Big-wheel truck treats fragile tundra like a golf green

With tires 5 1/2 feet tall, the Tundra-Cat could be considered an Alaska-size toy for big boys. That would be a mistake.

The vehicle designed for use in the oil fields -- looking a lot like a monster truck -- has a tender touch when it comes to the delicate Arctic tundra.

Its huge tires, pressurized at 5 pounds per square inch, do less damage than a golf cart, said Mark Tope, the man who came up with the Tundra-Cat after a brainstorm a couple of years ago while watching a 1 a.m. monster truck show.

Tope said he recalled the moderator saying: “Man, they have a big footprint.”

“Then the light bulb came on. I said ‘Why can’t we do that for Prudhoe Bay? Why can’t I put a crew cab on big wheels?’ ” Tope said.

“Mark dreams big,” said wife Trisha, who said that she thought her husband had lost his mind when he came up with the idea. Now that one Tundra-Cat is built and another is taking shape, she’s not so sure.

“He said, ‘This is my niche,’ ” she said.

“I never gave up on my niche,” he responded.

Tope, 36, was born into a family that hauled heavy equipment to the North Slope oil fields. He had done his share of bumping around Prudhoe Bay in Rollagons and Tucker Snocats -- large all-terrain vehicles used to transport equipment and crews.

He thought it was time the oil field workers had a more tricked-out ride. But he knew if his idea were to have commercial success, the 15,000-pound Tundra-Cat -- priced between $240,000 and $270,000 -- would have to be gentle as a pussycat on the tundra.

State regulations are strict when it comes to tundra damage. The Department of Natural Resources has 20 stations on the North Slope where frost and snow depths are measured to determine what types of vehicles are allowed on the tundra, and when.

Most tundra traffic shuts down in mid-May. Operators then have 72 hours to get off the tundra; it’s later opened to a short list of vehicles approved for summer use only.

The tundra is what keeps the permafrost frozen, said Leon Lynch, a natural-resources specialist with the resources department in Fairbanks. Permafrost is ground that remains frozen year-round.

“Once you disturb the vegetative mat, the frost gets exposed and melts, so you basically melt the permafrost,” Lynch said. That also leaves the tundra even more susceptible to scarring.

A warming Arctic also means that oil companies now must wait about three weeks longer for the ground to sufficiently freeze to begin the winter work season, the busiest time of the year, when repairs and exploration work get done. Next summer, the resources department will test the Tundra-Cat for inclusion on the list of summer vehicles.

This year, the department approved the Tundra-Cat for prepacking snow. Prepacking is used by oil companies to build ice roads that allow crews to get out on the tundra to drill pads and get rigging in place weeks before areas are officially reopened to vehicle traffic. The snow is tamped down and then water is sprayed on it, creating an ice road.

“We’ve been encouraging them to use the Tuckers, the Rollagons, the Tundra-Cats. We want them out there to drive the frost level down faster and capture the snow [before it blows away],” Lynch said.

The Tundra-Cat’s tires are 66 inches tall and 44 inches wide -- agricultural tires used mostly by sod growers. Tope has equipped them with metal studs for a better grip on ice and snow.

The Tundra-Cat comes with four-wheel drive and two-axle steering, allowing the two front wheels to point in one direction and the back wheels in another. The advantage is that the Tundra-Cat is gentle, moving like a snake slithering across the tundra. “You can crab it,” Tope said -- in other words, move it sideways when necessary.

With the front steering one way and the back steering the other, the Tundra-Cat can cover an impressive 14 feet of ground in one pass when prepacking snow.

Tope turned to Mike Dropik -- who for three years built and raced monster trucks as a member of the Indiana-based Bearfoot Team -- to build the Tundra-Cat. It took Dropik, 39, three months to build the Tundra-Cat.

Not only is it light on the tundra, it is designed to leave nothing behind -- not even human footprints. It comes with extensions for a 3-foot-wide, metal catwalk for walking around the truck.

The Tundra-Cat also has an undercarriage drip tray to catch any leaked fluids. It has triple-sealed axles to keep gear oil in. And the belt-driven transfer case is dry -- no lubricants that could ooze out.