A long reach excavator [1] is a type of excavator where the arm has been extended to reach farther than a normal excavator would. It is often used in demolition of buildings, but it can also be used in other applications.
The term long reach excavator was probably first coined by Richard Melhuish, the Chairman of Land & Water. During the 1970s Land & Water operated the UK's first hire fleet of these new and innovative long reach hydraulic excavators. In fact they still operate the largest fleet of long-reaches in the UK. Land & Water's first long reach excavator was the Hymac 580 BT All Hydraulic 360 “Waterway” machine, designed for work on waterways. [2] These early machines from Hymac came to be widely preferred to the more traditional drag lines designs. [2]
Around the same time Priestman (and later Ruston Bucyrus) VC (Variable Counterweight) excavators started to become more popular. However, the work VC machines could achieve was slightly constrained by design limitations compared to fully hydraulic "long reach" machines, especially with the arrival of more reliable machines from Japan built by manufacturers such as Hitachi and Komatsu. These Japanese designed machines hardly ever leaked hydraulic fluid. [2]
Long reach machines are not suitable for the high side twisting forces that can be exerted by demolition attachments and many demolition machines are unstable at large radius – so they are often assisted with electronic cut off devices that restrict the operating radius of the machine. Long reach machines are particularly useful in dredging operations. [2]
The high reach excavator is a development of the excavator with an especially long boom arm, that is primarily used for demolition. Instead of excavating ditches, the high reach excavator is designed to reach the upper stories of buildings that are being demolished and pull down the structure in a controlled fashion. It has largely replaced the wrecking ball as the primary tool for demolition.
Ultra high reach demolition excavators (UHD) are demolition excavators with several tens of meters of reach. [3] [4] Reaches of up to 48 metres (157 ft) are in operation as of 2016. As of 2017 [update] there are UHD machines that can reach 67 metres (220 ft).
The long reach excavator imported to New Zealand for demolitions of tall buildings following the 2010 and 2011 earthquakes has been nicknamed Twinkle Toes. It is the largest excavator in the Southern Hemisphere. [5] [6]
A military engineering vehicle is a vehicle built for construction work or for the transportation of combat engineers on the battlefield. These vehicles may be modified civilian equipment or purpose-built military vehicles. The first appearance of such vehicles coincided with the appearance of the first tanks, these vehicles were modified Mark V tanks for bridging and mine clearance. Modern military engineering vehicles are expected to fulfill numerous roles, as such they undertake numerous forms, examples of roles include; bulldozers, cranes, graders, excavators, dump trucks, breaching vehicles, bridging vehicles, military ferries, amphibious crossing vehicles, and combat engineer section carriers.
A skid loader, skid-steer loader, SSL, or skidsteer is any of a class of compact heavy equipment with lift arms that can attach to a wide variety of buckets and other labor-saving tools or attachments.
A hydraulic fluid or hydraulic liquid is the medium by which power is transferred in hydraulic machinery. Common hydraulic fluids are based on mineral oil or water. Examples of equipment that might use hydraulic fluids are excavators and backhoes, hydraulic brakes, power steering systems, automatic transmissions, garbage trucks, aircraft flight control systems, lifts, and industrial machinery.
Excavators are heavy construction equipment consisting of a boom, dipper, bucket and cab on a rotating platform known as the "house". The house sits atop an undercarriage with tracks or wheels. They are a natural progression from the steam shovels and often mistakenly called power shovels. All movement and functions of a hydraulic excavator are accomplished through the use of hydraulic fluid, with hydraulic cylinders and hydraulic motors. Due to the linear actuation of hydraulic cylinders, their mode of operation is fundamentally different from cable-operated excavators which use winches and steel ropes to accomplish the movements.
A crane is a type of machine, generally equipped with a hoist rope, wire ropes or chains, and sheaves, that can be used both to lift and lower materials and to move them horizontally. It is mainly used for lifting heavy objects and transporting them to other places. The device uses one or more simple machines to create mechanical advantage and thus move loads beyond the normal capability of a human. Cranes are commonly employed in transportation for the loading and unloading of freight, in construction for the movement of materials, and in manufacturing for the assembling of heavy equipment.
A loader is a heavy equipment machine used in construction to move or load materials such as soil, rock, sand, demolition debris, etc. into or onto another type of machinery.
A backhoe loader, also called a loader backhoe, loader excavator, digger in layman's terms, or colloquially shortened to backhoe within the industry, is a heavy equipment vehicle that consists of a tractor-like unit fitted with a loader-style shovel/bucket on the front and a backhoe on the back. Due to its (relatively) small size and versatility, backhoe loaders are very common in urban engineering and small construction projects as well as developing countries. This type of machine is similar to and derived from what is now known as a TLB (Tractor-Loader-Backhoe), which is to say, an agricultural tractor fitted with a front loader and rear backhoe attachment.
Heavy equipment or heavy machinery or Earthmover refers to heavy-duty vehicles specially designed to execute construction tasks, most frequently involving earthwork operations or other large construction tasks. Heavy equipment usually comprises five equipment systems: the implement, traction, structure, power train, and control/information.
A dragline excavator is a piece of heavy equipment used in civil engineering and surface mining.
Dredging is the excavation of material from a water environment. Possible reasons for dredging include improving existing water features; reshaping land and water features to alter drainage, navigability, and commercial use; constructing dams, dikes, and other controls for streams and shorelines; and recovering valuable mineral deposits or marine life having commercial value. In all but a few situations the excavation is undertaken by a specialist floating plant, known as a dredger.
A steam shovel is a large steam-powered excavating machine designed for lifting and moving material such as rock and soil. It is the earliest type of power shovel or excavator. Steam shovels played a major role in public works in the 19th and early 20th century, being key to the construction of railroads and the Panama Canal. The development of simpler, cheaper diesel-powered shovels caused steam shovels to fall out of favor in the 1930s.
A grapple is a hook or claw used to catch or hold something. A ship's anchor is a type of grapple, especially the "grapnel" anchor.
Bagger 288, built by the German company Krupp for the energy and mining firm Rheinbraun, is a bucket-wheel excavator or mobile strip mining machine.
The Acushnet River is the largest river, 8.6 miles (13.8 km) long, flowing into Buzzards Bay in southeastern Massachusetts, in the United States. The name "Acushnet" comes from the Wampanoag or Algonquian word, "Cushnea", meaning "as far as the waters", a word that was used by the original owners of the land in describing the extent of the parcel they intended to sell to the English settlers from the nearby Plimouth colony. Quite naturally, the English mistook "Cushnea" for a fixed placename or the name of a specific river.
A tiltrotator is a hydraulic attachment/tool used on most excavators, and backhoes between 1,5 and 40 tons in the Nordic countries. A tiltrotator is mounted on the excavator such that the excavator bucket can be rotated through 360 degrees and one tilts +/- 45 degrees, in order to increase the flexibility and precision of the excavator. The Tiltrotator was introduced to the market in Sweden in the early 1980s by the Norgrens under the family owned and operated company named Noreco, and has become the standard in Scandinavia. The concept has recently gained popularity in other countries such as the Netherlands, Germany, UK, Japan, Canada and United States.
Ruston-Bucyrus Ltd was an engineering company established in 1930 and jointly owned by Ruston & Hornsby based in Lincoln, England and Bucyrus-Erie based in South Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the latter of which had operational control and into which the excavator manufacturing operation of Ruston & Hornsby was transferred. The Bucyrus company proper, from which the Bucyrus component of the Ruston-Bucyrus name was created, was an American company founded in 1880, in Bucyrus, Ohio.
A suction excavator or vacuum excavator is a construction vehicle that removes materials from a hole on land, or removes heavy debris on land.
Twinkle Toes is the largest excavator in the Southern Hemisphere. It was used in Christchurch to demolish tall buildings following the 2010 and 2011 earthquakes before moving to Wellington following the 2016 Kaikoura earthquake.
NCK, started as a subsidiary of Newton, Chambers & Company, a large engineering company based in Sheffield, England. They produced the range of agricultural equipment, skimmers, excavators, cranes and draglines that were renowned for high quality and long life, typically over 20 years. Many NCK machines continue to operate worldwide.
Demolition is the science and engineering in safely and efficiently tearing down of buildings and other artificial structures. Demolition contrasts with deconstruction, which involves taking a building apart while carefully preserving valuable elements for reuse purposes.