broken rubber track

[big bear]

I heard today that a hydro line service crew was using an Argo on tracks during the course of their work. Muskeg swamp packed up inside the track making it tighter and tighter finally causing it to break. This would be the stock rubber track. Don't know when exactly but probably about within the last 5 years.
Has anyone else had this happen or know about it ?
Maybe it was only one big chunk that did it. I can't see how anything would build up.

[Buzz]

maybe...sounds possible. Especially since it's a solid belt. Tire guides that stick above the belting might catch and possibly hold material that fell in from either side. And nothing could fall through/squish through when going under/around the rear tire.... I guess all tire guides could probably suffer that problem a little though, but its probably rare.

[ARGOJIM]

Wondering the specifics of the damage, did the rubber track belting break or did the hinge kit fail?
I would think the tire would fail before the belting unless it either pulled the bolts from the hinge kit or the hinge extension welds failed.

[Noel Woods]

It sounds like this track will be prime for some back woods engineering.

[monoped]

Tires inflation should give first if enough debris somehow could torque against them?, interesting. On my solid max tracks if a failure occurred it would be suspected at lacings area. In the industry I worked with great widths of belts in comparison ,out side of an edge rubbing against some thing, centers could wear when heavy hot iron pounded on them a long time, but when a failure was near it was mostly at lacings due either to direct wear of metal of lacing or to stress and heat stretching belt holes. Slush freezing to ice,or a increased accumulation of debris would seem to create a wheel chock effect from inside binding unit before tearing material at splice but that would depend on integrity of splice..Then also, should there be a more controlled "weak spot" to fail other than at splice? Hmmm, would be a track to look over to see where it failed and its condition,wear, or weather checking. Even a self built from sled tracks should take some pretty good abuse if track is still healthy and tied together properly at splice and guides are correct.

[big bear]

You are right about the soft tire pressure being forgiving. You would think that a solid "chunk" would kind of sink into the tire as it went around and then likely fall out.
I don't know the nature of the fail. It has me kind of bugged so I am going to try to track down the individual that knows about this and get more details. It was probably a freak thing or maybe a track flaw,
never to happen again.

[philipatmaxfour]

I heard today.....

I heard today that a hydro line service crew was using an Argo on tracks during the course of their work. Muskeg swamp packed up inside the track making it tighter and tighter finally causing it to break. This would be the stock rubber track. Don't know when exactly but probably about within the last 5 years.
Has anyone else had this happen or know about it ?
Maybe it was only one big chunk that did it. I can't see how anything would build up.

Is the source of this story a particularly heavy drinker? we know of axles being run so tightly that an axle broke but a rubber belt??

[big bear]

Well, "egg on my face". I tracked down the origin of this story and apparently it threw a track not blew a track. Quite a difference don't you think. Twas a young crew member driving and showing off in the skeg.
I guess doing donuts fully loaded in the muskeg is not a good idea. My faith in Argo is restored. Sorry bout the mis-information but it made us all think.

[ARGOJIM]

I can see that happening.