At Dominion Creek, Parker’s crew is working hard to fix a severely damaged excavator.
“We got the tub cleaned out, removed all the debris. Once we cleared out the grease, it was pretty shocking to see the size of the hole the pinion tore through the tub.”
The tub houses all the grease for the swing bearing and drive pinion. When one of the swing drives exploded, it sent its pinion through the steel tub, tearing a large hole in the process.
“You can see the teeth marks here. It must’ve taken an incredible amount of force to punch through steel like that.”
Now, the team needs to cut out the damaged section and fabricate a new steel plate to patch the hole and get the machine operational again.
A 480 excavator has two swing drives, which allow the cab to rotate a full 360 degrees. With one drive destroyed, the machine is out of action until repairs are complete.
Taylor’s first task is to weld in a new steel patch to replace the busted section of the tub.
“This is a really valuable machine. Having it split in half and parked in the yard does us no good. It’s slowing down all the ditching work at the cut.”
Taylor carefully measures and cuts the new plate, fitting it into the tub.
“Just about done here. That’ll do her.”
Meanwhile, the rest of the crew gets ready to reassemble the machine. The track body needs to be pulled back into position under the excavator cab, and a new swing drive must be installed.
“Just packing in some grease here.”
“Okay, guys. She’s greased up and running. Everyone knows their job?”
Aligning the swing drive is a delicate process — one wrong move could cause serious damage.
“This is the tough part. Lining it up under there. One slip and it could go horribly wrong.”
“Okay, keep coming. Just a bit more. Fingers out of the way.”
“Looking smooth. A little more on your side, Jeno… All right — we’re tight.”
With careful coordination and teamwork, the machine is finally brought back together.
“Good work, boys. It’s been a crazy day so far.”
Taylor points to the broken swing box lying in pieces nearby.
“You can see the old swing box — completely blown apart. Just gotta slam the new one in place, and this thing’s ready to go back to work.”
