Plant Machinery

Posts Tagged ‘Guide’

Like a Swiss Army Knife on wheels, a skid steer loader can support a huge range of additional attachments to enable it to be used for an unbelievable variety of jobs. Your standard issue skid steer loader comes with a bucket attachment, but its capabilities don’t end with just humping mud and dirt about. Here are just some of the attachments available for your skid steer loader, and a brief explanation of what they do.

Augers – These look like giant drill bits. They use the Archimedes principal to dig deep, clean holes for foundations.
Claws – hydraulic grapples that are used to grab and lift heavy objects.
Hitches – like the trailer hitch on your car. Attached to the back of the loader and used to pull trailers and so on.
Backhoes – a steel bucket attached to a rotatable hydraulic arm used for digging and scooping.
Mowers – for cutting the grass!

Dozer Blades – a large metal blade fitted to the front of the skid steer loader. Used for pushing dirt and debris..

Plows – like a blade but can have a curved plate at the top, or be angled in a v shape to enable snow or leaves to be pushed to the side
Rakes – for scarifying ground and gathering loose material like leaves.
Forks – same as you would find on a forklift, these blades are used to carry palletized materials and suspended loads such as heavy bags.
Trenchers – used for digging ditches or long trenches.

The list above is only a small selection of the hundreds of additional tools that you can buy for your skid steer loader. You will probably never need most of them in you day to day work, so it’s good to know that there are many hire shops around the country that will rent you specialist tools on a daily or even an hourly basis. Thanks to the skid steer “quick attach” system most of these attachments can be used on any brand of skid steer loader, although there are some exceptions so its worth checking suitability with your supplier before purchasing.