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A walking excavator or popularly spider excavator is a special type of all-terrain
Unusual off-road locomotion website, September 2010 Despite the advantages of the design, it failed to be widely used for a number of reasons, including the relatively small gain in mobility; the fact that most excavation is done in urban areas; and costliness, both of the electro-hydraulic controls and of maintenance. The walking excavator is still not well known to the general public.''Unusual spider excavator, the Swiss-made Menzi Muck excavator, crawls on the hillside at Farm World''
Glenn Mulcaster, Machine The Weekly Times, April 2, 2014 Today, only walking excavators and forest harvesters, such as the Ecolog forest harvester or the TimberPro tilt cab, are designed to move and work in mountains.
annual report, Menzi Muck, 2013 In 2014, Kaiser AG had a turnover of 70 million Swiss francs.'' Unternehmer im Gespräch mit Studierenden''
Julius Rößner, Universität Liechtenstein, March 7, 2014
Kaiser AG website
Menzi Muck AG website
Engineering vehicles Excavators
A walking excavator or popularly spider excavator is a special type of all-terrain excavator
Excavators are heavy construction equipment consisting of a boom, dipper (or stick), bucket and cab on a rotating platform known as the "house". The house sits atop an undercarriage with tracks or wheels. They are a natural progression fro ...
. Like the regular excavator it consists of a boom, stick, bucket
A bucket is typically a watertight, vertical cylinder or truncated cone or square, with an open top and a flat bottom, attached to a semicircular carrying handle called the '' bail''.
A bucket is usually an open-top container. In contrast, a ...
and cab on a rotating platform known as the "house". However, its house sits atop an undercarriage consisting of leg or arm-like extensions with or without wheels. All extensions can move in increments, hence the name ''walking excavator''. This is different from an early 20th century dragline excavator
A dragline excavator is a piece of heavy equipment used in civil engineering and surface mining.
Draglines fall into two broad categories: those that are based on standard, lifting cranes, and the heavy units which have to be built on-site. Mo ...
where a set of feet plate are alternately lifted and lowered.
History
Most traditional excavators have tracks orwheel
A wheel is a circular component that is intended to rotate on an axle bearing. The wheel is one of the key components of the wheel and axle which is one of the six simple machines. Wheels, in conjunction with axles, allow heavy objects to be ...
s as undercarriage, limiting their usability on steep inclines, uneven terrain or inaccessible positions.
In 1966, Edwin Ernst Menzi (1897–1984) and Joseph Kaiser (1928–1993) together invented the walking excavator for work on mountain slopes. Subsequently, Kaiser AG, Schaanwald, Liechtenstein
Liechtenstein (), officially the Principality of Liechtenstein (german: link=no, Fürstentum Liechtenstein), is a German-speaking microstate located in the Alps between Austria and Switzerland. Liechtenstein is a semi-constitutional monarchy ...
, and Menzi Muck AG, Kriessern, Switzerland
). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...
, developed excavators separately.''Walking Excavator and Mobility''Unusual off-road locomotion website, September 2010 Despite the advantages of the design, it failed to be widely used for a number of reasons, including the relatively small gain in mobility; the fact that most excavation is done in urban areas; and costliness, both of the electro-hydraulic controls and of maintenance. The walking excavator is still not well known to the general public.''Unusual spider excavator, the Swiss-made Menzi Muck excavator, crawls on the hillside at Farm World''
Glenn Mulcaster, Machine The Weekly Times, April 2, 2014 Today, only walking excavators and forest harvesters, such as the Ecolog forest harvester or the TimberPro tilt cab, are designed to move and work in mountains.
Economic success
In 2007, Kaiser AG, Schaanwald, Liechtenstein, realized a turnover of nearly 60 millionSwiss franc
The Swiss franc is the currency and legal tender of Switzerland and Liechtenstein. It is also legal tender in the Italian exclave of Campione d'Italia which is surrounded by Swiss territory. The Swiss National Bank (SNB) issues banknotes and the fe ...
s.
In 2013, Menzi Muck AG had a turnover of 56.93 million Swiss francs.''Geschäftsbericht 2013''annual report, Menzi Muck, 2013 In 2014, Kaiser AG had a turnover of 70 million Swiss francs.'' Unternehmer im Gespräch mit Studierenden''
Julius Rößner, Universität Liechtenstein, March 7, 2014
Design
The walking excavator's main feature is the ability to move in a crab- or spider-like fashion and hence overcome any terrain obstacle. The undercarriage design varies widely from model to model and between specialized roles. The number of legs or wheels can also vary from three (Menzi Muck 5000T2) to four. The leg design can also vary from fixed to telescoping. Most walking excavators now have rotating or powered wheels, allowing them to roll or drive depending on the need. Often the boom is also employed in moving, for example to overcome gaps that are wider than the reach of the excavator's legs.See also
*Harvester (forestry)
A harvester is a type of heavy forestry vehicle employed in cut-to-length logging operations for felling, delimbing and bucking trees. A forest harvester is typically employed together with a forwarder that hauls the logs to a roadside la ...
References
{{reflist, 2External links
Kaiser AG website
Menzi Muck AG website
Engineering vehicles Excavators