Do you own or help operate a construction company? If so, it’s going to be very difficult for you to enjoy success without the right construction equipment.
From bulldozers and excavators to loaders and trenchers, there will be so many pieces of construction equipment you’ll need to obtain. You’ll struggle to keep up with other companies in the construction industry if you don’t have them handy.
A track hoe is one of the pieces of construction equipment you’ll turn to early and often. It’s an excavating machine that features everything from a boom and a bucket to a rotating cab and, of course, an undercarriage consisting of tracks, which is where it gets its name.
Of all the types of excavators you can buy for your construction company, this will be one of your best excavator options. You’ll find yourself using an excavator like this for all kinds of things.
Here are 11 ways to use a track hoe in the construction industry.
1. Clearing Land
At the beginning of a construction project, there will typically be a parcel of land that’ll need to be cleared to some degree. It might be covered with small trees, brush, and other things that’ll get in the way if they aren’t removed.
This is the first way in which a construction company can put a track hoe to good use. They can utilize it to clear almost anything that might be sitting on a patch of land off of it.
If you have especially tall trees on a piece of land, you might want to find a better way of clearing them than with a track hoe. But otherwise, you should be able to clear land pretty effectively with a track hoe alone.
2. Breaking Ground
“Breaking ground” is usually a ceremonious occasion that takes place at the start of a construction project. Many construction companies will use a few shovels to symbolically break ground.
But after that’s finished, they’ll bring in the really heavy-duty construction equipment to break more ground and get a construction project moving in the right direction. A piece of construction equipment like a track hoe will be one of the best options when it comes to breaking ground.
Even if the ground is very hard, it isn’t going to be able to put up much of a fight against a track hoe. This type of excavator will shred right through dirt, stones, etc., and get any construction project off to a fantastic start.
3. Earth Moving
Once you’ve broken ground on a construction site, you’re going to need to begin moving earth all over the place. And it’s going to be almost impossible to do it if you don’t have easy access to something like a track hoe.
Some other pieces of heavy construction equipment might buckle under all the weight of a bucket full of earth. At the very least, they’ll move very slowly and serve as a safety hazard when they’re overloaded with earth.
But a track hoe won’t struggle at all as it picks up earth and moves it to wherever it needs to go. The rotating cab on a track hoe will make it especially easy for you to move earth around without encountering any problems.
You might just want to think about getting some heavy-duty mats for your track hoe if you’re anticipating a lot of mud on your construction site.
4. Busting Up Stones, Rocks, Etc.
There will inevitably be a wide range of smaller stones, rocks, etc., mixed in with the earth that you move around with a track hoe. You might not even notice them when you’re moving earth to a designated location.
But every now and then, you might come across larger stones, rocks, etc., that’ll need to be broken up before they can be moved. Under normal circumstances, you might have to bring your construction project to a grinding halt to deal with this situation.
But you’ll be happy to hear that you won’t have to stop working when you have a track hoe on your construction site. It’ll pulverize any stones, rocks, etc., that might be in your way so that they can be removed from your site in smaller pieces.
You’ll be shocked to see how quickly a track hoe will be able to make bigger stones, rocks, etc., a distant memory. It’ll keep your construction project on the right track by doing this and help you steer clear of any unnecessary delays.
5. Digging Foundations
One of the most important parts of building any home or other structure will be laying down a strong foundation for it. The strength of a building’s foundation might make or break it.
For this reason, you should always utilize the right construction equipment when you’re digging a foundation. It’s yet another thing you’ll be able to rely on a track hoe to do.
No matter how deep you might need to dig for a foundation, a track hoe is going to be up for the challenge. Whether you’re digging a foundation for a single-story house or a larger commercial building, it’ll check all the right boxes for you and ensure you don’t encounter any issues while digging for a foundation.
You should also consider getting your hands on the best materials for building foundations. These helical piles will be a great choice in certain cases.
6. Digging Drainage
Outside of digging a foundation for a building, you’re also going to need to dig drainage for it. This drainage will prevent water from pooling around the outside of the foundation and possibly causing it to wear down quicker than it should.
Digging drainage for a building by hand can be an exhausting and sometimes even dangerous job to do. It’s why you should try to avoid subjecting any of your construction workers to having to do it.
Rather than digging the drainage for a home or other structure by hand, you should enlist the services of a track hoe to get it done. Not only will it dig drainage faster than usual, but it’ll also help keep your construction site as safe as it can be.
7. Creating Trenches
You’ll often need to create a series of trenches when you’re building a new structure. These trenches will be used to house pipes, cables, etc. for the structure that you’re building.
Just like with digging drainage, you’re going to discover that trying to create trenches by hand will take a really long time and prove to be back-breaking work. Because of this, you should give your construction workers a break by allowing them to use a track hoe to create trenches.
It doesn’t matter how deep, wide, or long you need the trenches for a structure to be. You’ll be able to create these trenches in no time at all when you have a track hoe on standby to help move things along.
In the event that you’re creating trenches for pipes, cables, etc., you’ll also be able to fill them back in later in the blink of an eye. You’ll save so much time on your construction site and make it infinitely safer by counting on your trusty track hoe to help you at every turn.
8. Making Holes
During a construction project, there will be times when you’ll need to dig holes in the ground for various reasons. For instance, when you’re building a house, you might need to make holes for the posts for a fence, a deck, or something else.
In some cases, it might not make sense to pull out an entire track hoe to dig these types of holes if you don’t have to. But if you already have it on your site, it certainly wouldn’t hurt to use a track hoe to do any digging that must be done.
Just about any time you need to dig down into the ground on your construction site, a track hoe will be there to save you. You won’t even bat an eye when it’s time to create a hole, even when you need one that’s on the deeper and/or wider side.
9. Grading Ground
Towards the end of your construction project, you’ll need to use your track hoe to move much of the earth that you moved earlier back where it belongs. You’ll also need to remove some of it from your construction site entirely since it isn’t all going to fit once you’ve built a new structure on it.
In each of these cases, you’ll find that it’ll be helpful to have a track hoe around. You can use the backhoe to put the earth back into place on your construction site. You can also use it to put earth into the back of dump trucks so that it can be hauled off somewhere else.
At the end of all this, you’ll also be able to use a track hoe to grade the ground on your construction site. Grading the ground will involve making it level.
You might want to use it to put aggregate materials for driveways, parking lots, etc. in place as well.
10. Moving Heavy Equipment, Tools, and Materials
The average track hoe can pick up a ridiculous amount of weight on a construction site and move it around. With this in mind, you might want to use a track hoe to pick up heavy equipment, tools, and construction materials on your site from time to time so that you can move them around with ease.
To be clear, you don’t want to do anything with a track hoe that might jeopardize the safety of your site in any way. You also don’t want to break any OSHA rules and regulations by using a track hoe to move heavy items around.
But as long as you’re safe when you do it and abide by all the rules and regulations that are in place, you might be able to find ways to use a track hoe to move heavy items you wouldn’t be able to move otherwise, like pre-cast concrete. It’s one of the more innovative ways in which you can use a track hoe.
11. Doing Landscaping
If your construction company is going to be lending a hand with landscaping a site once it’s all done, this is one more way that you can utilize a track hoe. A track hoe can be used to do any digging related to a landscaping project.
A track hoe can also be used to move some of the items that will be a part of a landscaping project around. It will be difficult, if not impossible, to move some trees around without the right construction equipment.
There is a chance that your construction company might not have much involvement in the landscaping of your sites. But if you do ever get asked to work on the landscaping side of things, it’ll be so great to have a track hoe for it.
As you’ve seen here, there is almost no end to the various ways in which you can use a track hoe when you own or help operate a construction company. It makes it easy to see why track hoes have turned into such essential pieces of equipment within the construction industry.
Contact Us If You Need Help Moving a Track Hoe
Did your construction company just add a track hoe to its fleet of construction equipment? If you did, transporting it from one job site to the next might be the only thing stopping you from putting it right into action.
But not to worry. Patriot Freight Group can provide you with the over-dimensional and heavy haul trucking services you need to get a track hoe from point A to point B. We have the experience it takes to move this kind of construction equipment around quickly and safely.
Would you like to take advantage of our services? Reach out to us today to get our help.
