Tracked Excavators for Sale (518)

Buying a Tracked Excavator

Thanks to the huge variety in capacity, both in terms of operating weight and digging capabilities, a buyer of a tracked excavators should carefully consider the size of the machine needed to carry out the job. If you can get away with a machine under 10 tonnes, then you should be looking at our mini-excavator pages.

The heavier the machine, the more power it needs – therefore a larger engine and wider track to accommodate it. This all leads to additional cost, so make sure you choose the right size, not simply the largest you can afford.

If you buy an excavator only to find it won’t fit on your trailer then you’ll be looking at even more investment in trailers and potentially adding to the transport complexity.

You may be tempted to buy a (cheaper) and more obscure brand, but you need to make sure that you can get the parts and get them quickly.  If you have a breakdown and parts take a week to arrive you’ll be losing more money that you saves in the initial purchase. This is why it is usually best to opt for a popular brand and model if you are a relative newcomer to operating tracked excavators.

Check the Provenance of the Excavator

As with buying any machine, make sure that it has a manufacturer’s plate and that it appears in order and not tampered with – if there is something wrong here – walk away.

Is the machine a grey import? Check carefully that the machine is CE marked.

Has the machine had a ‘facelift’? It is easy to change the model number stickers on the side of the machine to a more desirable model – check the model number on the manufacturer’s plate to avoid falling for this trick.

Zero Tail Swing?

If your digger is likely to be working roadside or in confined spaces, opt for a zero swing tail excavator.  This means that the rear of the rotating body will not protrude from the extremities of the tracks when slewing.

Explaining Excavator Model Naming

Let’s use a few models as an example – let’s look at the CAT 320D, Hitachi ZX200-3G, Komatsu PC200-8 and the Doosan DH215LC-7.

So, as far as Caterpillar are concerned, 320D 320, the first ‘3’ stands for “excavator”, Caterpillar uses different numbers for each of the product lines, for example “7” is for articulated trucks, “8” is for dozers, “9” is for loaders.

Next, the letter in front of the brand excavator represents the excavator code number of the manufacturer, Komatsu uses PC for excavator, WA for loaders, and D for dozers. Hitachi’s excavator use “ZX”, and Doosan use ‘DH’ for their excavator and “SK” for Kobelco.

Next comes some numbers – take CAT 320D. The ’20’ represents the operating weight of the excavator in tonnes in this example, 20 tons.

It’s not always exact, for Komatsu’s PC200-8, the 200 means “20 tonnes” (not 200 tonnes), Doosan’s DH215LC-7 means 215 for 21.5 tonnes, etc.

Finally, using the CAT 320D example the end is the letter “D” which is the series of products made by Caterpillar,

LC at the end indicates that the model uses widened, lengthened crawler, in order to increase the contact area with the ground.  This is generally used when there are soft ground conditions.