My friend is trying out a JD850 excavator and he is looking for a shorter stick for it.It has a 12 or maybe a 14ft stick now.He needs more of a mass excavation stick.Somebody said a ZX870 Hitichi would work but how bout a 850H Hitichi? I would handle a bigger bucket and be more stable with this short stick.
The Deere 850D is a Hitachi ZX850, so the stick, boom etc should be interchangeable. The buckets also interchange with the older 800C, ZX800, EX750, EX700, except that true the mass excavator sticks (which are around 9' in length, if I recall correctly) do NOT interchange with the regular buckets. I'm not sure if the stick interchanges with the older machines' but I believe that it's possible they do. I was told by a Nortrax mechanic that the 850's boom definitely doesn't interchange with the older machines, as it is a bit wider. You should be able to find an 11' stick for the 850 that will easily handle an 88" bucket. My older 800C can handle an 80" digging wet shot rock with the regular 27' Boom and 14' 5" stick, so the more powerful 850 should be able to handle a bigger bucket easily.
Thanks for the info,he must be running the 14'5 stick cause it's got tons of reach and my buddy says if ya get it streched all the way out it gets kinda tipsy.He's got the 84'' bucket on it.I have found a boom,stick and bucket off a ZX 850 thats pretty close to here.Maybe they would just rent the stick and bucket or just the stick. Thanks again and ILL keep ya posted.
If the stick seems very long then it may be the 17' 9" stick which is the longest stick that Hitachi/Deere offers for that machine. The standard length stick for the 750-850 Hitachi machines is the "medium" 14' 5" stick. My 800C came with one of those. Initially I was using that stick with an 8' AddaBoot (which added 6500lbs to the end of the stick) for several months, which made it a bit tipsy, so we took the AddaBoot off and used the 14' stick with the 80" bucket. Late last year, we installed a 18'1" aftermarket stick, which I have been using for the last year with a 60" 5CY CF bucket. We did not have to add any counterweight to the machine. We've excavated over 250,000 cubic yards of shot rock in the last 12 months with that setup, and we've had no issues. I am about to install a custom 35' boom on the machine, so that we can dig closer to 38' (to get more yield) and we are going to add 5500lbs of counterweight and use a 50" bucket. I can't see how your friends 850 would be tipsy with a 14'5" stick, even with a 84" bucket on it. My 800 was solid with the 14'5" stick and 80" bucket and we're digging wet, heavy, blasted shot rock. It could also be that it has the long 10 meter boom on it? That would make it tipsy with a big bucket.
Im thinking your right about that stick being 17ft.We ate lunch together yesterday and he says it must be a 17ft.He was settin on a 15ft+ bench and had tons of reach left.He's been top loading 637D's till they get some 40 ton Deere trucks in there.Takes 4 passes to load a 637D Scraper.He said it's a 8 yard bucket heaped.He also said yesterday that it really doesn't have a wole lotta pulling power to ya ,but we both agreed that with a 17ft stick how could it. LOL It's more of a pipe laying machine with that stick,Id say 30+ ft deep easy on depth.My uncle has a old R981 Liebherr that he strips dirt for his sand pit,now you want a machine with alot of pullin power Liebherr has it on pullin power and breakout force.Those twin cyl on the stick make a huge difference.A R974 has the same breakout force as a PC1100 Komatsu which is quite abit bigger.Anyway they brought in a PC 400 yesterday with a 72" bucket and it looks like a toy settin beside the 850.Id love to run one of those giant excavators like a EX5500 or EX8000 backhoe version. It would be like swinging your house behine ya!! LOL Talk to ya later.
Ran the 850 last Sunday,boy it is a horse!! Loading 40 ton Deere Articulated trucks with tailgates in 4 passes and 3 without gates. Settin on a 18ft bench and still had plenty of reach.It does get alittle tipsy when you swing way out there with a full bucket but it is a awesome machine,had a PC400 workin beside me and it looked like a toy. Got a ripper for the 400 and the 850 to rip some of the rock.
My buddy ended up sending the 850 back,he now has a 650D LC he bought instead of having to rent the 850.