Getting the Dirt on Bucket Design

Many millions of dollars are spent each year on new excavators and wheel loaders trying to get more reliability, economy and low maintenance. But, the machine may not necessarily be the problem reports ADRIAN MASON of EI Engineering Pty Ltd.

CONSIDER this – if you wish to cut a piece of wood, or drill a hole and you
find the tool is not cutting efficiently, do you go and buy a new more powerful machine or look at the cutting implement?

Our Olympic swimmers out swim even the biggest, strongest people in the community.

Whether it’s a saw blade, core drill or even a champion swimmer, wherever you have one material penetrating another, it’s all about the design and geometry!

Excavator and wheel loader buckets are no different. The bucket must be designed to dig efficiently and economically to the geometry of the machine.

The Ground Engagement Tool (GET) is actually designed to cut efficiently into the material, enabling the bucket to be a collection tool so the cut material falls into the bucket rather than the material being rammed into the bucket by the machine using excessive power and fuel. Traditional flat bottomed excavator buckets plow the ground, create extra wear on bucket and machine, use more fuel and create more machine maintenance.

eiengineering have designed buckets that enhance the capabilities of the excavator with a tapered, double radius back plate bucket that follows the G.E.T. through the material, in the arc of the excavator arm, collecting full bucket loads quickly and efficiently, using less machine power, thus lowering fuel and maintenance costs.

The superior bucket shape, creates a shorter pin to point (distance from the front bucket pin to the bucket teeth), which provides greater bucket breakout and more power into the teeth, without losing any bucket capacity. The front to back taper ensures there is minimal bucket drag as it progresses through the cut.

Another important design issue is the bucket geometry. Each machine has a different geometry and is responsible for two main criteria, bucket breakout and the bucket loading and dump positions.

If the bucket is designed to the geometry of the specific machine, it will dig the material at the correct position where the most power is generated, collect a full bucket load every time, and dump easier.

As global warming dries and continually hardens the earth’s crust, it is becoming more important that bucket manufacturing materials are harder and stronger and weld sizes larger to ensure that it holds together.

Using high tensile steel such as Bisalloy, which is 3 times stronger and abrasive resistant than mild steel, ensures buckets will be more robust and last longer. In harder and more abrasive environments, wear packages designed to protect the bucket structure are recommended for greater working life and economy.

eiengineering manufacture a full range of tough and efficient excavator buckets, hammer friendly hydraulic and tilting quick hitches, grapples, compaction wheels, skeleton buckets and rippers for excavators and wheel loaders up to 300 tonnes for all applications.

For further information contact Adrian Mason 0411 227 701

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