flag out the trail and show it to your guy. Maybe he can whack it out his own way. Be sure to ask about the debris plan with a dozer.


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[Turkish]

When I did mine, I just crawl forward in the direction I want to go, and pop and pull everything out of the way as I go. Every so many yards Id stop and back drag what I just cleared. It’s like laying the new trail in one pass, clearing and smoothing.

I did it with my phone compass in my lap. I’d pick a heading and a marker tree ahead and just blast my way to that point. This winter, I’ll go back and cut up the slash I threw out of the way and pile it for burning.

I don’t have any dozer experience. If low ground isn’t a concern, it’s probably not a bad idea to take some dirt with you. The hard part with having an operator do it is you can’t sit on his shoulders and direct every step. But maybe flag out the trail and show it to your guy. Maybe he can whack it out his own way. Be sure to ask about the debris plan with a dozer.


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Man, debris doesn’t last long here. What are you thinking in terms of debris mgt excavator vs dozer?

 

[Howboutthemdawgs]

Man, debris doesn’t last long here. What are you thinking in terms of debris mgt excavator vs dozer?

Way better with an excavator in my opinion. I can place it with an excavator. With a dozer I’m more of a wrecking ball. There’s some finesse but I’m limited to just pushing out of the way.

 

[SD51555]

Way better with an excavator in my opinion. I can place it with an excavator. With a dozer I’m more of a wrecking ball. There’s some finesse but I’m limited to just pushing out of the way.

This, 100%. You Cat 310 will be able to wiggle through places more easily too. What Dawgs is saying here is very important about being able to “place stuff.” Likely, a lot of what you’re taking down is gonna be tall or long. Once you find a pocket to put stuff, it’s doesn’t have to lay right along the trail.

If you have enough room, you could pick or make a spot off to the side and pile up so much slash from a given stretch, and it’s much less cleanup for you. Maybe you just come by and toss a match in it when you’re ready.

I didn’t have the time to be that deliberate about it. I was running out of time and just needed to get thru. I also had severe weather bearing down on me and the machine was overheating. I had to just blast and go.


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[SD51555]

If you wanna see my newly made trails with the excavator (I had a 10,000 lb machine) watch this starting at the 3:11 mark.

https://rumble.com/v6uw1td-2025-dig-on.html

 

[Howboutthemdawgs]

Cool video. Is that plot at the beginning one you recently made?
The stump at the end, was that where you dug it up it were you just burying it there? Hell of a hole

 

[West_Fork]

masticator head is the biggest reason I want an excavator.

 

[SD51555]

Cool video. Is that plot at the beginning one you recently made?
The stump at the end, was that where you dug it up it were you just burying it there? Hell of a hole

Yep. That was my new 1/3 acre plot. The very opening of that video, and the area left of the machine, that's what it looked like when I started.

I had a number of stumps that the machine couldn't lift, so I drug them up out of the hole, dug the hole deeper, and pushed them back in. Then I packed a bunch of smaller stumps around the big one before I back filled it. It's crazy to me to look out over that plot and know all the stuff is under there, and there's very little lift showing it. Once the roots get down to that rotten wood, this plot is gonna really go like hell. It takes a few years for the wood to start giving back, but after that it's money in the bank.