Excavator control and startup Basics

 Excavator

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basics and when i mean basics we're not

even going to get into running the

machine today on today's BOLOG because

it's going to get too lengthy if i try

to do it all

so today we're doing an outside the cab

and inside the cab tour of the machine

we will do a separate bolog for running

the machine just because this is

excavators are way more involved than

dozers and it would be really difficult

to do a tips and tricks

and keep the tour together i think it

would get way too lengthy

so stay posted for the actual operating

bolog reading but today we're gonna go for basic never

been in an excavator new operator what

do you do to start your day

so the first thing we're going to do

when we walk up to this machine

before we're ready to do anything

for

the day is we need to grease this

machine

and i'm not going to go through every

individual grease point but

excavators for the most part all have

the same grease points

so you're gonna have two bucket pins

which this machine has a coupler and

i'll show you that real quick

this has a quick coupler on it so these

two pens here

don't actually receive grease the this

is a what's called a pen grabbing

coupler

so this coupler which is this piece

right here

this coupler grabs onto these pins and

so they don't need grease because they

aren't physically moving

now there is a piece in the coupler that

needs grease you'll see right up in here

and i think there's another one further

down in there

the the components of the actual coupler

will need grease

but when you have a coupler on a machine

and it's a pin grabber style you don't

need to grease these two

but you will have these pins that you

need to grease

and you can see there's some grease

points back here there's going to be

grease points up on that front pin as

well

then you're going to have grease points

on the linkage up here

moving up your stick cylinder i'm sorry

your

bucket cylinder where it attaches to the

stick is going to have a grease point up

there

and you'll just curl the boom all the

way in and your bucket all the way in

and lower it to the ground

and you'll be able to reach that grease

point up there moving away from the

machine

so that we can actually see what we're

doing here you'll also while you have

the machine in the curled position

you're going to have grease points up

there where the boom and stick meet

you're going to have your stick still

cylinder that you'll grease this point

back here it's important to note you're

not going to grease from the ground

that's actually on a grease block that's

up on the machine that i'll show you in

a second here

but you do have grease points up in that

area and then one of the most critical

things you do need to grease

is this guy right here that is

your swing bearing that's this whole

turntable right here

that you're greasing with these this

point that is one of the most expensive

components on an excavator that you can

replace

and that the only reason you'll need to

replace that component

outside of just the the machine being

ancient

the only reason you'll ever need to

replace that is if you don't grease it

it's a stupid simple thing to do and it

can save that i bet that swing bearing

is easily 30 thousand dollars on this

machine you're talking a substantial

amount of money if you don't grease that

so

make sure you grease the turntable

you've also got your

boom cylinders here that will take

grease and that's pretty much it for on

the ground stuff

so then what we're going to do is we're

going to move up onto the machine

and right here on the side of the boom

is the grease block i was telling you

about

you're going to have multiple grease

points here this is going to grease

parts of the boom itself this long pin

that runs down here it's going to grease

part of that

it's going to run up and grease your

boom cylinders at the top

and you're also going to have a grease

point that goes up to our stick cylinder

that's up at the top there that we won't

be able to reach from the ground

so that about sums up greasing the

machine and that needs to be daily

there are points on here that you don't

have to grease quite as frequently

a lot of machines all machines really

have hour charts that tell you when you

should grease

here are my thoughts on that is you get

to know your machine and this isn't just

excavators this is any machine you run

as you get to know your machine you're

going to know when certain points need

grease for instance

i know for a fact that those bucket pins

out there

is a daily grease point i know that my

stick and boom

joint is going to be a daily grease

point my swing bearing

is going to be pretty much a daily

grease point because they're constantly

rotating

they're constantly wearing you need to

grease those well

now when you start getting into some of

the smaller movements like

your stick cylinder up top or your boom

cylinders here

they don't get quite as much rotation if

you think about how much

as that stick cylinder just moves just a

little bit

because you're sticking in and out

there's not a whole lot of wear there

there's not a whole lot of grease

getting forced out so you can skimp on

those you can go two or three days

before you need to grease them

so just take time to learn your machine

in the beginning when in doubt i will

say this

every time when in doubt grease

it's always safe to put grease on

something it's not safe to let it go

until it starts squeaking because that's

when you're wearing it you cause

problems

and then you get into a whole mess of

problems so all that to say

first thing for the day grease the

machine second thing we need to do is

start looking at our fluid checks

so this is a fluid check that i'm going

to show you that's not necessarily a

daily fluid check but

you do need to look uh this is your

swing motor

this is the the motor that is physically

turning the machine

and it does have fluid with a dipstick

and you'll just pull that out and you'll

check your fluid and make sure it's on

the dipstick and it's at a good level

the next thing you're going to do is

move back here and we're going to do our

two little checks like we do on any

other machine

maybe if i can get this off of here

[Music]

one-handed there we go

and i'm not physically checking all of

these today because i did this morning

i've actually been running and this is

all hot

but here's the engine you've got your

oil check right here

our coolant is actually going to be down

at the bottom but this is where you're

going to pull your oil dipstick and

you're just going to kind of give the

engine a general look make sure there's

nothing you know really sticking out

that needs to uh

that needs to be addressed before you

start for the day i'm not gonna fool

with shedding that right now

because it's gonna take two hands and

i'm not gonna mess with it

so once we've checked our fluids up here

we're gonna go down to ground level

uh three points of contact right safety

first

uh some other things you're gonna wanna

know so let's finish out our fluid

checks really quick

uh we're gonna go over here to what

would be the passenger side i guess you

could call it of the machine

in this compartment right here this has

all of our hydraulics

so you can see this mama right here

is the main hydraulic feed line going

into your hydraulic pump that's why that

sucker is so huge

uh this is coming from your hydraulic

reservoir which is right in inside this

compartment

you can see it tucked right in there and

i'm going to apologize because this

might be

a little difficult for you guys to see

when we go to check hydraulic levels

if you think about really what hydraulic

oil is doing

it's being fed out into all of our

cylinders to push them out

or pull them in well in order to check

our fluid

we need to have kind of a set point of

the machine being set up

so that we know where the level is

correct

with whether it's all the cylinders are

are pulled in

or they're all pushed out we need to

have a checkpoint where we know the

fluid level is correct

manufacturers provide you with that and

this is really important

instead of just glancing at your

hydraulic sight glass you need to pay

attention to this part right here

and it's this sticker you see it right

back in there

i'm hoping let me tap my screen yep so

you can see it

so this machine in order to check the

sight glass which is tucked right back

in here let me see if i can get you

there you go you can see it in order to

check that sight glass

and have it accurate this machine

needs to be sitting like i have it

parked right now which is with the boom

and stick

with the stick sitting at 90 degrees and

the bucket not curled in sitting flat on

the ground

that is how you check on this machine

where the hydraulic oil is at

every machine is going to be different

every manufacturer is going to be

different some of them you have to pull

the boom and the stick and the bucket

all the way in curl everything in and

that's how you check it

just make sure you're aware that each

machine is different so you can go check

it in the 90 degree position on call it

a case

or a hitachi and you may be actually low

on oil and you think you're fine

it's because you didn't have the machine

positioned correctly so really important

pay attention to that while we're in

this compartment

you do have filters uh so you've got

your engine oil filter here yes it's

massive this is a 330 it's a good size

motor

you've got hydraulic oil filters here

and that's really all you're going to

need to pay attention to

in this compartment

so we're going to go ahead and close

that up and we're going to go around to

the other side

because there's some important things so

now that we've done our fluid checks and

we know that we're ready to run there's

a couple other things i want to show you

on the ground before you go to fire this

machine up so here on the

collet driver side of the machine

you've got your back most compartment

that you're going to have to open first

before you open this compartment here

and we have things we want to pay

attention to in both

so in the first compartment back here

obviously

we have our air filter for our engine

that's an important piece

tucked down behind here is our batteries

we've got fuses here and then we have

our master right here

so our master disconnect you need to

make sure that's on otherwise the

machine is not going to fire up for you

on this particular machine don't get too

hung up on location of filters just

because they do

vary depending on the machine but on

this particular machine

we do have our fuel filter and our fuel

oil separator i'm sorry fuel

water separator right here along with

our primer

we have our coolant check right here we

have our washer fluid

but really what i want to tell you guys

about is this little guy down here

and there's a reason i wanted to show

you that because that is a non-descript

that right there is your pattern changer

this moves so what you do is back out

this nut right here

and then this will flip over and that is

how you change your pattern on an

excavator

on almost every single large excavator

so call it

call it your i don't know probably your

eight ton machine

up almost every excavator on the large

size

that switcher is going to be located

right behind the cab there if it's not

a switch in the cab like some of the

newer models it's going to be directly

behind the cabin it's going to be some

non-descript valve like that so that's

what you're going to be looking for if

you need to change the pattern

on your excavator if you don't know what

pattern changers are what different

patterns are

we're going to get into that here in

just a second when i meet you in the cap

so that is most everything you need to

know

to fire up an excavator that's all your

morning checks that's your greasing that

you've got to do

so that's what you're going to check for

the only other thing i'm going to tell

you while we're outside the machine you

can see my tracks are pretty packed here

because we've been working today that's

okay if you live in the north

and you know you're going to get a

freeze overnight a hard freeze

make sure you clean your tracks at the

end of the day and make sure you park

this excavator on some grass

or on some boards uh it doesn't need

don't leave this sucker right in the

dirt

because what's gonna happen is you're

going to come up the next morning and

that machine is going to be frozen

solid and you cannot get the tracks to

move you're going to spend at least half

a day with a torpedo heater running

and shoveling those tracks out because

they're going to be froze rock solid

and the machine will physically be

frozen to the ground so

trust me as a texas boy that moved to

michigan

and learned this lesson the hard way

trust me when i tell you it is worth

your time

to spend 20 30 minutes cleaning your

tracks at the end of the day

and parking that sucker on the grass if

you know you're gonna get a hard freeze

that night

i had to learn it the hard way so that

being said give me just a minute i'll

meet you in the cab we're gonna go over

the controls and kind of just do a quick

in-cab tour

and we'll wrap this video up so we'll

see you here in a second

all right guys welcome inside the cab

we're just gonna do a really quick cab

tour we'll fire the machine up and i'll

show you the basics of the controls in

an excavator

um so the first thing we're gonna do is

just kind of looking around the cab

we have our monitor here that's going to

show us all of our engine parameters

it's going to show us our hydraulic

temperature stuff like that

hours on the machine if you do have to

check the hours on the machine

down here by your leg we've got an

actual hour meter

an analog hour meter that's not always

there sometimes it's under the seat

sometimes it's over by the door

just look around the cab if you need to

find that if all else fails it may not

have an analog hour meter a lot of the

new machines don't have one

so you just have to turn the key to the

on position and check it on a computer

i don't necessarily like that in case

the computer screen goes off or you have

battery issues or whatever but whatever

it is what it is

moving over here to the right this is to

cancel your backup alarm

so it is a safety feature on all these

excavators

you're never going to be able to totally

turn off the backup alarm

at least i haven't found on any of the

machines what you can do is temporary

silence it

so when you start catting instead of

having it going forever you can hit that

button

and while you are continuing to cat it

will turn off

as soon as you stop and then start

tracking again

the backup alarm is going to turn on

again and you have to hit that button

again

so that's what that button does this is

going to be your automatic engine

deceleration so if i stop

messing with the controls after about

four i don't know three or four seconds

the engine will idle down by itself and

then when i touch the controls it's

going to take back off again

that turns that feature on and off

this is your track speed whether you're

in rabbit or turtle mode we have wipers

right here

and we've got our lights moving over

here

we've got our climate controls

and then further back here we've got our

back over here we actually have i

believe this is going to be the button

for the quick disconnect for the coupler

i'm not 100 sure on this machine and

then you've got a couple other wiper

switches here

so that's what all these buttons do

right here is our throttle

and our ignition so when we go to fire

up one of the things that you're going

to notice that i didn't show you when we

got in the cab here

it's always on the door side of the cab

is your safety lockout and that is this

bar right here

it's not it's not your controller it's

beside you that has to be down

in that position

in order to run this machine however for

a safety reason

it will not start unless it's in the up

position because and the whole idea is

you don't want to be accidentally

leaning on this fire up the machine and

have the machine start

running all over on you when you're not

prepared for it so that is

why the lockout has to be in the up

position to start so we've got it in the

up position

we're going to fire up you can see our

screen turning on here

through all the dust

[Music]

and this machine did just

go through a bunch of checks and tell us

all our fluids were low but then it's

fine

that's just part of this machine firing

up by the way this does have

a keypad for getting into the menus

that's tucked away

the new machines don't get too hung up

on that the c series is an older

series the new machines that's almost

always a touch screen

or the keypad's very visible so don't

get too hung up on that

but now that we're fired up if we want

to actually run this machine

now we have to take our safety bar and

put it in the down

position and now all of our hydraulics

are live

and so we're going to do a quick tour of

the functions i'm sorry i should point

this at my face i'm really getting bad

about that

now we're going to do a quick tour of

the functions of this machine

so you have two different patterns and

excavators i'm going to show you

the more common pattern i'm going to

call it for excavators

and then i'll show you what it would be

if it was flipped so

and i've shown this in a couple other

videos on my channel if you've seen

those but we're going to go through

all of the controls so over on our right

side

we have our boom and our bucket

functions

so if i lift back on this that's going

to pull my boom up off the ground

if i push that forward we're going to

slam that sucker right down on the

ground just like we did

so let's get it back up in the air

now if i move this and pull it towards

me to the left

towards me that's going to curl the

bucket and the way i always remember

this on all machines is

and by the way if i push it away from me

it uncurls the bucket

the way i always remember that

personally is i want to

pull it towards me if i want the bucket

to curl towards me

i want to push that handle away from me

if i want the bucket to move away from

me

so we've got boom and bucket here if we

go to this side

this is going to be our swing to the

right

and to the left and then we've got

stick in and stick out

and that's just stick in

and stick out

the only other thing you've got in this

particular machine is you've got your

travel pedals

and uh this is very straightforward

the left one operates your left track

the right one operates your right track

and

and that's in the forward position and

the way you know you're in a forward

position an excavator is

right here if you look that is our front

idler

i'm sorry i can't talk that is our front

idler

that's not a final drive let's spin

around so you can see what a final drive

looks like

and i'm going to go ahead and throttle

this machine up so we got some juice so

i'm going to take this

and when you're running an excavator

that's all the way

i mean it's really not worth fooling

around unless you're doing some really

really delicate piece work that you

really need to dial it down

you can go to you know partial throttle

but really everything's done here and

you want full power

so we're going to go ahead and spin the

machine so i can show you what a final

drive looks like from the back

so that is our final drive that's

actually what's going to drive the track

around on the undercarriage this is the

rear of the machine

so you can spin 360 in an excavator but

the undercarriage still has a front and

a rear

and so when we're in this position

now our travel pedals are opposite of

what they would be because we're

backwards

so if i push on

this travel pedal it's going to move

that track

and it's because we're backwards so

that's the quick way to orient yourself

without looking like an idiot on the job

site

is before you go to travel if you're not

sure which way you're facing

just peek out your window that's my

idler okay we're going forward

so back to our travel pedals you've got

forward

and if you go backwards you go backwards

in order to turn

if we want to turn off to the right

we're going to go forward with our left

track and leave our right track

stationary

or if you really want to turn sharp you

can go

forward with your left track and

backwards with your right track and

that's going to turn you a lot sharper

so those are the basic controls of an

excavator and like i said

i'm not going to get into tips and

tricks on this particular video

i am going to tell you one crucial piece

of advice it's the

it's the biggest piece of advice i can

give you in an excavator especially

because

most of the time when you're in an

excavator you're working around other

people

if you need to do anything you can see

i've got my stuff behind me in the cab

here

if i need to turn around and get into

that stuff before you do anything

whether you take off your coat you take

off another piece of clothing

you mess with your lunch whatever it is

please

please please get in the habit of taking

that safety bar

and just doing that with it because it

is so easy

and it happens every year guys in the

hole lose their life over

it's so easy to start taking off your

coat and you just

hit that really quick or you

accidentally brushed that guy

and guess what you just killed the guy

in the hole

it happens that quick it happens that

easy

so please guys get in the habit of any

time

any anytime you are not running the

machine and not

actively digging i you know personally

i actually take it a step further and if

i'm not digging and i know

someone's going to be up against the

machine i will actually pull that lever

up

and it's just a safety thing i would

rather be safe than sorry

please get in the habit of doing that we

just here within the last year had a guy

in michigan killed for this exact thing

a guy turned around the operator turned

around in the cab to get something out

of his lunch

his jacket pocket caught the excavator

controls

and now that guy has to live with the

fact that he killed his labor

he has to live with that for the rest of

his life so please please

please if you hear nothing else out of

this video please hear this

put that safety bar up when you're not

running the machine

so that's it for today's bolog let me

know if you guys have any questions i

know this was kind of

a quick overview there's a lot of

information to take in on this excavator

so feel free

to ask away in the comments section

thanks for Reading