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Guide to Maintaining Ground Engaging Tools
Heavy-duty industries like construction require rugged solutions. Ground Engaging Tools (G.E.T) protect your valuable equipment while adding enhanced functionality like ripping and grading strength. Maintaining G.E.T tools maximizes your return on investment and your equipment's life span.
Take the time to examine your fleet's tools weekly by following this tip list. Need a little more guidance? Check out these real-life, ground engaging tool problems the Empire team tackled and learn how to prevent serious downtime in the future.
8 Tips for Maintenance & Prevention
Keep your tools in excellent condition with additional insight to what your equipment needs.
PERFORM A DAILY VISUAL INSPECTION
Inspecting equipment daily helps your team watch for issues like excessive or uneven wear, loose hardware and components, damaged bolts and pins, or welding cracks. Catching these problems early can help you prevent more costly repairs and downtime.
ADJUST THE BUCKET POSITIONER
When using G.E.T for bulldozer equipment, configuring the bucket's position precisely is crucial. Slight errors can damage your tools and shorten valuable equipment's service life.
ANALYZING WEAR PATTERNS
Another essential step is to keep track of wear patterns. These can help the operator identify areas where they're using consistently making mistakes over time or if they're using the wrong ground engaging tool for certain projects and terrain.
RECORD A MAINTENANCE LOG
Keep a written log of every maintenance task you perform on your equipment and track upcoming inspections. A physical logbook is an important tool to prevent confusion, especially for large fleets.
USE A REPLACEMENT SCHEDULE
It's vital that operators never go beyond the service life of parts like wear plates, end bits and cutting edges, even if they seem sturdy. These parts are relatively inexpensive, while the equipment they protect is extremely valuable.
ROTATE GROUND ENGAGING TOOLS
It's also wise to swap edges, bits and tips. This rotation can help your operators achieve maximum wear life for tools by keeping them sharp and even.
FOLLOW OEM WELDING INSTRUCTIONS
Typically, original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) provide instructions on safe and reliable welding parameters for their equipment. It's critical that you follow these instructions to extend your equipment's like span.
REPAIR WELDING CRACKS
Another important maintenance tip is to repair weld cracks promptly. These issues can threaten the equipment's structural integrity, leading to safety concerns and high repair costs.
EMPIRE SOLUTIONS
Before
After
This excavator bucket needed reinforcement for the application it was in. Frequent inspections could have prevented the migrating of the crack. With Empire this bucket has now been properly repaired.
PREVENTIVE TIPS: Perform daily visual inspection & adjust bucket positioner.
Before
After
In analyzing the harsh wear of this bucket, the bottom was worn into the parent material, which was too thin for normal repair. Instead, it was replaced with a more durable wear resistant material.
PREVENTIVE TIPS: Analyze wear patterns & record a maintenance log.
Before
After
The end bit on a D8 blade was worn way past its intended life cycle and ended up damaging the blade. A bolt is missing in the before image - edges should've been flipped to extend the life and receive full value of the product.
PREVENTIVE TIPS: Rotate G.E.Ts & use a replacement schedule.
G.E.T. Services With Empire
Ready to explore your options? Reach out to our team today to learn more!
Empire is your go-to for equipment solutions and maintenance on ground engaging tools across Arizona, Southern California, Nevada, and parts of eastern California. We're a family-owned business and proud to provide the local construction industry with legendary Cat equipment and support.