Which medium Excavator for personal use?

[TMJD]

Hi all, This is my first post on here. I once bought a Cat 215 and it was a total disaster. I figured that I could fix things as I went vs renting a machine for $4000 a week. The travel motors were pouring oil out, the rails shot with the idlers out almost to the end, All the bottom rollers we're worn down flat. The engine ran good except for I had to replace the o-ring on number 2 cylinder pre-combustion chamber. After I got it back up and running again, i was able to do work with it digging up tree stumps and doing some clean up on the property but that was about all I could really do with it because the hydraulics were pretty weak if you wanted to do some heavy digging. I ended up selling it because i couldn't see sinking alot of money into the main pumps that were pretty well gone.
Here I am once again looking for another Excavator to re-dig a pond I have.
I've been looking for something in the Medium size range that's good on fuel and can still put dirt on the hill, that's pretty reliable and fairly easy to get parts for. I know the reality is that any of them can break, but that's why I thought I'd get some opinions on here. Thanks.

 

[CatToy]

I went with a Link Belt 330 (78k lbs) for my personal use excavator on my property (used for fence line cleanup, clearing several wooded acres and digging a pond). Turns out after shopping around for over a year, it was about half the price of a unit half its size with twice as many hours. Obviously, moving it is problematic if you have a large property but if you do not need to move it, I would consider a bigger unit. The other downside to such a large excavator is it filled my single axle dump truck with with just 2 buckets, so hauling dirt, it seemed I spent more time climbing in and out of the excavator than digging.

That stated, I also have a Yanmar VIO80 (18K lbs) for all my small stuff like moving my wife's roses.

 

[TMJD]

Thank You for the reply CatToy, That Linkbelt you have is a fair size machine, How good is it on fuel an hour when digging steady?

 

[CatToy]

Thank You for the reply CatToy, That Linkbelt you have is a fair size machine, How good is it on fuel an hour when digging steady?

Well, it has three modes of operation, depending on how fast you want to work, set on max and digging steady it would burn thru around 10 gph but that is a lot of dirt being moved. In 8 hours run time clearing trees I would burn about 50 gals which was a 1/3 a tank of fuel.

In contrast, my Yanmar uses about 2-3gph, but that is like comparing a miniature pony to a stock horse, both can do the same job but one will have to make many return trips...

Fuel consumption would not be a overriding factor for personal use in my book unless fuel is hard to get around your neck of the woods but getting good serviceable unit that can do the work you want and not be a money pit would be. Hopefully others will chime in with their experience...

 

[pp13bnos]

I have a ex120-5 for my place. Overall its a nice sized machine. Easy on fuel, easy to transport, and so far has proven to be quite dependable. With nearly 18k hours on it, it still starts up in the coldest weather easily.

But honestly, if I had the money, I'd love to have a 200 sized machine. I think that no matter what sized of excavator you have, (Unless you have a 330 lol.) you'll want something bigger.

 

[TMJD]

Thanks pp13bnos, Actually I've been looking at the Hitachi ex200s and the Deere 160lc machines. I ran a Deere 270 Lc, that was a fast machine for it's size and smooth, not bad on fuel either. The only drawback that I'm a little afraid of is the electronics and computer going out on those machines, I think that's why I went with that old Cat 215 before, at least most of the mechanical things I could fix my self if it broke. I've read where people have modified the machines with computers over to manual controls setup, might sound like a good idea.

 

[gilraine]

we have a Kobelco SK290 that would be great for that. its a little too small for our rock quarry, but as a farm machine, you could do a lot worse

 

[TMJD]

Hi gilraine, That 215 cat I had looked like it had been through a war, because the turn table had split and was welded back together and reinforced with guesits all the way around. Plus the boom had been rewelded just ahead of where the boom cylinders attached. I'll have to say that was the worst I've seen any Excavator that was that tough and still keep going. Though I got it for a fair price, I'd like to get something that was not in as bad of shape as that one was Lol!!

 

[gilraine]

I Spent today in a Cat 235 loading rock in a quarry. machine has 35K hours on it. runs great and digs well. don't count out Cats.

 

[TMJD]

Wow, that 235 has been very good with that many hours. How much fuel doe's it use in a 8 or 10 hour day? I seen a 235C in my area that looks like it's in pretty good shape.

 

[gilraine]

working it hard like i was, i think it goes through 60-70 gallons in a 10 hour day. we have 3 cat machines with over 30k hours, the 235,a 988b loader and a 773 rock truck,

 

[CatToy]

I think that no matter what sized of excavator you have, (Unless you have a 330 lol.) you'll want something bigger.

Funny you say that, the 330 is just big enough to lift my D4H out the my pond when I get stuck. I would like to have a 50 ton excavator, just need to save my pennies.

A few years back, I was offered a Komatsu PC600 with 18k hours in good shape for what would have been scrape price, getting it shipped was the deal breaker. I overheard one thime, if your toys get too big for your sandbox, get another sandbox

Back to the op's question, any unit around the 300 size will work for what you say, just go test as many as you can stand and take a mechanic you trust to go over it. Good luck, it is fun buying things, not so much fixing things.

 

[200lc1]

Definitely second the prepurchace inspection as you've found out. I have an old hitachi ex200lc love it. Needed a couple grand in parts from the prepurchace. I don't think I hit 3 gallons per hour, digging as hard as I want to, on my farm. Stumping/clearing, ditching, grading, what ever. Older, so it has it's quirks, but I can fix most everything myself. I just try balance machine perfection with financial realism.

 

[John C.]

Rather that fixating on any certain machine I would suggest defining a budget for what you want to accomplish and decide from there. Any old machine is going to have problems. After all why would anyone want to get rid of something cheap if it worked properly. No one makes a particularly bad machine anymore, you just need to find that machine that has the chance of accomplishing what you want for as little cost as possible.

 

[catman13]

around here I see a lot of cat 330 ( any brand) and larger size machines at auction go for a lot less than the smaller ones, it seems the big iron has a place and the smaller iron has a more all around use

 

[TMJD]

Rather that fixating on any certain machine I would suggest defining a budget for what you want to accomplish and decide from there. Any old machine is going to have problems. After all why would anyone want to get rid of something cheap if it worked properly. No one makes a particularly bad machine anymore, you just need to find that machine that has the chance of accomplishing what you want for as little cost as possible.

Yes, That's the point I'm getting at. The machine that fits the Job and is practical for the user to maintain and fix there self. It is tough trying to find the right machine that hasn't had the guts run out of it at one time or another without major fixes.

 

[TMJD]

I've been to auctions with friends looking at excavators and they would be all painted up and pretty with new stickers with the idler axles out past the end of undercarriage welded up solid with square stock so the track chains wouldn't show any slopp in them. Drive sprocket teeth worn down flat. Bucket pins an bushings completely gone. Get in the seat, fire it up, pick the bucket up off the ground and watch it wobble side to side really bad. Then start a little test dig to see how the controls respond and boggs the machine down to almost nothing, hardly loading the bucket. I start laughing when they say it's got low hours and has 50% undercarriage.

 

[moriboy]

We bought a Case 210 for our farm. It has about 8000 HRS on it and is still a pretty tight machine. Having a Cummins 5.9 pretty much ensures we won't ever have any problem finding engine parts. Everything else, well I'm not sure how well Case supports 15+ year old equipment.