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According to Lemke, the 764 HSD and 3D-MC² should have a fundamental, beneficial impact on company operations when they start working with both the machine and the system by summer 2009. "We can probably do more work with the equipment we have," he notes. "Our radius of work for heavy highway is 150-200 miles in northern Minnesota and northern Wisconsin and if we have a piece of equipment that can handle a couple of different tasks, it would save the mobilization costs for a five-hour drive. We're a diverse company with a short season and we don't really have the market where we have repeat-type projects, so we need to be versatile and adapt to markets. This dozer is versatile and will adapt to any type of job, whether it's a city street or a rural road or a landfill."

An example of a project on which the new dozer and machine control system would eliminate the need for a machine was a road-grading project in Ashland, WI that RJS completed in 2008. "With some of the intersections on the side streets, our motor grader was too large to get in and effectively do the intersections. So a dozer with the Topcon system would give us a turn-on-a-dime-type piece of equipment for those tight spots."

Don Talend of Write Results, West Dundee, IL, is a publicity and communications project manager specializing in construction, innovation and technology.