Equipment World Digital Magazine
Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/536721
EquipmentWorld.com | July 2015 41 I t's more ripple than tsunami, but there's been an increase in sales of excavators toward the upper end of the midsize category. Why? No one's sure. "It could be that there are more larger projects," says Kurt Moncini, large excavator product manager for Komatsu America. "It could be acceptance of Tier 4 Final technology. It could be aging fl eet replacements. Ease of trans- portability may play a role. While there have been no huge changes in performance there has been an overall leveraging of machine intel- ligence, but that's true of all size classes." Some of this shift may result from variations in the rate of recovery of markets, says Rob Palermo, excavator product man- ager for North America with Volvo Construction Equipment. Buyers of 35- to 50-ton machines are in production, quarries and heavy and highway construction where government money has helped sustain the market. Shane Reardon, excavator product specialist with Doosan Infracore, also cites a disparity in recovery rates of various markets as a factor. "The 20- to 25-ton class used to be one of the largest in volume but that has changed to the 35-ton class," he says. "Mar- kets that the 35-ton machines go into have recovered faster and are growing faster than the other size class markets. The single-unit housing market has been slow to recover while commercial construc- tion and infrastructure have been faster to come back. Roads have to be fi xed regardless of economic condi- tions." While Reardon thinks there will be no pullback in the market for 35- to 50-metric ton excavators, he's not sure whether that size class will continue to grow or merely plateau. At least one expert says there's been some retreat already. Mark Wall, excavator product market- ing manager for John Deere and Hitachi, says that those compa- nies' 350 through 470 models are used extensively in pipeline work, which has softened in recent months as oil prices have fallen. Even so, other markets continue to support sales, especially for the 35-ton machines. "Our 350-class machines are the biggest guns you can take to the fi ght," says Wall. "They provide the greatest produc- tivity without special permitting for transport and for this reason we expect them to stay strong." Transportability is crucial as the demand for larger machines con- tinues to grow, says Kevin Grover, large excavator platform manager for Sany America. He's seen sanitary sewer lines put in at 30- foot