Taking a look at What Makes a Heavy Duty Excavator

A marvel of modern engineering, the heavy duty excavator has become a standard sight on many construction sites including buildings and road repairs. This article takes a look at the machine's components as well as offering some maintenance tips.


Also called JCBs in a great example of a generic trademark, excavators are a marvel of modern engineering, combining hydraulics, physics and cutting-edge scientific research in one mammoth package. The ever-present sight of a JCB heavy duty excavator is what has made the machine take on the company's name, especially in India.

A natural evolution from the steam shovel, these magnificent machines are also often called power shovels, a mistaken but fitting name. A great improvement from their precursor, the cable operated excavator, modern excavators are fundamentally different in operation due to their use of hydraulic motors, which are activated linearly.

In this article, let's take a look at what makes this beautiful example of human ingenuity tick. Like all major machines, the tracked excavator is an amalgamation of many different parts. This may vary depending on the excavator attachments used, but in general, they follow a basic pattern.



The major and arguably most important component is of course, the motor. The powerhouse of the entire machine, it is traditionally powered by petrol, but can also be powered by alternate fuel sources like diesel and increasingly nowadays, even electricity. Admittedly though, electric motors are extremely rare and limited to specialised uses.

The second important part of an excavator is the excavator arm. This is the long section attached to the lower part of the chassis frame. It has two main sections that are attached together with a hinge. It is to the end of this arm that the excavator attachments, usually the bucket loader, are hooked. This is the part that does all the heavy lifting when the excavator is in use like scooping and digging.

One of the interesting things about the excavator is the fact that instead of wheels, it has tracks, like a tank. These tracks function in a very unique manner. In tandem, they can only move the excavator backwards of forwards in a straight line. To execute turns, the operator has to stop one track and move the other one. A spin is completed by moving both tracks in opposite directions.

All these moving parts working in the kinds of conditions that excavators are exposed to, make for a machine that is susceptible to damage, wear and tear. To avoid this, they have to be maintained properly, which involves using genuine excavator spare parts and regularly oiling any moving parts and cleaning the entire machine.