I had one too, but the wheels fell off...

[admin]

An old saying my grandmother uses when she has no idea what you just said. But it actually happened to me today! Not really looking for help, just sharing an interesting tale of rough early packing.

I was doing some pre-season packing today in the '99 BR275. Sometime in my first pass up to the top after lunch, I lost my front driver's side tandem (spline broke, tandem and tires gone...). It's so rough out there right now (10-16" of snow on top of rocks, trees, stumps, etc.) that I didn't really notice anything out of the "ordinary." I was also distracted by dropping oil pressure (most likely just the sender, but not something to mess with). I stopped at the top, and couldn't get ahold of the mechanic, but VP Mt. Ops showed up to help troubleshoot the lack of oil pressure. Standing on the track, it seemed awfully loose, but we were running a little loose anyway, and our focus was on the oil pressure. So he decided to send me back down to the shop, since it was reading some pressure (at high enough RPMs). As I drove off, he called on the radio and said "keep going, but make sure you check your driver's side tires when you get to the shop." I thanked him, assuming it was a simple delam or something. He said, "As in... where were you last? I need to go look for them!" I made it back to the shop without a buzzer (until I ramped down to about 1100 RPMs), and then jumped on a sled with him and the lift maintenance manager. We scoured the path I took, and could not find any signs of tires. Nothing coming up out of the snow, no tracks into the woods or down another trail, no funny marks in the pattern. Just gone! Can't figure it out! Maybe it will turn up over the next week if the sun shines enough. If it went to the inside, between the tracks, there's a chance it just got "finished" into a deep spot by the c-bar. Seems hard to lose something that big, though.

[admin]

Found them! Turns out I lost them before lunch doing a big dozing project to fill in a very deep waterbar. The tandem was buried in the waterbar. We had ridden right over it several times with a snowmobile, but didn't notice it until we started probing down into the waterbar.

But shame on us (2 groomers and a mechanic) who were out at lunch standing on that track to check the oil (there were already signs of oil pressure issues), and then standing beside the machine without noticing the missing tandem. I brought a twelve pack to the shop...

[mjolnir64]

Patrick, that's hilarious! I had a similar experience grooming mid season. I was climbing one run and dropping one next to it in a loop. I was at bottom (cat-track) heading up when I noticed a couple of sheaves laying in the snow on the edge of my corduroy. "Strange" I thought " the lift line is a good 50+ yards from here! How did those end up here?" I'm of Norwegian descent so you'll understand the 5 second delay before the"Oh sh** " kicked in! Managed to tip-toe back to the shop without de-tracking thankfully. I still laugh at myself about that!!
FYI this was also a br 275 of that vintage 98-99 I think. We had a second identical failure on different cat while I was in park, fortunately I had a good relationship with our cat mechanic he accepted that I wasn't abusing equipment and called Bombi. We had leased 3 new 275's from them I don't think they had a 1000 hours on them yet. Turns out they warrantied the items, apparently they had a batch from their supplier with incorrect heat- treatment and were having them fail regularly.
I am assuming it was the shaft the two tires and connecting arm rotate on? If IRC they call it a flexitor or flexitor shaft. Not that Prinoth/Camoplast/Bombardier would warranty it after this long. Guess it wouldn't hurt to try!

[admin]

Good times! Glad I'm not the only one........

[ward-o]

Awsome story ,
I actually had a simular experience, except the tandem and 2 tires passed me coming downhill doing about 15 mph and rolled off into the woods after traveling about 400 yrds balanced upright. I stopped, got out and dug them out of a hole and managed to balance them on the back of my tiller to take to the base area. Afterwards i asked the rest of our crew behind me "hey, who lost a whole set of tires? they just about rolled right into me?" after each person got out to check their cats and no one seemed to have any missing parts, i finally stopped again to check my own cat (about a mile later) You guessed it ,they were mine. I Never even noticed anything out of the ordinary, the crew had a good time reminding me to check my tires, all season.