Digger Upgrade

[Digester Man]

Looking for a 6-7 ton class digger, the main jobs would be cleaning sheughs, digging drains and general farm work. Also work at a golf course occasionally. Budget is around £15k, what would you recommend?

What are the pro's and con's of having the boom centre mounted (EX60, JZ70 etc) vs front knuckle mounted (Takeuchi etc). Would a centre mounted boom make the digger more stable, but the knuckle mount give you more forward reach?

Lastly what is our own digger worth to sell, shes a Kubota KX-024 with 3 good buckets. Think she would be early 90's Jap import with no cab. Rubber tracks and blade.

 

[Digester Man]

Also should have asked, single vs twin pump.. is twin pump always better so you can track and dig at the same time?

 

[Zetor]

Also should have asked, single vs twin pump.. is twin pump always better so you can track and dig at the same time?

Twin/single pumps don’t effect the way it tracks & digs. Ideally twin but my TB290 is a single pump and it’s fine.
Preferably offset boom (pivots at cab)
knuckle booms (pivots in middle of boom) tend to have short dippers to compensate for them being unbalanced, prone to wear and can be difficult to trench with at certain angles.

 

[Derky]

Takeuchi or jcb are good machines. JMJ plant often have some jcbs running through.

 

[The Son]

Don't discount volvo, good strong machines

 

[Digester Man]

Twin/single pumps don’t effect the way it tracks & digs. Ideally twin but my TB290 is a single pump and it’s fine.
Preferably offset boom (pivots at cab)
knuckle booms (pivots in middle of boom) tend to have short dippers to compensate for them being unbalanced, prone to wear and can be difficult to trench with at certain angles.

So would a TB175 be knuckle or offset boom? Is a mono boom how you would describe a scaled down 13 tonner like an EX60?

 

[yohan115]

Yes knuckle boom pivots in front of window. Good for tight awkward spots but poor lift height. Mono boom more desirable for your work imo !

 

[Pheasant Surprise]

Looking for a 6-7 ton class digger, the main jobs would be cleaning sheughs, digging drains and general farm work. Also work at a golf course occasionally. Budget is around £15k, what would you recommend?

What are the pro's and con's of having the boom centre mounted (EX60, JZ70 etc) vs front knuckle mounted (Takeuchi etc). Would a centre mounted boom make the digger more stable, but the knuckle mount give you more forward reach?

Lastly what is our own digger worth to sell, shes a Kubota KX-024 with 3 good buckets. Think she would be early 90's Jap import with no cab. Rubber tracks and blade.

An ECR58D would suit you perfectly, although I am biased as you can guess. The 58D shares much with its ECR88 8 ton class big brother including engine and pump, so actually punches well above.

Kingpin style boom is the way to go with these weight machines and zero/low tail swing gets you into tight spots.

Also should have asked, single vs twin pump.. is twin pump always better so you can track and dig at the same time?

Look at the total output volume of the pump, what’s available at the hammer line (and optionally rotate circuit line) rather than pump style/construction. For example my little Volvo has a total pump output of 126 litres/min, of which up to 70 litres/min can go to hammer/x1 line and 35 litres/min can go to the rotate/x3 line. So it’s a powerful and flexible unit.

 

[ACEngineering]

Looking for a 6-7 ton class digger, the main jobs would be cleaning sheughs, digging drains and general farm work. Also work at a golf course occasionally. Budget is around £15k, what would you recommend?

What are the pro's and con's of having the boom centre mounted (EX60, JZ70 etc) vs front knuckle mounted (Takeuchi etc). Would a centre mounted boom make the digger more stable, but the knuckle mount give you more forward reach?

Lastly what is our own digger worth to sell, shes a Kubota KX-024 with 3 good buckets. Think she would be early 90's Jap import with no cab. Rubber tracks and blade.

Dont get a takeuchi with a sliding king post. Type that you can offset the whole king post to be online with either track.

Way too many pivots on them. Slightest bit of wear on them and there flopping alover the place. Stick to a normal king post unless you need a fancy pants one.

 

[jd6820]

Don't discount volvo, good strong machines

Yeah, can agree with this. They are good value for money, usually well spec'd and a reliable machine an EC55B would be in your budget and maybe even money to spare.

 

[mar]

Also should have asked, single vs twin pump.. is twin pump always better so you can track and dig at the same time?

The benefit of the twin pump I was told is if you get bogged you can pull and track yourself out of the hole

 

[Chuckie]

There were some nice 3000hr 2013 Volvo ec55 in the last rb auction for around £16k, I was almost tempted myself.

 

[Digester Man]

Seems to be split opinions on knuckle or mono boom. An EX60 has a forward reach of 6.2m and a TB175 has a forward reach of 7.2m, surely the extra metre on the Takeuchi means it would be a hell of a lot more usable, or am I missing something? I don’t have a huge amount of digger experience so appreciate the input from those who do

 

[Grouse]

The benefit of the twin pump I was told is if you get bogged you can pull and track yourself out of the hole

A big plus one there

 

[devonboy]

you can have different length dipper arm on the same model machine, the longer the dipper arm the less digging power you have, depends on what you,re doing if its an advantage or not.

 

[gerr]

I have a Takeuchi with the boom that you can move across the front of the cab. I don't know what it's called. it's a pleasure to use after using a JCB with a centre boom. The boom, when shifted to the right, comes back so much further, allowing turning in tight places and it reaches a lot higher. Lovely bit of kit. Don't get hung up with all the double pump talk. Every modern digger will track and dig at the same time and all pumps are suitabley big enough to do everything they should do. I have a TB 153. bought from https://www.jdaviespencader.co.uk/. Got a massive selection and nothing leaves their yard with a worn bush or a worn track. They are a top company to deal with.

 

[Eggs5]

We picked up a Doosan DX55, great little machine

 

[wuddy]

We run one of these been a cracking little digger has been doing all the things you are wanting to do. Getting a little slack in the pins now iirc it’s about 9500hrs only does the little jobs now as have a 13 ton jcb for doing the bulk of the work!

 

[Digester Man]

Does anyone know what I should expect to pay for a Hitachi EX60-5? See a lot advertised for €20k euros, but don’t see them disappearing so can’t help but feel they are overpriced given they are 20 years old with 9000hrs?

 

[Hesston4860s]

Does anyone know what I should expect to pay for a Hitachi EX60-5? See a lot advertised for €20k euros, but don’t see them disappearing so can’t help but feel they are overpriced given they are 20 years old with 9000hrs?

Last one of them I saw advertised about 6 months ago was 14k ish with 5000 hrs ish !.