I finally called out a guy for running the cutterhead too fast in soft material

This new operator kept burning up our hydraulic oil last week because he wouldn't slow down, and when I showed him the pressure gauge hitting 4800 psi in muck he looked at me like I was speaking Greek, so has anyone else had to deal with someone who thinks more throttle always equals more production?

3 comments

3 Comments

fiona_west211mo ago

4800 psi in muck, yeah that's a textbook way to toast a cutterhead seal and blow a hose. My question is how did this guy even get the job without knowing what a pressure gauge means? I'm wondering if his previous experience was all on excavators or something where you can just run them hot and they handle it. Did you catch what brand of machine he came from? Because some of those cheaper units let you get away with way more abuse before things fail, and that sets a bad habit. Also, did your foreman back you up or did they let this guy keep running it that way until something actually broke?

jana_jones1mo ago

Funny thing is, nobody's talking about how the operator might not have been the only one at fault here. That foreman who said "he's learning" while the seals were screaming should have stepped in sooner, right? It's like that old saying about failing to plan is planning to fail. If the foreman saw the gauge climbing and just shrugged, then the whole crew was set up for a blowout. Sometimes it's not just the new guy's bad habits, it's the guy above him not having the guts to stop a job before something expensive breaks.

vera_robinson361mo ago

Wait, isn't this the same kind of thing where people ignore the oil light in their car until the engine seizes, just because they've gotten away with it before? It seems like once someone learns bad habits on cheap equipment, they just assume all machines can take the same abuse without reading the gauges. The foreman didn't back me up, he just said "he's learning" while the seals were screaming, so that job went exactly like you'd expect.