How to pick a crawler excavator

A crawler excavator is a multifunctional type of excavators. This type has the range of its special features. Firstly, it drives on the tracked chassis (with flat link chains). Secondly, it can have different variants of configuration (including the choice of the basis and additional attachments). Due to these features crawler excavators are widely used in such spheres as civil engineering, general construction, mining, laying of communication lines, driving tunnels and others.

The production of excavators in general and crawler excavators in particular makes up a prominent percentage in the world market of construction machinery. This market is characterized by a high level of competition among the manufacturers.

Top 5 global brands

1. Caterpillar
2. Hitachi
3. Komatsu
4. Liebherr
5. Sany

This group of manufactures provides the main part of sales. But there are also other companies, which are significant in this market segment (Hyundai, JCB, Case, LiuGong, Volvo).

Strong demand for crawler excavators is explained by a wide range of their advantages, namely the high level of cross-country mobility, increased capacity and efficiency (both fuel and operational).

Things you should know before making your choice

There are some limitations in exploitation of this kind of construction machinery, which result from its structural features. One should avoid transporting crawler excavators on topcoat asphalts (because of the risk to damage the coat by the tracks) and transporting them for long distances (because of the risk to increase the depreciation of a vehicle and thus to lower its efficiency).

If you have decided to buy an excavator of the crawler type, we recommend you to take into account the following aspects:

1. the character and the scale of the work to be done;
2. the peculiarities of the ground;
3. the required dimensions of a vehicle and its attachments.

Also we’d like to remind that to guarantee the quality and accessibility of the necessary parts in case of repair and retrofit you’d better to buy machinery from the well-known manufacturers.