Fond Memories of an old Cat

Digger Man Blog Facebook Group member and contributor Kenneth Hatcher has recently been up to visit one of his ex-boss’s old machines which has been parked up for a number of years and he has kindly shared some of his mobile phone photos with us.

Kenneth was a long serving employee of Harkins Plant Hire. The business was originally founded by Len Harkin, and carried on by sons Mike and Paul. In 2015 Mike’s health was suffering so he decided to sell up in 2015, while his brother went off and did his own thing, he is still running a few machines to this day. Mike sadly passed away in 2018. Kenneth has remained a good friend of the family to this day and often helps out with things.

He recently popped over to see an old Cat 312C which was on the Harkin’s fleet back in the day, Kenneth said the machine was driven by a fella called Allan, for around 7 years. It is now lying at the family farm in South Wales.

The machine has been parked up now for around 6 years, during which time its only put around 120 hours on the meter bringing her total lifetime working hours to 12,163hrs. Despite its green moss appearance, it is still in excellent condition for its age, starts first time and is still sporting its original set of tracks.

Kenneth said, “It’s an incredible machine really, it still has the original batteries on it, they were obviously flat as a pancake though, so a few weeks back I took them home and gave them a good charge up. There is not a single leak anywhere on the machine, she’s dry as a bone, a real testament to the quality of Cat equipment back in those days, it’s a real shame she’s gone all green, it would be nice to give her a good wash off and get her stored somewhere undercover, maybe another job for me one of these weekends!”.

A Caterpillar 312C brochure cover from the C Series era. 

The Digger Man Blog thanks Kenneth for sharing his photos with us here.