Most reliable machines from 20-30 years ago.

I had a membership here and somehow forgot my password then locked myself out. So this is a new account. I'm buying land for a new shop and eventually a new house and we have lots of skidsteers and material handling equipment, but don't do much on the excavation side. I'm going to need to get an excavator to park on there for use on whatever projects pop up, the first one being clearing several acres of young trees. Originally my plan was get just get the biggest old iron I could find, but then decided that was likely going to just end up costing me more money in the long run. So I've been looking at 12-15 ton machines that should be able to kind of do everything for me, and I can just rent a big one if needed or hire it out. I'm looking more for long term reliability and ease of repairs over production speed. Nearby I've found a Samsung SE130, Case 688 and Hitachi EX100-3. I'm going to keep looking for awhile, to make sure I get the right choice, but wanted some opinions on brands to look for or to avoid. The 688 intrigues me right now, it's at 5000 hours and looks to be decent condition, all the glass is still intact too. Seems like it's a fairly simple machine to work on. The Samsung is the best fit as it has a hydraulic thumb, but the internet searches have me a bit leery of it as far as getting parts goes. There's lots of older Deere, Link Belt and Cat machines with really high hours for cheap, but they are monsters, and I don't want to start the project off with 30 grand in repairs just to get up and running.

The hitachi -5 machines are very reliable and parts still available. I’d stay away from the -2 & -3 machines, they seem to have a lot of electrical problems

Case was a French Proclain design at that time, never saw one around me. Hitachi & Komatsu was one of best of the 90's . Korean machines disappeared like Daewoo & Samsung by the 2000's but Case had Samsung build later machines. Deere is Hitachi with JD engine all ways heard reliability wasn't there on 690 to a 200-

I'm seeing quite a few Komatsu machines, bigger than what I'm looking for, but not a deal breaker really as long as I can fix the thing.

Welcome back to the Forums! Out of the 3 you list I would leans towards the Hitachi and run away from the Samsung. No experience with either just what I've read on HEF. Cat will have the best parts availability FWIW.

Stay away from gray market or EL Cats they rebranded Mitsubishi/ Mitsubishi no parts

I'm gonna throw a curve ball into it I guess. What about a heavy backhoe, like JCB 214? I think I'm going to have a friend cut in the driveway for me when it's time with his big equipment, once I have good access I'll be able to get to most of the property with a wheeled machine. Anything I can't access I could get to with my C345 skidsteer. My plan is to first grub out the small trees on the bottom side, and then pull shale out of the pit that's there to get the roads roughed in. After that I need to clear about 5 acres to start (it was logged already so the trees are pretty young) then dig for the new shop and house as needed. I wanted a big excavator on site for digging shale when needed, but I think it's fairly soft shale, so maybe a backhoe would work to both dig it and move it around a bit.

maineplower said: The hitachi -5 machines are very reliable and parts still available. I’d stay away from the -2 & -3 machines, they seem to have a lot of electrical problems Click to expand... ^^^Yes^^^ Avoid -2, -3. We recently picked up a EX100-1 for this reason. Very simple, solid older machine. But…getting really old; hard to find a good example. We have also owned 2 Hitachi ZX series machines. They were excellent, pre-emissions units (Isuzu power) We also have a 2003 Hyundai 210-7. Cummins 5.9, Kawasaki pumps. This has been a very reliable machine over the past 10 years. Problem is (at least here in BC a lot of the dealers (Woodland) have closed up. Not hard to find most parts through other sources. Have not really needed any parts; other than Heater/ac control ‘box’. Found that on eBay.

If you gotta run junk, you gotta have a lot of it. If you don't have it, it needs to be available from other sources. I'd look on a site such as machinery trader to see how many of any machine you are interested in are available. Quite a few machines are really scarce on the ground. That leaves you in a predicament when you need a part from a salvage machine. I get the whole part about how orphans need love too. But you have work to do, and a busted machine is a double burden, as you have to take time to fix it, and you are busy working on equipment rather than doing the job. Your thought about a TLB is valid. I cleared a lot of trees with a 410 Deere. And the front end loader is quite handy, especially with pallet forks. In the range of smaller hoes you mention, a TLB may be a more universally useful choice.

I wouldn't run from a Samsung, yes they are a level below Hitachi in terms of performance and longevity but you can get just about every part for them at a good price from numerous companies out of Korea. You will need a parts manual however and require basic to reasonable experience working with machinery. If the price is right there's no reason to fear them.

I've been down that road more than once. I dropped a valve in my old Takeuchi a few years ago and couldn't find any parts in the US. Ended up getting a new head and piston from a factory in China off of Alibaba. It took a few weeks, but everything showed up and I was back up and running for like $750 total. The Samsung looks like it checks most of the boxes. It was a single owner machine, pins are tight and cylinders are dry. Less than 4000 hours on it. I still may consider going big. I found a Deere 792 (Hitachi with a Deere engine) that had the undercarriage redone for a really good price, but it's so damn big it would just have to live at the property forever.

terex herder said: If you gotta run junk, you gotta have a lot of it. If you don't have it, it needs to be available from other sources. I'd look on a site such as machinery trader to see how many of any machine you are interested in are available. Quite a few machines are really scarce on the ground. That leaves you in a predicament when you need a part from a salvage machine. I get the whole part about how orphans need love too. But you have work to do, and a busted machine is a double burden, as you have to take time to fix it, and you are busy working on equipment rather than doing the job. Your thought about a TLB is valid. I cleared a lot of trees with a 410 Deere. And the front end loader is quite handy, especially with pallet forks. In the range of smaller hoes you mention, a TLB may be a more universally useful choice. Click to expand... It looks like the Case 688 is a rare bird. The price on it is bargain basement, but if it can't be fixed then it seems like a silly thing to get into. I do like that it's basically all mechanical though.

CBMasonry said: It looks like the Case 688 is a rare bird. The price on it is bargain basement, but if it can't be fixed then it seems like a silly thing to get into. I do like that it's basically all mechanical though. Click to expand... At the current time, I'm not sure you can buy anything for a 688 unless it's for the engine, undercarriage, or hoses. Many a story on here about guys needing hydraulic components for 688, 888, 1088 and ending up at a dead end. They are probably about the worse orphans out there.

Case 688 & JCB past was metric & or British pipe thread mix of fittings. JCB parts use to be hard to find mostly waiting to get'em from the king himself in England

Deere500a said: Case was a French Proclain design at that time, never saw one around me. Hitachi & Komatsu was one of best of the 90's . Korean machines disappeared like Daewoo & Samsung by the 2000's but Case had Samsung build later mchines. Click to expand... Case and Link Belt both had Sumitomo start building machines for them in the early 90s. 90xx Case were great machines.

Ya wrong machine Helicopter cab couldn't think Sumitomo partners in 92. First modern Case 210 saw at dealer was 2000

Link belt is another shared brand to look at all I was around was the big old FMC LB.

I'm gonna go check out the Samsung this week and take a guy who knows more about them than me. For the size of it the hours seem very reasonable. I'm seeing other similar units online for sale pushing 10,000 hours. Looks like it's powered by a 4BT, those things are hard to kill.

CB - What is your budget?

Samsung became Volvo. That doesn't mean that there are any parts for old Samsung machines. Sumitomo and Link-Belt were in bed together in 1979 when I worked for the dealer. Case came into the fold with Sumitomo in the late 80s and early 90s. Parts are the same for period comparable machines. Each dealer will tell you they are not. Poclain and Drott were owned by Tenico Corp. in the eighties. It all ended up as part of Case eventually. Poclain started the change to high pressure high flow hydraulics. Case took the Drott machine and put their name on the brand. Didn't want to do the redesign so had Poclain do it. Parts were always a problem even when they made them. the "88" orphans don't deserve any love from anyone. I haven't had anything to do with Hitachi machines in awhile. I do know that 20 year old Komatsu parts are very expensive and not guaranteed to be available for any of the line. Right now the auction market machines are likely going to be much older than we have seen in the past with a lot more hours on the clocks. New machine prices are still going up but sales at this time are pretty poor. Old machines make lousy trades so those end up in the auctions. If you are looking for used, you might just wait a couple of months as the markets are showing signs of strain. Get to know someone with a background in repairing these units.