When you need to lift heavy amounts of soil, an excavator is a must on your job site. Excavators are popular earthmoving vehicles that feature a bucket, arm, rotating cab, and movable tracks. These components provide superior digging power and mobility, allowing this heavy equipment to perform a variety of functions, from digging trenches and breaking holes to lifting away waste and excavating mines.
Excavators are applied to a variety of contractor and industrial needs, including mining, road construction, building construction, and demolitions.
There are many types of excavators, smaller machines handle digging and drilling functions, while larger excavators have different tools for heavy-duty projects. When renting your excavator, you will need to consider its size and speed as well as the working conditions..
The most common excavator types are crawlers, dragline excavators, suction excavators, skid steer, and long reach excavators.
Unlike other large wheeled excavators, crawler excavators run on two large endless tracks, tracks are often used in heavy mining and construction work. Also known as compact excavators, these excavators use hydraulic power mechanisms to lift heavy earth and debris.
Their sprocket system allows them to slide down and up hills with less risk, making them useful for grading hilly areas and landscaping on rough terrain. While slower than other dredges, tracks offer better balance, flexibility, and overall stability.
The dragline is a larger dredger that uses a different process. The rig uses a hoist line system connected to a bucket via a hoist coupler. The other side of the bucket is attached to a towline that runs from the bucket to the cab.
The lifting rope raises and lowers the bucket while the towline pulls the bucket toward the operator. Tow lines are often installed on site due to their weight. The unique system of this type of excavator is often used in large civil engineering projects such as canal excavation.
Also known as suction dredges, these dredges feature a suction pipe capable of delivering up to 400 horsepower of air. The bulldozer first shoots a jet of water to loosen the soil.
The tube, with sharp teeth on the rim, creates a vacuum that sucks in dirt and debris at speeds of up to 200 miles per hour. A suction dredger is ideal for delicate underground applications as it can reduce the risk of damage by more than 50 percent.
Unlike standard excavators, compact loaders have booms and buckets that point away from the operator. This orientation allows the attachments to travel over the top of the cab rather than around it, making them useful in tighter areas and when maneuvering through tight turns.
Commonly used for digging ponds, cleaning up construction sites, working in residential areas, and removing debris where space is limited and items are scattered.
As the name suggests, a long-reach excavator has a longer arm and boom sections. The design allows for better operation in hard-to-reach places and the boom extends 100 feet horizontally.
These excavators are best suited for demolition projects such as the demolition of buildings, walls, and overwater applications. Various attachments can be attached to the arm for additional work such as shearing, grinding, and cutting.