Small crawler dozers (300 horsepower and under) seem to be doing just fine surviving the onset of heavier CTLs equipped with larger blades dedicated to production and grade-control systems dedicated to precision.
One of the first shots across the bow of small dozers was Case Construction Equipment's Minotaur, the DL550 dozer loader, which looks like a CTL with an integrated blade and a ripper on the back. Billed as a "new machine form" and category, it features a chassis-integrated C-frame with six-way dozer blade. The C-frame hydraulically couples into both the chassis of the machine as well as the attachment coupler.
It's a design meant to provide the stability and smooth operating plane of a small dozer while ensuring that all operating power is channeled through the whole body of the machine and not into the loader arms.
Case says this results in greater performance and long-term reliability than the simple combination of a dozer blade attachment to a traditional CTL.
Read also: Sound strategies for compact track loader cost control
The industry has seen a number of so-called new machine forms with mixed results. John Deere's 764 High-Speed dozer (combining a crawler dozer with grader-like speed helped by quad tracks) started out promisingly in niches but was killed by the Great Recession. JCB's Teleskid took advantage of the company's one-armed skid steers and CTLs by adding the range and lift of a telehandler. Though JCB dealers heap on the praise, job site sightings have been scarce.
The verdict is still out on the Minotaur, but small dozer manufacturers, whether they are also in the CTL market or not, are standing their ground.
“When comparing compact track loaders and crawler dozers that have similar horsepower and weight specifications, the crawler dozer has advantages over a CTL,” says Casey Zbinden, product marketing manager for Komatsu. “The blade of the crawler dozer is wider, which means a larger blade capacity. The crawler dozer has a lower ground pressure compared to a CTL. It’s important to note that a CTL is often equipped with rubber tracks or triple-bar steel tracks, which will further reduce the dozing performance compared to a single bar steel track that is most common on crawler dozer models.”
Jake Sherman, product and dealer marketing manager for Develon, a relative newcomer to the North American market with two crawler dozers under 300 horsepower (as well an upcoming CTL launch), sees both sides of the coin.
“When you start to look at the capabilities of a of a true dozer and what I'd almost refer to as some of these hybrid type of technologies almost between a CTL and a small dozer, you still can't match the capability of a true small dozer,” Sherman says.
“Of course, there are some limitations when it comes to job site size and these types of things, so I think it's very application dependent,” Sherman says. “But when it comes to getting work done, we still see a very good position for the true dozer. “Referencing back to the CTL that we're developing, obviously there's an opportunity there in the marketplace for smaller of those restricted type of job sites and whatnot where the real estate just isn't available for a true dozer.”
Like Case, John Deere is another manufacturer that has taken a run at the beefed-up CTL market with a heavy blade attachment and its SmartGrade integrated grade control system. According to the company, putting SmartGrade in the 333G CTL marks the first time a fully integrated grade-control system has been available on compact equipment.
The SmartGrade 333G is designed, says Deere, to expand the capabilities of CTL users working in site development, roadbuilding, landscaping, and residential/commercial building operations by enabling them to take on new tasks and larger jobs that require highly accurate grades. The application list sounds like that of a small crawler dozer.
“We look at the CTL and look at what it was designed for—versatility--and see that CTLs are used for a lot of different things on the job site," says Matt Goedert, Deere's solutions marketing manager for roadbuilding products. "Obviously, you can put a lot of different attachments on CTLs and we added a blade attachment on our largest CTL, the 333, just to increase that versatility. Our 333 is just over 12,000 pounds and when you look at our smallest dozer, our 450, we're up to just over 18,000 pounds, so there is a still significant difference in weight that affects the stability of the machine.
"It also affects the balance of the machine," Goedert says. "Thinking of the CTL, it has to do a lot of different things. So, whether we're putting a snowblower attachment on and we're piling snow, and then in the summer months using a bucket on it and loading trucks, the CTL is really designed for that versatility. But not only that, it is also designed for lifting and fitting into tight tight areas versus a dozer with steel tracks.
Goedert says the center of gravity of the dozer is low and considered from front to back. As a result, it's centrally located.
"Right down by operators foot is where we like to keep the center of gravity, and that's for the balance and stability on slopes to transfer that weight to the tracks for more traction," Goedert says. "Dozers are really designed for large scale, heavy dozing and grading work. And that's a contrast to the CTL. We're trying to do a lot of different things well. It's not purpose built, I would say, for a dozing application. However, if you have a customer that let's say they're working in confined areas, inside buildings, tight areas, and they're having to switch between attachments and do a lot of different things with one machine, the CTL will work extremely well for those customers."
