Excavators are standard machines found on construction sites in Australia. Contractors and construction workers use excavators to dig holes, remove soil from the ground, and sometimes even assist in removing or demolishing an existing building or structure.
There are several types of excavator machines used on construction sites. They vary slightly based on their technology and functionality. Let’s review the top five excavators you may need to use or haul on a construction site in Australia:
1) Crawler Excavators
Crawler excavators are popular because steel tracks are built underneath them to navigate rough and rugged terrains. Since most construction sites have uneven terrain filled with hills and objects, it helps to have a crawler excavator to climb over it efficiently.
Furthermore, the crawler excavators have additional weight to give them more stability, which is beneficial when lifting soil and heavy materials from the ground. The last thing you would want is a lighter excavator if you have heavy objects or dirt to lift.
Crawler excavators are best suited for heavy-duty construction projects, mining, or any project where you must dig foundations, trenches, or large holes in the earth. You could also use them for demolishing structures too.
2) Dragline Excavators
Dragline excavators are massive excavation machines featuring a rope system to pick up and transport dirt and materials from the ground. The rope (or wire) is connected to the bucket, so it can be raised and lowered as needed. There is also a dragline linking the excavator’s cab to the bucket. Once you finish digging, the dragline pulls the bucket back toward the cab.
Some common uses for dragline excavators are building roads, seaports, canal dredging, or pond dredging.
3) Skid Steer Excavators
Skid steer excavators are small excavator machines with a bucket and boom facing opposite the cab. The purpose of this unique configuration is to let the operator pick up the debris and raise it above the booth. This comes in handy if you’re removing debris from narrow spaces on smaller properties are locations, such as swimming pool sites, residential properties, etc.
4) Vacuum Excavators
Vacuum excavators are suction excavators that utilize a wide suction pipe to remove loosened debris and soil. It has up to 400 horsepower of air auction strength, which ensures more direct debris removal without impacting the surrounding environment that much.
Some contractors may prefer to use vacuum excavators to cause less destruction or damage on a construction site, especially if it is a sensitive underground site. So if you are worried about impacting areas around a demolition or dredging site, you may benefit more from using vacuum excavators.
5) Long Reach Excavators
Long-reach excavators have a long extendable arm and boom capable of extending more than 100 feet horizontally. Operators use long-reach excavators when they need to exercise precise control on a construction site, especially if they need to work in hard-to-reach locations.
Workers often use long-reach excavators for industrial demolition projects where it may be deemed too unsafe to use explosives to cause a structural demolition. Usually, it is customary to start tearing down a building from the upper floors using the extendable arm.
The Best Way to Transport These Excavators Securely and Safely
Transporting excavators can be challenging if you’ve never done it before. There are many factors worth considering as you plan for the excavator transport, such as the destination point, the type of excavator, and the size of the excavator.
In addition, you have to obtain the required permits to transport the excavators legally. Every Australian state has unique rules and regulations governing how oversized or irregular loads are to be transported. If you plan to transport your excavators across state lines to other states, you’ll need to obtain a permit for each state you travel through with the excavators. These permits will add to your total excavator transport costs.
When transporting heavy excavators within a state or across state lines, your best bet is to hire a professional transport company like Executive Tilt Tray Services to handle it. We have a fleet of tilt tray operators in Western Australia capable of transport excavators safely and efficiently.
In most cases, we recommend using a low-loader trailer to transport heavy excavators because they have flatbeds closer to the ground and accommodate their massive height and weight. If you want the best chance of reducing the clearance of your load, a low-loader trailer is ideal.
Our transport operators will determine the best trailer based on the size and weight of your excavators. Either way, we promise to take every safety precaution imaginable to secure your excavators onto our flatbeds to prevent accidental damage during transit. We’ll use strong boomers and heavyweight chains to ensure your excavators don’t move around and get damaged along the way.
The most complex part of the excavator transport process is loading the excavator onto the flatbed. We usually use levelled ground for the loading process to keep everything even and balanced. We’ll also remove all debris between the path from the low-loader trailer to the excavator being loaded.
The excavator’s heaviest side will be the one facing the trailer. That is the side that gets loaded onto the trailer first. Since it is a low-loader, we can typically drive the excavator onto the flatbed without any need to lift it. After that, we’ll tie down the excavators to the flatbed to ensure they stay in place for the trip. All doors, covers, hinges, pivots, and other articulation points must remain locked during transit.
Contact Us
Executive Tilt Tray Services practices the best excavator transport methods in Australia. Contact us to learn more about how we transport various excavator machines and the estimated prices we charge for these professional transport services.
The initial consultation lets us learn more about your specific excavators to be transported, such as the excavator type, model number, quantity, etc. You don’t necessarily need to give us your excavators’ size, weight, and dimensions if you don’t have this information. We can most likely calculate this information once we learn the excavator type and model – Call us now on 0400 738 658 to find out more or visit Excavator Transport Perth
