Well if i ever have any money to piss down the drain i'd like to try the hyratrek...Originally Posted by MaxRules
Well if i ever have any money to piss down the drain i'd like to try the hyratrek...
We explored the dually idea with the tracks, but was advised i would need a set up that could deal with the extra weight at the wheels..so in the end this is the best i could do..it works (for now), so I'll keep milking it until the Ox dies (hopefully a pleasant death)..
Forget the hydrotrek look into a Marsh Master made in LA. Not cheap but all the utility companies use them down south and I can tell you they use'm hard on water/land and muck. My .02.........
Kmac
For the price that you payed for your two Mud Ox machines ,and the money that you've now sink into each one of them , a Marsh Master would have suited you much better I think.
Ahh yes hindsight... at least i now know about the MMs. But i doubt i would ever be able to purchase one. I will not have that kind of cash to outlay on amphibious ATVs. My doesn't work like that. We will only ever have enough cash at anyone time to purchase something the price bracket of an Ox. We got very lucky, and received additional cash after the first one was purchased Also the two Oxs were purchased for two different projects so they are to be used differently (one for exploration and the other for heavy work). Additionally where we work, i would never go for one ATV, we must have two just in case. Our hides were saved a few times at the start because we had a second ox that was used to pull the other ATV so i value that, and I am sure we will benefit from having two again in the future.
Some of you guys had asked for an update, so i was just providing one. But we have not exceeded the weight capacity on land despite all the doodahs. If it weren't for those persistent niggles we would be laughing....not saying i'm completely happy, but if i managed to fit a square peg in a round hole, that's not bad...I'm one outboard away from being satisfied....and it is only when it is replaced I will come close to spending what it would cost (2 atvs, all the accessories, modifications and repairs, 3 outboards, a 7 x 20 enclosed cargo trailer (which cost the same to ship as the purchasing price) for one hydratrek (6 x 6) with tracks, a cab and a trailer (and this does not include shipping costs)...and i don't know what would have gone wrong with the other machines and if they would be easy to repair. So despite the headaches, the OX is still the best value for money...
Kmac
I can understand why buying the two Mud Ox 8x8's worked out better for you, but, if the price of these two machines were the same, could you have used an amphibious machine like the Marsh Master in the places that you need to go?
I really don't know. I would still have to solve an important problem..the 1 mph on water would not be enough. I have to travel up the river. That is why the only machine i would have considered outside the Ox if i had the cash was the hydra trek, because it was self propelled on water. I pitched an idea to Matt and he said he could set it up, i.e. putting on an outboard that can be steered from the front of the ATV. He was the only one willing to set it up and test it, that's why i eventually decided to go with the Ox.
Also the weight is an issue. The 3800 pounds for the smallest MM seems a tad bit too heavy. The terrain is very very soft in some places, unusually soft. Some sites have a thin layer of water with nothing but soft mud/peat below it. That is the stuff that sucks in the ox, and the stuff i have to avoid. If i hit a patch by accident, the only thing i can do is to come out and try to winch it out. The more the tracks are used, they act like excavators, digging the ox in deeper. Also, some of these holes are mud filled bottomless holes and the pontoon thing i set up has actually saved the ox from turning over or sinking too deep into these holes. Knowing what i know now, it would take an exceptional machine to drive through some places. We made up a way to describe some parts of the marsh land.. the treaterosity factor. If the factor is high, nothing much can go through if any thing at all. Also the banks are very steep in most places, so nothing with tracks below water line can climb on land; we'll have to use a winch. In most cases we just have a small tree to attach the winch to. So again weight is important. The pullpal would also fail, if the machine is too heavy, because in most cases there is nothing to anchor it to.
Also footprint. The Mash master leaves a mess behind it, in some of the softer stuff, the Ox doesn't. This is important because we don't want to mess up the environment too much.
And ease of repair. The Ox (outside of the hydrostatic system which i do not know if we will be able to repair) is a very, very simple machine, and outside of the electrical problems, i can fix every mechanical issue myself, and i'm not mechanic or car nut. Plus we have an automotive electrician who can fix any electrical gremlin on the Ox.
That is why our funders would not provide the cash needed to pay for a MM or Hyratrek. They are not sure if they can perform that much better to justify the price. They would rather pay the price for an ox, so if it doesn't work, that is an acceptable risk. If both cost the same as the price of an ox, i'd have to go see both in action, and dig through it's mechanical parts. More than likely I'd have to add an outboard to the MM...so the ox still seems reasonable (considering everything i said before about weight etc). But to be honest as i said before the hyratrek is the only machine with all that i'd need (except the weight). It is the only machine i would consider if the price was right...
Kmac
I talked to the Mud Ox dealer in Canada when I had a Mudd-Ox ,and this dealer has leased out lots of Mudd-Ox machines and about 6 Hydratrek machines. I asked him which machine has proven to be move reliable ,and he told me he preferred the Mudd-Ox because it has proven to be less costly to maintain when compared the Hydratrek's. He has had Hdratrek's sent back to have wheel motors that replaced that failed. He has had to repair punctured aluminum tubs on the Hydratreks.
Wow, ok...well that confirms what I said. Even if a machine is more capable, the OX is very, very, easy to repair and modify. So the ox does have an edge..I can image if something went wrong with the tracks of the MM, how easy will that be to repair out in the middle of nowhere? The tracks of the ox came off and we were still able to drive it through soft mud with the tires. We were able to drive the ox all the way back to a point where we could off load our stuff. The tires eventually became stuck so the next day, we just threw two pieces of ply boards in front of it, and kept rotating the ply boards in front of the ox, until we were on firm ground and able to throw the tracks back on. Can the MM drive without the tracks in the mud? I can't image what would happen if those large trackless things got wedged in the mud, similar to what happened with the tires. We just dug in front of the tires and wedged the piece of board under the tires, and presto.. And will the MM be too heavy for pieces of ply board that can be carried by someone to the point where the tracks failed? Can it grip the ply boards and move with the boards under it without the tracks? That's why i said it's a tough question to answer. What i know now is that capability is only part of the equation, maintenance and ease of repair out in the middle of no where is possibly more important. I don't have a field crew, it's just two of us, or sometimes one person. So if anything goes wrong i have to sort it out and if i can fix most things on the ox by myself or isolate problems, anyone can. So in terms of capability, all we do is scout for ideal places to drive, if we run into the soft mud we just try to find another way around it...We realise that with careful planning and manoeuvring, we can get to most places, we don't need to drive through the rough stuff.
Sorry mudbug, you got me started on this..final points..we can't send anything back to be repaired because we are not in the US, so it has be repaired locally. I was afraid of the hyratrek, because the props were linked to the hydrostatic system. I use to wonder if something goes wrong with the system, both the wheels and the props won't work. With the outboard on the ox, if the hydrostatic system goes, at least i can tow it using the second ox to the river and power down the river to point where i can recover the thing. And if the outboard goes, i can just tread down river, very slowly. So the two means of propulsion are separate, and i can use either as a backup, plus i got extra money to buy a back up atv (i had a nightmare about having to abandon an atv in the middle of no where because it broke down, that is why i tried to get money for two units). But believe me when i tell you i am very thorough. It took a year of research and hours watching videos online to come to a decision. If i had gotten the wider tub that i had asked for, this post might not have been necessary, because i realized that the ox would need to float better before i bought it...
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