Still building a DIY tractor / excavator - racing against time, as autumn is rainy here and you cannot weld water. I need it to improve the road to where I live.

It can already maneuver, turn and raise the boom, lower / pull the bucketed arm (stick), but the excavator bucket is incomplete and the bucket tilting mechanism missing.

The remote control system is also missing (relays on a slow boat from China), so currently I have to control it via cables. Limit switches are missing, currently it’s unsafe to use for a careless operator. Later on, it will be remote controlled and limit switches will ensure it cannot break itself.

My own reason to choose remote control is convenience (better ergonomics as I can write pre-programmed movements and stay out of noise). If it works too well, I might send a recipe to a friend in Ukraine, with the suggestion of asking around - maybe someone needs cheaper mine disposal machines.

Hydraulic excavators are neat, but too expensive for me, and require far too much power. Thus mu excavator uses ATV winches (meant to pull a 900 kg machine out of mud) to drive and work. Some of the winches have been disassembled: driving uses sprockets and “08” roller chain, turning the boom also uses sprockets and chain. Some of the winches are intact however: raising the boom uses a winch in factory condition, and pulling in the bucket in also uses a winch.

A big corner has been cut to gain strength asymmetrically and reduce complexity: I assumed I’m never going to do a pushing movement with the bucketed arm. So, where old-fashioned cable excavators used a super complicated winch system to extend the arm, I use a boring simple gas spring. Near-zero pushing-out power to gain the absolute maximum pulling-in power.