Good Morning Membership,

Greetings from Richmond. The show got off to a good start yesterday. I will attempt to post some pictures. I say attempt because the hotels wireless is just about out of range for me! Also please forgive me for not knowing names of operators in some of the pictures.

First I want to give huge Thanks to Mark Olsen. He helped us out immensely Thursday night. He has also put a lot of effort into this show and it is greatly appreciated.

It was very nice to finally meet Jeff Huff. I enjoyed talking with him several times thoughout the day.

Ron and Bonnie Meeder have the high, wide, FIFTEEN here too. I hope to have better pictures of it today. Always enjoyable talking with Ron. Bonnie took the prototype FIFTEEN out for a ride and seveal of us followed on our machines. A small parade so to speak.

Check out the picture of the mighty D9 and Cat TEN parked side by side. That little TEN has a LaPlant Choate blade on it. That is the first manufactured blade I have seen made for a TEN. It also has the original Bosch generator on it!

The picture of the THIRTY is a stunning tractor brought by Billy Sanders. I've always thought the THIRTY with a full canopy was nicest looking antique Cat produced.

Enjoy the pictures

Some nice looking tractors & everyone having a great time playing in the dirt.

I am sitting in a hotel room in ashland anxiously awaiting the GF to get ready so we can get breakfast and then head to the show!

catmatt

Darned nice photos, Pat. Thanks for posting, even during the show. It must be a busy time for you. GWH

Today was Hot, Humid and wonderfully Dusty!

Lots of dirt was pushed, dug, and hauled today. It was quite the spectical.

For me, the hit of the day was 11 year old Luke Warfield operating a D6. Not only did he a great job, his attention to his surroundings were keen. He did a fantastic job and made a lot of us smile on the side lines. Yarnell, you were a good teacher!

Of course the D9 came to life today and pushed mountains of dirt without much groaning. It only stopped for rests to let the temps come down on the torque converter.

Mark Olsen is seen operating his THIRTY with friend Rob Moore getting a work out on the towed scraper.

That's Bonnie Meeder's high, wide, FIFTEEN. It looked great out front of the club tent.

It was nice meeting many of the posters here. I sure enjoyed talking with you all and putting a face to a call name.

The banquet was very nice and the food very good. A nice tribute was given to Dave Smith for all he has done for our great club. We were also told about next years show and what we can expect. I wish it wasn't so far away! It sounds like a once in a life time event!

I'm dead tired...and my photo allotment is nearly full, but I'll see how many more I can sneak on here tonight!

Great batch of pictures and commentary:D Thanks for posting.

I'm in lust for the 30. Nice, really nice. Thanks for posting. John

Hi Pat,
here are scans of an explaination of the reasons fuel type T/C's may overheat if operated too lightly or too heavily loaded. Optimum load seems to be when the t/c output shaft is turning at 50% of engine Rpm's.
Of course if the T/C cooler or radiator have cooling issues that is another story.
Hope this helps the D9 in question.
Cheers Eddie B.

Let me try and post a few more.

One picture shows some of the equipment parked at one end of the demonstration area. Thanks to all those operators that demonstrated all the equipment. I know a lot of diesel and gas were burned yesterday!

And how about them draft horses! Notice they are both looking at the D6 under load. They're both thinking "why are we out here when they have all of this big stuff?" "Somebody get me some more oats!"

The DW15 got sorted out and ran good all afternoon.

You wouldn't believe all the equipment sitting around under sheds and canopies. This fellow has collected lots of equipment. If I have any room left at all in my allotment, I will post some of those pictures.

I know we thanked them last night at the banquet but I feel like it is worth mentioning here too. Billy Sanders and Mark Olsen made this show happen. Mark also mentioned several other names that helped him tremendously. We appreciate all the work that went into this event. It's folks like you that make events like this enjoyable for all attending. A job WELL DONE ladies and gentlemen! THANK YOU all!

I still have room left!

So take a look at some of these.

These pictures don't even show half of whats there.