New guys keep setting up on the outrigger pads like it's level ground

I was on a job in Bakersfield last month and watched a kid set his pads on soft dirt without cribbing, just sent it. Twenty-five years ago I did the same thing on my second week and the pad sank a good 4 inches when I swung the boom, scared me half to death. That's the thing nobody talks about in the books: the ground tells you what it wants before the load does. You check the soil, you use mats, and you don't trust a spot just because the last guy parked there. Any of you got a story about a pad that looked fine until it wasn't?

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john_fisher1mo ago

I have noticed this same thing in a lot of places, not just cranes. People trust a spot because somebody else used it once and it worked out, and they never stop to ask what was different that day. Soil, weather, how long the last guy sat there, all of it changes the answer. On a pad, that could be four inches of sink and a load swinging where you don't want it. In life it's usually just money or time, but the idea is the same. The ground, or whatever you're standing on, will tell you the truth if you actually look at it instead of assuming. My old foreman used to say the job doesn't care what you did last week, and he was right about that.

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