Oh that's right! that looked like a good time too!

Good reading tonight. Heck of a project. Can remember hearing about Garrison Dam when in high school and stories about the twin HD 19's. Seem like the story was that PK and MK built them. Found this old home movie from a guy who worked there and toward the end it shows the twin AC's and a statement " Caterpillar said it couldn't be done so they did it." Shows the two sets of twins pushing dirt side by side.
HP
www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&...2_f72ac9WK9UlinPdUsg

Fantastic video looks like there was at least two AC Siamese built

lucky person to have that video and thanks for sharing it with the rest of the world

Paul

Hi, Folks.
There is a mention in Eric Orlemann's Caterpillar Chronicle of Buster Peterson building a set of siamesed AC tractors before he built the siamesed D8s. I have never been able to discover whether either of the Garrison Dam sets was that set. All sorts of 'stuff' seems to come out into the daylight here. Does anybody know anything about this?

A kew-ree-yuss mind would like to know.

Always wondered if all the work to do this was really worth the effort and expense. Thought it was really neat when I first heard of it but seems to me all that was saved was one guys wages per day. A couple of good "skinners" should have been able to run two dozers side by side all day long and gotten as much done or maybe more. Was it more of an advertising public relation thing or just something they wanted to do to prove it could be done. Also when you got done you had one big chunk of iron to figure out how to move. I'm sure the undercarriage took a beating, but of course they had another set left over to use. Also if it broke down you had the same as two tractors down but about the same chance of a break down as two tractors and no way to pull in another tractor and keep going. Anybody got an idea?

Hey HeaderPuncher,

At the time, there was need and a quest for More Power... From the Cat side... The D8 at one time was the biggest one could get, so Buster Peterson used Two Together. Then shortly there after that, the Mighty D9 came about. So the quest for More Power again came about and caused Buster Peterson to put Two D9's in a set of DD9g's together... Then shortly after that the D10 came about... So, customers wanted more. Some machines were made so huge and time consuming putting them together, that I myself wondered the advantage, but they did make and use some rather big and unique rigs... Three 657's with one operator... Impressive!!!

Hi, Headerpuncher.
For what it's worth. The first set went to the Hungry Horse dam in Montana, initially for clearing, fitted with, I think, a 21foot rake for raking the fallen timber into windrows for burning. The second set went to a coal-fired power station in Lawrenceburg, Ohio, for coal stockpile work. Both of these machines would have had the advantage of spillage around only two corners of one blade instead of around four corners of two blades. Also, both would have had an advantage in traction with the total weight of each side minus the missing inside track concentrated on the remaining outer track - outweighed to some extent by having less total track on the ground.

Another big advantage would have been less wasted time in manoevering two separate machines into position for the next push. This was also a huge plus with Buster Peterson's DD9s and SxS D9s - both machines were where they needed to be at the same time.

The Ohio coal stockpile would also have had an advantage over two separate machines by having a higher ground pressure PSI than two separate tractors would have produced, This is fairly important with coal 'cos the tighter it is packed, the less likely it is to catch fire, simply 'cos their is less air contained in voids within the coal to feed a fire.

The third set was a whole different machine, built high clearance and about 2 feet wider than the earlier versions to carry a funnel dozer in front and a cable-controlled root plow behind for one-pass clearing in heavy mesquite thickets on the King Ranch in Taxes - - - er, ooops, sorry, Texas. The idea was that the funnel dozer would knock the mesquite down and funnel it into a windrow that passed under the machine - the reason for the higher clearance - and the root plow would cut off the roots behind the tractor while allowing the windrowed mesquite to pass under the ripper beam.

It must have worked 'cos they apparently replaced this machine with a D9G, also converted to high clearance and fitted with a funnel dozer and root plow.

There are some photos of all three versions in post #13 on page 2 of this thread. www.acmoc.org/bb/showthread.php?22043-Siamese-Twin-D8-s/page2

Hope this helps

"7upuller" wrote:

Hey HeaderPuncher,

At the time, there was need and a quest for More Power... From the Cat side... The D8 at one time was the biggest one could get, so Buster Peterson used Two Together. Then shortly there after that, the Mighty D9 came about. So the quest for More Power again came about and caused Buster Peterson to put Two D9's in a set of DD9g's together... Then shortly after that the D10 came about... So, customers wanted more. Some machines were made so huge and time consuming putting them together, that I myself wondered the advantage, but they did make and use some rather big and unique rigs... Three 657's with one operator... Impressive!!!

Probably right but as I set here with my semi engineer mildly analytical mind the only increase in usable power could be the added psi on the track touching the ground. On good footing the added traction would really increase the work you could do. Sure make you stay away from the mud holes though.
Remember a job long ago when the D9's first came out. Every time the skinner drove over a rock we spent half the night replacing rollers. AC did have at the time a new patented design on rollers with Timken bearings and the floating spring loaded steel on steel flat faced seal. In my mind the best roller ever built for crawler tractors. Probably get shot with yellow paint for saying that but I've worn out a bunch of them and the bearings and seals were still fine.

Thanks Deas, I kind of knew that the one guy with the super analitatitical mind would answer my questions. Good answer.
HP

Hey, Headerpuncher!
PLEEEEZZZ?????????????? Ana.......... What???????????????????????

PLeeez, try to keep the words down to one syllable or less. Remember, I'm just a 'pore, dumb (re

---

tired) dozer operator'.

Thanks in advance. (Other than that, yer welkum.)

Just my 0.02.