Hi guys, a newbe to this forum and heavy equipment generally, just a retired motor mechanic. I have been asked to partner a gold miner reprocessing tailings from the Palmer R. gold-rush days 100+ years ago. The bottleneck in operations is the excavator. He currently has a mini excavator, I think it is called a 3 ton class, and wants something with a 3 ton capacity bucket. Is that a 10 ton class? That is talking real money but the Palmer gold fields were so rich the early miners were more concerned with tons processed rather than percentage Au extracted so there should be a return. This does not sound like hard work so would a 2014 CATERPILLAR 312E with 3,000 hrs be suitable AND what size bucket could it handle? I did read the thread here "How many hours is too many hours" and it was suggested that 20,000 may be the upper limit so it is well below that. Would a wheeled loader be a cheaper alternative? Thanks for your patience, there will be more beginner Qs yet.
a 3 ton bucket is a 2 cubic yard bucket. A 312 Cat swings about a 3/4 yard bucket, so that is quite a bit of difference. As far as which machine would be best, you need to understand what the operation will be. Most of the time the excavator is lifting up the material from a lower elevation, and off road trucks take it to your plant. If the tailing are sitting up high in piles, then a wheel loader could work just fine.
Thanks Skyking, that's what I suspected.