What To Look For When You Are Looking For Used Construction Equipment
Today’s economy, where almost everyone is predicting doom and gloom, may be the best time for you to expand your lineup of bulldozers. Many construction companies are off-loading their heavy equipment inventories at an astonishing rate.
Not to mention some dozer manufacturer dealers are creating very deep discount on any trade-ins they have in order to move items off their sales floor. So this makes an excellent time for an enterprising owner to buy into some great deals on bulldozers for sale, especially veritable workhorses like the Cat D8.
The economy like everything else will eventually rebound and those construction businesses that are prepared can seize renewed opportunities while others are still quaking under their blankets. Read this article to discover some good tips on buying bulldozers for sale.
Tips on Buying Bulldozers for Sale
One of the most versatile yet powerful of the heavy equipment machines in the construction industry is the bulldozer. Often nicknamed dozers, Cats (shortened from the legendary Caterpillar manufacturer) or D8s (one of Caterpillar’s most popular model names), bulldozers are basically just large hydraulic blade mounted on the front of very powerful engine. They are separated into two main categories: crawlers with wide, tank-like tracks that grip the ground and faster, rubber tire dozers.
It’s the compact power and go-just-about-anywhere mobility that make dozers great for grading and sculpting land and moving around loose materials like soil, rock, gravel, etc. Not to mention, bulldozers are frequently used to clear away brush and debris, even cutting or knocking over small trees and stumps.
Tip #1 – Get the horsepower you need. Typically bulldozer engines range from 40 hp (horsepower) to 400 hp or more in size. The most common one are from 100 to 240 hp and probably are the ones a construction company would be interested in. The larger hp monsters are used in trash recycling, mining or other large-scale operations
Tip #2 – Look at the tracks. The mentioned before, dozers have massive ground-hugging threads on tracks, similar to tanks. These tracks make it possible to bulldozers to move handily on just about any type of material from boulders to deep mud. The wider the track footprint the more the weigh of the Cat is spread over the surface area so that it can “float” over bogs or other wet areas.
Tip # 3 – Look at the tires. Rubber tire bulldozers are often used in mining, timber harvesting or construction projects where fast speed is important. Tired bulldozers are also used in areas where traveling long distances over sharp, hard rock may have priority.
Tip # 4 – Look at the physical size. You may to compromise between the actual size of the dozer and its capability to move materials. The standard rule it the more powerful the bulldozer, usually the larger it’s cab, blade, engine and tracks.
Tip # 5 – Look at the blade. The further the blade is away from the body of the machine the more visibility the operator has but they will lose lots of seconds to response time. The closer the blade the better the response time but the less ground area is visible from the cab.
Now that you understand a bit more about what to look for in bulldozers for sale, you can start making a buyer checklist that will help you find a bulldozer in your price range.
