If he is making 30-40K a month he wouldn't be working on junk equipment! He would have all new. But the way he jerked the #$% out of trying to get that pin out and busting the counter weight on the 977 shows you what he really is!

Not that its any of our business, but this breakdown is actually a bit on the conservative side of the money generating potential of YouTube -


Content creators generate revenue at an even higher rate than the $4 per 1K views listed above if ads are clicked on and time is spent browsing a 3rd party site, and even more still if actual online business transactions take place.  Granted the majority of viewers just skip or sit through the ads but there are always a few that will click and that's why advertisers buy lots of ad time on YT, because it works. You can apply these general figures to anybody's channel analytics and get a ballpark idea of what they make.

He likely messes with the old equipment because it's either just what he likes to do, or for the fact that he's got a good thing going and that's what provides him with the content he needs to ensure his channel's success - or maybe both.  Would his fan base still be as interested if he only operated shiny new machines and never engaged in the outrageous 'adventures' that he does?  Maybe, or maybe not but I suspect he's smart enough to have that on his radar.   Either way, it's not really my business.  Speaking from experience though, I have viewers tell me to just hire in the truckloads of fill I need to finish my machine shed building spot because it wouldn't cost that much money and would be easier and quicker than removing brush, trees, and rocks to get down to the sand I already have on site.  That is true, but throw in the YouTube dynamic and it turns everything on its head - people want to watch me operate my old machines and do my own thing, even if it's not the quickest or easiest way.  So by doing all of that work myself I'll create a decent amount of new content, get the clicks and watch minutes, generate the revenue, and actually pocket a tidy profit after deducting operating costs and even repairs that may be necessary (and repairs create content too!).  Plus gain new subscribers that will watch other videos I've already made and profit some more to boot.  Track the business expenses to write off at the end of the year and keep reinvesting in the channel - try to keep growing.  Or I could just buy a few truckloads of fill and although it would be quick and easy, I'd only have a bill to pay.  See how this works?  When people just want to watch me do things it actually pays more than the work that I'm doing ever could.

Toby, thanks for that information and insight about youtube. I continue to be amazed of all the helpful videos on there and of course thanks for sharing all your knowledge and expertise.

I've often thought about turning my projects into YT videos, but I don't want to get into the rat race of having to routinely supply content on a prescribed schedule. Nor do I want to be on camera really. Nor do I want to spend the time editing video, been there done that, kind of hate the process.

So yes, guys like Andrew are to be respected for the channels they run, but his actual content, what he does to machines, drives me a bit crazy. Especially how he "fixed" the lift cylinder rod eye bearing on his telehandler. He made the machine very un-safe, that's bad juju IMO.

I have watched his channel for a while. I can admire his work ethic, the video about him building a overhead hoist bothered me. Not the design but the poor welding skills on display. The unit is supposedly cleared by an engineer.