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"It just became readily apparent we needed that instant mobility, and the ability to make that move without having to arrange a lowbed truck to put a crawler on," Fouty says.

Ease on down the road
Ease of movement around and to jobsites is one reason wheel excavators are such an integral part of the equipment fleet at K-Five Construction, Lemont, IL. This heavy highway construction contractor handles 135+ jobs each year, ranging from large parking lots to interstate highways and airport runways, in and around the Chicago area.

The company has been using Gradall chassis-mounted excavators for nearly four decades. "They eliminate the lowboy," says Dave Gorski, equipment superintendent. "They're easier to move up and down big jobs. You don't have to have a lowboy on site to move them if you have a larger, longer job on the highway."

This means transport vehicles are free to move other, less mobile machines. "We try to keep our fleet unit numbers to the point where the utilization numbers can stay high," Gorski says. "With that in mind, and all of our equipment and the number of jobs we do, our lowboys are tied up moving other equipment every day."

Their self reliance also means the wheel excavators can handle multiple tasks throughout the day. "The guys can go back and forth between two or three jobs if they have to," says Gorski.