Hammer attachment cuts trenching by one third

— filed under: Weekly Top Stories, New Equipment

Melbourne earthmoving contractor Andrew Zaf, has invented a hammer attachment which enables operators trenching through rock, to cut trenching time by a minimum of one third although it is more likely to cut time in half.

Hammer attachment cuts trenching by one third

Called the Clover Hammer Head it is a hitch head plate which allows an excavator to pick it up on 3 different sides: standard pick up, left and right. The essential advantage of this is the ability for the hammer chisel tip to be used at 90 to the normal across trench orientation.
It also allows the hammer to be slant 10 or so from the vertical, so that the chisel tip nearly always engages the rock face. This increases productivity and overcomes the problem of the chisel suddenly chipping away from the rock face. That in turn can cause the full weight of the hammer to release in free-fall and put greatly increased stress on boom and hydraulic rams
As Zaf explained it when Earthmover visited him on a stormwater trenching site in Tarneit, a new north western Melbourne suburb, proper chisel orientation allows stone to be cut accurately along its grain. This avoids large rock blowouts which may mean the trench ends up 40 or 50% bigger than it need be.
Zaf said normal trenching was a little like a brickie attempting to halve a brick by hammering a bolster spanning the length of the brick the equivalent of the chisel tip being used at right angles to the direction of the trench. This often causes rock to fracture unnecessarily into blow outs towards the sides of the trench.
The prototype called for a 7 offset which Zaf was evaluating on his 23,000 hour Cat 330B excavator at Tarneit. But in doing so he has discovered that increasing the offset to 10 with shims produced better results. Production units will come at this angle. However shims will be available for further slanting if required, he said.
More information: Indeco Australia, 1800 801 987.

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Hammer attachment cuts trenching by one third

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