Excavators range from mini-excavators that are used for light-duty digging to mammoth pieces of equipment that weigh over 1,000,000 pounds and have over horsepower behind them. These are serious pieces of earth moving equipment typically found only at construction sites, river dredgings, forest clearing, mining and other major excavations.
Mini-excavators are used for smaller jobs than the large ones and are often not actually dedicated excavators at all but tractors with backhoe arm attachments or skidsteer loaders with backhoe attachments. While they do excavate, calling them excavators isn't entirely accurate. There is a difference between backhoes and excavators that comes from the way they're constructed.
A backhoe is typically a tractor with attachments on the front like a bucket and the backhoe arm on the back. Even though the arm is mounted on the back of the tractor, that's not where the backhoe arm gets its name. It gets it from the way it digs backwards, pulling the dirt toward the tractor. So front loaders with backhoe arms mounted on the front are still often called backhoes, as are small tractors with the arm on the front. Many pieces of equipment people commonly call excavators are typically small tractors or skidsteer loaders with the backhoe arm mounted on them.
Regular excavators are large pieces of equipment with a dedicated arm that can be removed. Another chief difference between an excavator and a backhoe is that the excavator is designed so that the cab and the part of the machinery that holds the arm can turn 360° while the bottom of the chassis stays still. Excavators are also always on tracks rather than wheels because tracks offer better weight distribution the length of the equipment. They're so heavy that this is necessary in most construction and bare dirt areas. Backhoes are usually on wheels.
An excavator's bucket can be changed out for other attachments, even though the arm is permanently mounted to the chassis. The arm is articulated and comes in two parts. The part connected to the chassis is called the boom and the second part that holds the digging bucket at the end is known as the dipper or the dipperstick.
The digging bucket, which is sometimes called the claw, can be changed out depending on the type of digging that needs to be done. The bucket is often called the claw when it's the type of bucket that has teeth on its edge. This is designed for digging through hard ground or rocky ground. It cuts through the dirt and digs it away, and often has cutters on the edges to make this process easier. This is the type of bucket that you think of when you think of steam shovels from the 30s and 40s.
A bucket with a straight, blade-type edge can also be used on an excavator for digging up muddy ground or soft earth. And the bucket can be changed out for other attachments like drills, pile drivers, borers and other equipment designed to punch through rock, mine or use in demolition.
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Originally posted 2010-04-11 03:41:44. Republished by Blog Post Promoter
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A backhoe is a piece of earth moving equipment designed for digging. There is a common misconception that the entire vehicle is known as a backhoe when actually it refers only to the attachment with the digger on the end. This two-part arm with its bucket used for digging is technically the backhoe attachment. But it's also common for tractors that have a bucket on the front end of the arm with the digger on the back to be called backhoes.
