The Bobcat T7X is fully battery-powered and is built to be more productive from the ground up with electric actuation and propulsion. It is also quieter with high-performance torque and more powerful than any diesel-fuelled track loader that has ever come before it, all while eliminating any carbon emissions.

Originally developed for the North American market, the Bobcat T7X is undergoing internal testing and the gathering of customer feedback is planned for Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) region to identify its commercial potential.

Scott Park, President, and CEO of Doosan Bobcat said:

“Doosan Bobcat is at the forefront of innovation, and we are proud to debut the all-electric technology of the T7X to help customers maximize both sustainability and productivity. Our focus remains on providing solutions and products that empower people to accomplish more and build a better world.”

In the T7X, the traditional hydraulic workgroup has been completely replaced with an electrical drive system consisting of electric cylinders and electric drive motors, which means virtually no fluids. The new, all-electric Bobcat T7X uses just under one liter of eco-friendly coolant compared to around 216 liters of fluid in its diesel/hydraulic equivalent model.

The all-electric platform enables instantaneous power and peak torque available at every operating speed. The operator no longer must wait for the standard hydraulic system to build up power.

Joel Honeyman, Vice President of Global Innovation at Doosan Bobcat, added:

“This machine is a technological feat for Bobcat and for the entire industry. We challenged the status quo to deliver a connected, all-electric machine designed for power and performance that previously was not possible. We are excited to share this advancement with the world and proud of the hard work that has gone into making this a reality.”

The T7X operates with zero emissions and reduced noise and vibration generated by the machine. It works quietly and efficiently in noise-sensitive areas and indoors, which significantly lowers sound levels and improves the working environment.

It can also significantly lower daily operating costs when considering the reduction in annual maintenance costs and elimination of diesel, engine oil, diesel exhaust fluid, and hydraulic parts.

At the heart of the T7X is a powerful 62 kW lithium-ion battery from technology partner, Green Machine Equipment, Inc. While applications vary, each charge can support common daily work operations and the use of intelligent work modes for up to four hours of continuous operation time and a full day of operation during intermittent use.

The intelligence of the power management system is programmed to sense when loads are increasing, automatically backing off power when not needed to preserve the total energy use and extend the machine’s runtime.

The T7X will initially be available only in the North American market but the company intends to expand this to other regions in the future. During the company’s CES Media Days news conference, Doosan Bobcat NA (North America) announced a strategic partnership with South Carolina-based Sunbelt Rentals, a leading rental equipment company in North America with more than 1025 locations, with a strong presence in Europe in the UK, Germany, and France.

Through this partnership, Sunbelt Rentals committed to a significant investment in a large fleet of Bobcat T7X all-electric compact track loaders and electric compact excavators in North America, which will be co-branded and made available in 2022 and beyond. Sunbelt Rentals will be the first national equipment rental company to adopt Bobcat’s battery-electric technology and make it available to customers, supporting the environmental, social, and governance (ESG) focus for both companies.

The post Bobcat Launches Electric Compact Track Loader appeared first on North America FarmQuip Magazine.

As the owner and operator of Elite Earthworks, a site management company in Joplin, Mo., he tackles everything from burying downspouts to clearing and building out yards ahead of commercial and residential construction projects.

No two jobs are exactly alike, so Johnson needs to have the right tools for whatever a job site throws at him, but he found himself spending a lot of time changing out buckets on his compact excavator or trying to make do with what he had.

As a sole proprietor, Johnson knows how important his time is to his business’s bottom line, so, when he took his dealer’s recommendation and installed a new hydraulic Werk-Brau D-Lock variable center pin grabber coupler for his compact excavator, saving him at least an hour a day, he never looked back.

After spending 18 years doing landscape for his parents’ business, Johnson launched Elite Earthworks with a Takeuchi TL250 track loader and a TB260 excavator.

At first Johnson worked with a small number of buckets and was not very enamored with the manual change-out that his standard pin-on coupler required. Searching for a better solution, Johnson asked Victor Phillips, his local Takeuchi dealer, for a recommendation. The solution? A Werk-Brau D-Lock coupler.

Johnson saw an immediate return just from time saved switching between attachments and a whole new world of possibilities opened up for his business.

Before picking up his Werk-Brau D-Lock coupler, changing out buckets was a laborious process. Johnson first had to take the pins out of his current bucket, then get back in his excavator to hook his coupler up to the second bucket, then get back out of his cab to insert the pin into the second bucket before finally getting back into his excavator to continue working. The process from start to finish took Johnson about 20 minutes. Today, he can accomplish the same task in under a minute.

“You can pop them off, swing over, grab the other one, and just go on. It’s really sped everything up,”

Johnson said of him the process.

The ease comes in part from a coupler switch installed inside the excavator cab for simple safe activation, a highly visible front lock indicator and an automatic front lock that locks the front pin in the event the rear pin is not secured. The simple yet safe unlocking procedure helps prevent accidental releases.

Johnson recalled an incident when the cotter pin which kept the main pin and the latch shut actually fell out of his manual coupler, causing the bucket to disengage while in operation.

“Luckily the bucket was in a ditch at the time, or it could have been a whole lot worse,”

Johnson said of the potentially disastrous situation.

The manual coupler also required frequent greasing, which was problematic since it was normally covered in dirt. Johnson’s hydraulic coupler doesn’t require any greasing or lubrication and the unlocking process is designed to release only when intended by the operator.

For Johnson, this means more time spent working and less time switching between tools.

“It just seems like I’ve been able to speed up my productivity and do a cleaner job having those different attachments with the Werk-Brau.”

Before his coupler upgrade, Johnson would try to use his current attachment for as long as he could before taking the time to change out his tools. But now that switching between his arsenal of buckets is no longer a detriment, Johnson finds that he is much more willing to switch attachments whenever he needs.

He summed up the transition from his old way of working to the present,

“I may over dig ditches, or if I just needed to take out a little bit here and there, you’d end up digging way more out than what you need to and have to put more back where now I can actually say, okay, I need to pull this bucket for this.”

The shorter changeout time led to Johnson to increase his bucket arsenal to a 12, 18, 24 and 36-in. toothed bucket, a frost ripper, a 36 in. wide rake and a 42 in. crane bucket.

Now Elite Earthworks has the right tools and isn’t afraid to use them.

Johnson purchased this fleet of buckets from his new Takeuchi dealer, Midwest Equipment Supply in Springfield, Mo., where he also picked up a Werk-Brau main pin thumb. He was immediately sold on the thumb’s design and versatility.

“I actually like the shape of the thumb better. When not in use, it’s back against the cylinder of the machine, so the visibility’s much better. It seems to be a lot stronger. It’s just built better to grab things and move stuff around.”

The variety and access to a wider array of tools help Johnson deal with the terrain in Joplin where after 2 in. of topsoil the ground goes straight to rock with no gradation. Before picking up his ripper, Johnson used his standard 24-in. bucket to dig but its teeth would only last 250 to 300 hours going into the rocky earth.

Today he uses the ripper to loosen up the rocky clay, then switches to a traditional bucket to make digging up the rocky earth easier. This change lets the teeth on his bucket attachments last longer because the ripper is doing the “heavy lifting” of loosening up the rocky earth.

Johnson recalled a recent Elite Earthworks projects that benefited from his coupler quick changes.

“I dug a ditch and laid about 700 feet of water main. I was able to dig it, pop the bucket off, and then I got just a shackle on the back where we could hook the pipe up to it. You don’t have that bucket up there in the way as well. It’s just sped up the whole operation a lot.”

Johnson’s Werk-Brau D-Lock coupler lets him spend more time working and less time switching attachments, so getting the right tools for the job is a breeze. From nearly 20 minutes to less than a minute, the dramatically increased efficiency and productivity have already paid dividends for Elite Earthworks, making Johnson wonder how exactly he worked for so long without this tool in his toolbelt.

Source: Werk-Brau Co.

The post [Job Story] Brandom Johnson Accelerates Work with Werk-breu Accessories appeared first on North America FarmQuip Magazine.

John Deere continues to provide industry-leading job site solutions with the addition of an exclusive on-board grade indication option. Available as a factory or field kit option on the large-frame G-Series skid steers (330G and 332G) and the large-frame G-Series compact track loaders (331G and 333G), this new feature is ideal for job sites that involve leveling and slope work.

“Our industry-exclusive on-board grade indication was designed to be an indispensable unit for applications like water drainage, general site prep and clearing work, allowing operators to accurately monitor and alter grades from the seat of the cab,” said Gregg Zupancic, product marketing manager, skid steers and compact track loaders, John Deere Construction & Forestry. “This feature is intuitive and easy to use so operators can take advantage of this technology without specialized training.”

The industry-exclusive integrated on-board grade indication option provides operators with an accurate readout of the cross slope and main-fall slope of the machine. The machine cross slope and main-fall slope information is displayed in real time through the machine’s main display monitor. The readout can be easily configured to display either percentage or degrees depending on preference.

The absolute and relative slope readouts provide enhanced information to the operator for specific applications. The absolute value readout is useful for providing information during general grading applications that do not need a local grade reference. The relative value readout is well suited for operators looking to alter grade relative to an existing or reference grade.

On-board grade indication is available as a factory install on G-Series large-frame machines or as a field kit for field installation. 

Source: ForesterNetwork news

The post John Deere Introduces Industry-Exclusive On-Board Grade Indication on G-Series appeared first on North America FarmQuip Magazine.