Plowing snow with Hanna, my '68 Cat 12F grader. A few weeks ago--only this past week that our snow has begun to melt. (In case it is not clear, the 'plowing snow' is linked to a short video from inside the cab.)

Hey OnFoot...
We lost a foot of snow pack just today... OMG it is wet... water water water. ... the driveway is peeking through and the little river is up.... WoooHooo Boy
Hanna, ye ol' 68 "12F" ott to be a blast ... at first LOL but they are real workhorses .... I love to work on these old things but I really love to operate them.... unfortunately it's like my ol' Harley the riding time gets less and less and the wrenching time gets longer and longer and in both cases the wallet is dying of starvation.
I worked for an Ol' Boy that took a 12E and welded a hook to the frame and cabled it to a D8. The D8 run along the top of the ridge and the 12F dangling from the cable while grading a 400' high back slop on the side of a mountain.
Can't wait to get mine out the snowbanks and to the house n start working on the ol' beasts.. I have a lot of work around the property. Will be needing a front plow for snow soon.
Glad you got yours going.....
Later Fat Dan

Hey Fat Dan!

Thanks for the story about the D8 and the 12E grader. Sounds like folks who figured out how to get s**t done! Hope your patch dries up soon. Our snow is disappearing fast. And water levels are very high.

Once the ground is dry under Hanna, I have a bunch of maintenance chores to do--filters, lube, etc. And I need to figure out what is going on with the circle. I think there are supposed to be plastic shims. But I have a parts book coming for the old girl. I also hope to replace at least some of the cracked glass.

And once the driveway is dry enough, I will need a few loads of gravel to touch things up. I want to widen a narrow bit as well. (What I call the driveway is 1.5 mile access road to our property, which I maintain.) So no lack of grader practice... (Did I mention that I know diddly-squat about heavy equipment? But it is nothing but fun to figure things out.)

I have a PhD in diddly-squat. Ha ha
I watch a guy, Jeff, on YouTube JPayDirt and a bunch of others but Jeff in ten minutes showed me loads about running a motor grader. Something like get in; start up ... a cussing and take you jacket off and then start the machine and worm up ALL the cuss words you know. LOL but he is right it takes a lot of mussel memory ... your hand knows what to do before your brain.
see ya around OnFoot
Fat Dan