Skid Steer vs backhoe: Both are indispensable machines for agriculture, industry, and manufacturing. They also have significant differences. Next, I will take you to understand them.
What Is A Skid Steer?
Skid Steer is a multifunctional engineering machine with a relatively compact and small body. Generally, it adopts four-wheel drive, and the left and right wheels can be independently controlled to achieve pivot steering, which gives it extremely high maneuverability in narrow spaces. For example, in some indoor demolition projects or narrow warehouse aisles, it can turn and move around easily.
What Is A Backhoe?
It is the most widely used earth-moving machinery, featuring flexible operation and fast slewing speed. In recent years, the backhoe market has developed rapidly, and the production of backhoes has been moving towards larger size, miniaturization, multifunctionality, and specialization.
Skid Steer Vs Backhoe: Different Product Structures
A skid steer usually consists of an engine, a cab, a bucket, and a main frame, and it is equipped with a lifting mechanism, which enables it to perform lifting operations. The front bucket can be moved up and down by the lifting mechanism. However, a backhoe does not have such a lifting mechanism. It mainly controls the position of the bucket through operations like moving forward and backward and turning left and right. This is one of the most notable differences between the two.
The bucket of a skid steer can be moved up and down by the lifting mechanism, which affects the convenience of operation. The bucket of a backhoe is fixed at the front end of the machine body and has no lifting function. Due to its short wheelbase, the skid steer can work particularly nimbly in narrow spaces. Moreover, in narrow spaces, the skid steer equipment can not only provide the original loading operations but also achieve various types of engineering work through attachments, maximizing the speed of engineering construction. There are also corresponding lights for night work.
Different Working Devices, Performances, And Parameters
Skid Steer vs backhoe
Working Devices
The working device of a skid steer mainly consists of a pair of front-mounted lifting arms. By replacing different attachments (such as buckets, grapples, sweeping brushes, etc.), it can achieve multiple functions. The cab of it is usually located in the middle of the machine, allowing the operator to observe the front and both sides of the work situation well.
The working device of a backhoe hydraulic machine is composed of a backhoe bucket, bucket cylinder, boom arm, boom arm cylinder, boom, boom cylinder, and linkage mechanism. All components are articulated, and various actions in the digging process are achieved through the extension and retraction of the cylinders.
The toe of the boom and the lower pivot point of the boom cylinder are both hinged on the turntable, and the boom cylinder is used to support and change the inclination angle of the boom. Through the extension and retraction of the boom cylinder, the boom can rotate around the lower hinge point for lifting.
The boom arm is hinged at the upper end of the boom, and the relative position of the boom arm to the boom is controlled by the boom arm cylinder. The lifting of the boom is controlled by the boom cylinder, and the rotation of the bucket relative of the boom arm is controlled by the bucket cylinder.
When using the backhoe for operation, the boom arm or bucket can be rotated as needed while lowering the boom. When unloading, the boom arm or bucket can also be rotated simultaneously. Rotating the bucket can directly unload materials onto transport vehicles.
In addition, the cab of the backhoe is positioned relatively high so that the operator can clearly see the working state of the digging arm and the bucket, especially when digging deep pits or trenches, facilitating precise operation. Besides, some backhoes may also be equipped with loader buckets at the front end for loading materials.
Skid Steer Vs Backhoe: Working Performances And Parameters
The operating weight of a skid steer is relatively light, generally ranging from 2 to 7 tons. Its lifting capacity is limited, and the maximum lifting weight is usually between 1 and 3 tons. It has a relatively high traveling speed and can move quickly on flat ground, which is convenient for frequently transporting materials over short distances. Its digging depth is relatively shallow.
Even with a digging attachment installed, the maximum digging depth is hardly more than 2 to 3 meters, and its digging force is relatively small. It is mainly applicable to shallow digging and handling light-load materials.
The main parameters of a backhoe include the overall machine quality, overall dimensions, standard bucket capacity, traveling speed, slewing speed, maximum digging radius, maximum digging depth, maximum digging height, maximum unloading height, minimum slewing radius, and tail slewing radius.
The operating weight of a backhoe is relatively heavy, usually ranging from 8 tons to dozens of tons. Its digging depth is relatively large, generally reaching 3 to 10 meters or even deeper, and the specific depth depends on the model and the length of the digging arm.
Skid Steer Vs Backhoe: Different Functions
The skid steer is famous for its flexibility, high efficiency, and multi-functionality. It can travel on uneven terrains, such as muddy construction sites, rugged mountain roads, or snow-covered areas, and it can be equipped with various attachments, such as buckets, forklift tines, sweeping brushes, bulldozer blades, etc., to adapt to different work requirements. The backhoe is mainly used for digging operations and is usually used for excavating loose materials such as ores, cement, clay, and coal.
The backhoe is one of the most common earth-moving equipment. It is mainly used for excavating foundation pits (trenches) or pipe trenches below the working surface, independent foundation pits, and slope excavation; linear and curved digging, digging at a certain angle, ultra-deep trench digging, trench slope digging, etc.
The main difference in functions between the skid steer and the backhoe lies in the focus of the operation. The skid steer focuses on flexible material handling and multifunctional site operations. It is like a “versatile handyman”.
For example, on a construction site, it can quickly complete tasks such as transporting piled building materials (such as bricks, and bagged cement) to different construction points by using various attachments. In the agricultural field, it can easily transport hay bales when equipped with hay forks. The main function of the backhoe, however, focuses on digging operations, especially downward digging. It is like a “professional digger”.
For example, when digging the foundation of a building, the backhoe can dig deep into the ground to excavate a foundation pit that meets the building requirements by virtue of its relatively long digging arm and large digging force.
Skid Steer Vs Backhoe: Different In Applicable Ranges
The skid steer is suitable for occasions with narrow working sites, uneven ground, and frequently changing work contents, such as infrastructure construction, industrial applications, wharf loading and unloading, urban streets, residential areas, barns, livestock sheds, airport runways, etc. It can also be used as attachment equipment for large-scale engineering construction machinery.
The backhoe is mainly applied to large-scale earthwork projects, mining (for excavating ores and cleaning up slag), building foundation construction (excavating foundations and basements), water conservancy projects (excavating ditches and river channels), etc. It plays a key role in outdoor engineering projects that require a large amount of digging work.
Skid Steer Vs Backhoe: Different Construction Methods
The construction methods for material handling mainly include shoveling, transporting, and unloading.
The construction methods for site leveling mainly include rough leveling and fine leveling.
The construction methods for digging mainly include shallow trench digging and shallow foundation digging.
The construction methods for sweeping mainly include ground sweeping material cleaning, etc.
The backhoe is suitable for excavating sandy or clayey soils of types 1 – 3. It is mainly used for excavating foundation pits (trenches) or pipe trenches with not too deep depth below the shutdown surface and soils with high water content. The maximum excavation depth is 4 – 6 meters, and the economically reasonable excavation depth is 1.5 – 3.0 meters. The excavated earth can be piled on both sides of the foundation pit (trench), or pipe trench, pushed to a distant place by a bulldozer, or transported away by dump trucks.
The general construction methods include trench end excavation method, trench side excavation method, trench corner excavation method, and multi-layer relay excavation method, etc.
Skid Steer Vs Backhoe: Machine Brand Recommendations
Caterpillar, Komatsu, Volvo CE, JCB, Case, Doosan. Click the link for more information about the brand.
Through the above introduction, I believe you have already understood the differences between the skid steer and the backhoe. If your next project requires either of them, please feel free to contact us, and we will meet all your needs.