Page 388 - Peterson 85 Years and Going Strong

overall. When Duane said he wanted them redone, my first thought was, You’re kidding! Boy, is this go- ing to be a challenge.”
At the time in 2014, Peterson’s San Leandro shop was full. “Duane said he wasn’t in a hurry, but then he threw out the date of Peterson’s anniversary, which wasn’t that far off.” Spencer and a shop me- chanic went out back to jumpstart the pair and as- sess the damage. “You could tell right off that one of the turbochargers was seized up because of the excessive amount of black smoke when we tried to rev up the engine above idle. The throttle pedal air valve was stuck from sitting for so long. And the front machine’s brake control actuators were completely destroyed.The machines were operable, partially, but we had to jumpstart them every time we wanted to move them. They needed so much work that we didn’t even try hooking them togeth- er for a while.”
Granite’s Quad No. 79 became Peterson’s renovation project in 2012
From there, Spencer put field tech Mike Harreld to work on them when he wasn’t busy. But as the date drew closer, the need became more pressing. As foreman—with a budget to watch and custom- ers to keep happy—it was a tricky balancing act. “It was really hard pulling guys off machines that were generating revenue and putting them to work on the Quads,” recalls Spencer. “But we had to start focusing on it to meet the deadline.”
PROOF POSITIVE
Fast-forward to October 1, 2016, and a beautiful day for a company picnic. Peterson’s 80th celebra- tion in San Leandro was in full swing.1 The main parking lot buzzed with people. Kids and balloons were everywhere. The smell of meat roasting on the big tractor-shaped barbeque hovered over the party like a large beckoning finger. In the center of it all sat the two featured giants being selfied, crawled on, and proudly examined. Randy Krieg, one of the Quad’s former operators, was there tak- ing it all in. “I knew that thing was an original Cat set because it had the right serial number plates,” says Krieg, now a test operator at Caterpillar’s Tucson Proving Ground. “You could tell they were
1 The Quad D9 and Twin D8 debuted at Peterson’s 80th Celebration in Eugene ( July 2016) followed by a celebration event at the Hillsboro property (August 2016) prior to its ground-breaking.
386 | PETERSON: 85 YEARS AND GOING STRONG
Art for t-shirts given away at Peterson’s 80th celebreation