Know anything about them? I'm toying with the idea of buying one.

What do you cal "smaller"

What are you going to do with it?

Do you want, or do you need one?

Cheaper to hire bulldozer and "OPERATOR" when you need one?

I can't justify one. I contract out 4-5 times a year for a day's services. The maint and upkeep is horrendous.

My neighbor had one that was about as small as they come. I believe I could have done as much with a 100hp 4wd tractor with a heavy built loader.............and it would have been cheaper too.

You folks might be right, just use Jake's loader.

Been heavy equipment operator/ for 30+ years .. specific question ?

I'd like to reshape some waterways.

D5-6 size 6 way blade ... Personally I'd stick with cat or komatsu depending on your dealer situation in that area. Cheaper dozer and cheaper parts is not cheaper if you can't get them. The old case machine especially a g-series and newer aren't that by the machine if you have a dealer for it. I don't know what all stuff else you might want to use them for but a motor grader can do a really good job on your waterways if they're dry enough and don't need a lot work.

When things go bad on most dozers the transmissions can be the most expensive. Motor and undercarriage of course the undercarriage always wears out at some point so a good undercarriage makes a older medium-sized machine worth a lot more. Recently put a new undercarriage under a 953d track loader aftermarket was around 12,000 caterpillar was almost $20,000. That's roughly the same track size and equivalent of most D5 size machines. Motors usually somewhere in the 16 to 20,000 transmissions have been we don't even want to talk about transmissions some of them upwards of 40

What about renting a scraper?

I'd love a dozer with a 6 way blade just to maintain our road. We are getting by with the tractor back blade and the blade on the mini x. Dozers are so expensive.

Neighbor has a grader he got going. Blew a cylinder for the belly blade. He's to cheap to fix it. I'm about to offer to replace the cylinder for him if I can use it whenever I need it.

Don't know your waterways are the size but that is definitely a possibility I will warn you a scraper is one of the harder things to really Master to cut grade really close. Or at least it was for me and I will still not even say I've mastered it cuz I just don't run one enough. If you've got a big enough tractor you might consider buying or renting a pan.
Would you might be calling a scraper I'm trying to upload some pictures and I have such little service here at the house I'm having a tough time.

I’d look at renting a 25-30K lb excavator with a blade, monthly charge would be less than the sales tax on buying a dozer, and an excavator is much more versatile at moving dirt.