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Had to choose between a bigger bucket or a thumb for the old excavator
My boss gave me a choice last spring, either get a new 36-inch bucket for the 320 or add a mechanical thumb to the 24-inch one we had. I went with the thumb, thinking it would be more useful for the demo work we had lined up. It cost about $2,500 to install, but it let me pick up and place concrete chunks way easier than just pushing them into a pile. After three months on a site clearing old foundations, I was moving material almost twice as fast. Anyone else had to make a call like that on a machine attachment?
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beth_park5mo ago
You spent only $2,500 on that thumb install? That seems way too low for a full mechanical thumb setup on a 320. I had a quote last year that was almost double that for the parts and labor. Did you do the welding yourself or find some crazy deal?
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hayden_king6mo ago
Smart move, that thumb probably saved your back from a lot of manual sorting too.
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kelly.patricia6mo ago
Actually have to disagree on that one. The thumb is doing the real heavy lifting here, not the back. That's a repetitive stress injury waiting to happen. Seen it too many times. You trade one kind of strain for another, and wrist or thumb problems can be just as bad.
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stella1216mo ago
But you're missing the whole point of using a tool. The thumb drive lets you move a huge amount of data without touching a single box. That's the win. A sore thumb for a day beats a wrecked back for life, every single time. You can always switch hands or take a break, but a back injury sticks with you. It's not a perfect trade, but it's a way better one.
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