The truck crane would not be my tool of choice, but you make do with what you have. Just as boxing is largely all about foot work, running a dragline with best results is all about positioning the machine correctly. You can get around this with the assistance of a small dozer if the pond bottom WILL SUPPORT IT AND AFFORD TRACTION, but does not sound like it… Dozers do not push material up hill very efficiently any way, so the dragline, tuck mounted or otherwise is a big plus to that end. The idea here is that the dozer can feed material within range of your truck-bound digger. If you can not run a dozer in the pond bottom, you will still find it useful for leveling work pads for the crane. Pushing away wet material will help keep work areas orderly. Drying is helped greatly by spreading the material out to increase surface area that is exposed to the wind and sun. Allow wet piles or "mud pies" to sit tall for at least a day to allow gravimetric water to run out of them before spreading or loading. If you can pump the water out, DO IT even if you can not get a tractor in there! Working blind is tedious, working the material around in the water makes it increasingly sloppy and hard to retain in the bucket, and wastes fuel by moving around a bunch of water instead of dirt. Running your drag cable in the slop is not good as your machine will get filled with it. You will see! In a small machine like yours the bucket is likely to stall in heavy clay. DO control depth with your hoist and make even slices. Lowering the position of the drag chains on your bucket if posible can help control “bighting in”. On a mechanical control machine, read the manual on how to increase tension on the compensation springs to increase line pull on the drag and hoist clutches if they are weak. Be careful working on mats! They can become slick and you can pull yourself into the drink. Swing easy so as not to slip off the mats if you are using them and so as not to fold that boom which is likely 900 years old. Be safe, take your time, have fun, and don't get killed as draglines really dangerous! Also, try to keep your material and equipment FAR away from any trees you might have or you will end up in the dead tree removal business. Go to HCEA.NET for questions about your old digger. You might get a few good answers along with a pile of know-it all responses like mine. LOL...
