Also referred to as a backhoe or digger, an excavator is a heavy piece of heavy machinery that is generally used to dig into the ground. An excavator can also be used for building roads, structures and mining various types of minerals.
Because an excavator is such a large piece of machinery, digging jobs are more efficient and effective when the machine is being used due to the amount of materials that it is capable of picking up.
Adding to their versatility, an excavator comes in a variety of different sizes. Ranging in size from smaller machines that can fit into your backyard to gigantic pieces of equipment that are used to excavate enormous rocks and mining substances like gold, soil and diamonds, an excavator serves many purposes. Helping various construction workers make their jobs much easier, an excavator can greatly decrease a projects operational cost while also increasing worker productivity.
Hydraulics in Excavating
The majority of the excavators that are used in today’s construction world function with a hydraulic part that helps increase the amount of power that the machine uses. In a commonly used excavator, a hydraulic cylinder, a bucket, an arm and a boom will be utilized.
Working synchronized together, each part of the excavator is essential to the machine’s overall performance. Simply making a small adjustment to the excavator’s hydraulic cylinder could extremely improve or decrease the machine’s overall accuracy.
Another critical component of the excavator machine is the cab that sits on top of a platform that pivots on its tracks or wheels allowing it to move around. In order to maneuver the excavator, the machine’s operator sits in the cab and uses the control system to move around. The boom part of the machine acts similar to an arm and is able to reach out and grab whatever object or material that is needed.
In addition to being capable of extracting a large amount of dirt and other substances, the excavator is a very diverse piece of construction equipment. Machine operators are able to remove the excavator’s boom and bucket to install specialized crushing tools, drills or scissors. This allows the piece of equipment to be used to drill through harder materials like concrete.
Types of Excavators
The two main types of excavators that are typically used include a backhoe and a dragline excavator. The most common type is a crawler excavator.
A backhoe can be seen at pretty much any construction or building site and is the main piece of equipment that is used for digging. The other frequently seen type of excavator is a dragline.
This machine is usually much larger than a backhoe and is used for large mining and civil engineering jobs. Depending on the specific construction job, either a backhoe or a dragline excavator will prove to be more useful.