Hello

[Smiffy]

Will you be putting idig on the 3cx aswell ??

 

[TiltyShaun]

The main reason i haven't bothered is that it's an amount of money which for me at the moment is far better put towards other things. As a rule for me when working an area big enough to make use of it there's either someone else on dumper who can check levels when you're loading the dumper or if you're dumpering yourself check levels when you're between machines. End of the day a good op shouldn't be that far off grade per loaded dumper.

Got to be honest. I am not a good Op!!

 

[GazCro]

Gaz, you live in the Lakes - nothing is flat there so I understand why you think this but you're wrong

If you use a laser on the work you currently do, with any machine, then Idig will save you either the lad checking levels with the staff or if you are on your own, then the need to get out and check your own levels. The spare lad can then be off doing something else. And for the investment vs return it doesn't take long to start earning its money back. Splitting between the two machines is a no brainer and gives you so much more scope for it to be useful to you.

The tiltrotator I agree is a bigger step and if I could only have one, it would be Idig. Purely because for the money it stands to earn the most return in labour saving alone. The tilty is great and I wouldn't be without one now, but takes a lot longer to start earning.

I can see your point but for one thing i can't sit in a cab all day so glad to get out and often work by myself so its no biggy checking levels between machines

 

[TiltyShaun]

The main reason i haven't bothered is that it's an amount of money which for me at the moment is far better put towards other things. As a rule for me when working an area big enough to make use of it there's either someone else on dumper who can check levels when you're loading the dumper or if you're dumpering yourself check levels when you're between machines. End of the day a good op shouldn't be that far off grade per loaded dumper.

The amount of time you save with the idig can be quite considerably. I use it to do the drain laying and that is not easy to do by eye, however good an Op you are!!

 

[GazCro]

The amount of time you save with the idig can be quite considerably. I use it to do the drain laying and that is not easy to do by eye, however good an Op you are!!

The two ways drain runs work here is either negligible fall and use grade laser or steep enough it won't matter. A lot of the time there isn't a long enough run to make it worth it. Its money better spent on other stuff for me at the mo

 

[Smiffy]

I can see your point but for one thing i can't sit in a cab all day so glad to get out and often work by myself so its no biggy checking levels between machines

Think of it another way though. A 7m X 7m pad 10mm out is over a tonne of type 1. That's over 30quid in the southeast. If it's a base for tarmac that's nearly 150 quid extra tarmac to go in. Or an extra tonne you have to over order by just in case on to reject and pay a tip charge on.

I know oli works to those tolerances on the mugga work and not everyone works to such small tolerances but my boss pointed this out to me using such small tolerances to show the importance of working accurately.

I can easily see how an I dig could earn it's money especially if you are prepping for tarmac or concrete or the like.

 

[Gunners]

I can see your point but for one thing i can't sit in a cab all day so glad to get out and often work by myself so its no biggy checking levels between machines

Cant say I even touch the ground between the dumper and digger. Literally jump out the cab onto the mudguard of the other if you park them right. You might not think it takes long to check a level - and it doesnt. I worked that way for long enough, but time sure does add up I've found especially when on your own.
I am not an Idig sales rep - certainly don't get paid for it, I just try to show how I've found it works for me and might suit other small contractors too. Its not for everybody and I respect someone who can dig level by eye. I'm not that bad but even 20mm here and there adds up and for me, that's money in aggregate, concrete etc that isn't getting any cheaper.

Will you be putting idig on the 3cx aswell ??

I am looking into how it could work. As I already have the system, its £300 in mounting plates away from getting fitted so not really hard to justify at this point. But I need to understand how I could make it work as not sure how Idig would compensate for the extending dipper?

 

[Shovelhands]

Cant say I even touch the ground between the dumper and digger. Literally jump out the cab onto the mudguard of the other if you park them right. You might not think it takes long to check a level - and it doesnt. I worked that way for long enough, but time sure does add up I've found especially when on your own.
I am not an Idig sales rep - certainly don't get paid for it, I just try to show how I've found it works for me and might suit other small contractors too. Its not for everybody and I respect someone who can dig level by eye. I'm not that bad but even 20mm here and there adds up and for me, that's money in aggregate, concrete etc that isn't getting any cheaper.


I am looking into how it could work. As I already have the system, its £300 in mounting plates away from getting fitted so not really hard to justify at this point. But I need to understand how I could make it work as not sure how Idig would compensate for the extending dipper?

If the mounting plate was on the extending part of the dipper, would it matter about it being extended or not?

 

[Smiffy]

Cant say I even touch the ground between the dumper and digger. Literally jump out the cab onto the mudguard of the other if you park them right. You might not think it takes long to check a level - and it doesnt. I worked that way for long enough, but time sure does add up I've found especially when on your own.
I am not an Idig sales rep - certainly don't get paid for it, I just try to show how I've found it works for me and might suit other small contractors too. Its not for everybody and I respect someone who can dig level by eye. I'm not that bad but even 20mm here and there adds up and for me, that's money in aggregate, concrete etc that isn't getting any cheaper.


I am looking into how it could work. As I already have the system, its £300 in mounting plates away from getting fitted so not really hard to justify at this point. But I need to understand how I could make it work as not sure how Idig would compensate for the extending dipper?

They did a video of it on a backhoe earlier in the year I think it was. They had two settings. Fully retracted or fully extended. I don't know whether they fitted a proximity sensor to tell the box which it was though

 

[Gunners]

If the mounting plate was on the extending part of the dipper, would it matter about it being extended or not?

Yes, because as I understand it, Idig needs to know the length of the dipper to know what depth the bucket is as. The sensor merely calculates radius between pivots, not movement along an axis.... if that makes sense.

 

[GazCro]

The bulk of my work isn't strictly priced often just ball park kinda figures as more often than not there's a lot of work not on plans that is to do on the same job so 10mm here or there isn't that critical (it's not going to cost me 2 ton of type 1) then a lot of the time I'm working to ground conditions as well as levels so desperately trying to stay within 10mm isn't possible or necessity until final finishes on a job at which point you're usually following kerbs/edgings etc anyway.

 

[Tintan28]

Talk to Rototilt - I’ve got two and they are the dogs danglies!

Do you have a contact at Rototilt that you could recommend?

 

[Gunners]

The main man Malcolm is a nice guy. On here @Dr pecker is now a rototilt dealer, as is Aiden @CPS if you are near any of their areas?

 

[Monkeybusiness]

Do you have a contact at Rototilt that you could recommend?

I’ve always dealt with Malcolm Long (he runs the UK setup) - real decent fella. 07852 299410
Aiden (@CPS ) on here is the oracle on anything Rototilt - he sells them in Ireland and troubleshoots/sorts tricky installs etc nationwide.
From my experience there is no bullshit with them as an outfit, and they’ve given me really good support well over and above what I’d have expected.
(I’ve also spent a few quid with Engcon and there promises and subsequent delivery was terrible tbh, I ended up with a brand new paid for machine sat in the dealers without a hitch and buckets for a couple of months)…

 

[Storrsy]

I bought a Takeuchi TB225 earlier in the year with it being at the top end of my towing ability to replace an old Case 695SR as it wasn't getting used enough due to driver retiring. I think the iDig is a good bet but need convincing to spend nearly £17K+vat on the engcon as we are general builders rather than a groundworks crew so machines can be idle in the shed for a few weeks at a time.

Do you like your TB225?

 

[doobin]

Do you like your TB225?

You wouldn't like one mate. Way too much of a compromise for what you and I do- they are designed solely to tick the 'totally legal to tow even with buckets' box.

I wasn't impressed with the one I tried at a demo day, and it didn't help that the owner had seen fit to lumber it with a twin hitch S40 engon setup and a bucket that was far too big for it. As soon as you started to pull back in you were out of lift height! Still, I suppose it looked good on Instagram...

Who needs expanding tracks on that size machine either? What a waste of engineering, as well as loosing ground clearance.

@Tintan28 - do you find yourself using the expanding tracks much?

 

[Storrsy]

You wouldn't like one mate. Way too much of a compromise for what you and I do- they are designed solely to tick the 'totally legal to tow even with buckets' box.

I wasn't impressed with the one I tried at a demo day, and it didn't help that the owner had seen fit to lumber it with a twin hitch S40 engon setup and a bucket that was far too big for it. As soon as you started to pull back in you were out of lift height! Still, I suppose it looked good on Instagram...

Who needs expanding tracks on that size machine either? What a waste of engineering, as well as loosing ground clearance.

@Tintan28 - do you find yourself using the expanding tracks much?

What a plonker. Fancy spending all that money just to have something that sounds fairly unusable in the real world.

I know your right about the compromise thing. It would always be a case of wishing for the extra weight and capacity of a 2.8t. I suppose I was thinking more to replace the 216 which I think I've had enough of now. It's actually too small for most of my work and I rarely benefit from the narrow access side of things too. The TB225 would have been far better if they'd put it on a proper undercarriage but kept the weight similar as can definitely see the advantage of its weight class for jobbing work with attachments on the trailer etc.

 

[Thomas7740]

You wouldn't like one mate. Way too much of a compromise for what you and I do- they are designed solely to tick the 'totally legal to tow even with buckets' box.

I wasn't impressed with the one I tried at a demo day, and it didn't help that the owner had seen fit to lumber it with a twin hitch S40 engon setup and a bucket that was far too big for it. As soon as you started to pull back in you were out of lift height! Still, I suppose it looked good on Instagram...

Who needs expanding tracks on that size machine either? What a waste of engineering, as well as loosing ground clearance.

@Tintan28 - do you find yourself using the expanding tracks much?

Is that Owen mays with the 225 and engcon? If so I seen pictures of it and thought it looked horrible to use

 

[Smiffy]

What a plonker. Fancy spending all that money just to have something that sounds fairly unusable in the real world.

I know your right about the compromise thing. It would always be a case of wishing for the extra weight and capacity of a 2.8t. I suppose I was thinking more to replace the 216 which I think I've had enough of now. It's actually too small for most of my work and I rarely benefit from the narrow access side of things too. The TB225 would have been far better if they'd put it on a proper undercarriage but kept the weight similar as can definitely see the advantage of its weight class for jobbing work with attachments on the trailer etc.

If that's what you want kobelco do a fixed undercarriage 2.3/2.4t machine.

I can understand the variable width tracks for some people but may have been better as an option rather than a standard

 

[Storrsy]

Is that Owen mays with the 225 and engcon? If so I seen pictures of it and thought it looked horrible to use

This? Yeah looks horrendous. Alot of weight and ridiculous stack height surely?