Reading an old dredge manual and found a wild fact about the 'Big Dipper'

I was going through a 1970s manual for a bucket ladder dredge and it said one model could move over 3,000 cubic yards of material in a single 10-hour shift. That's a mountain of gravel. Has anyone here ever run one of those old beasts?

3 comments

3 Comments

lewis.mila2mo ago

Wow, my forklift feels tiny now.

claire_davis312mo ago

That "feel it in your chest" noise sounds wild... can't imagine working around that all day.

ivan7742mo ago

My uncle worked on a dredge in the 80s that moved about 2,500 yards a day. The noise was unreal, a constant grinding and clanking you could feel in your chest. He said keeping the bucket ladder from jamming was a full time job, especially in rocky ground. Those old machines were absolute monsters of simple engineering.