Contractor’s Request Leads to New 6-Yard Bucket for Deere 470 P-Tier Excavator

An equipment dealer, an attachments manufacturer and a contractor have developed a 6-yard bucket that is light enough to be used on a John Deere 470 P-Tier excavator.

The LoadMax bucket from Craig Manufacturing is made of lightweight yet strong AR 450 steel that enables the excavator to get 10 to 20 more truckloads of dirt in a day at the same weight as a loaded 5-1/4-yard bucket, the company says.

The idea for the bucket came from Rawso Constructors of Murfreesboro, Tennessee. The company approached area Deere dealer McCoy Construction & Forestry about equipping a 470 P-Tier with a larger bucket. The goal was to reduce the number of passes needed to load 50-metric-ton articulated dump trucks, for increased productivity and efficiency on heavy earthmoving projects.

Customers have used the 51-metric-ton excavator with buckets as large as 5-1/4 yards, according to Alex Anhalt, McCoy corporate product specialist. To achieve the additional capacity, though, would require lighter material without sacrificing durability.

Craig Manufacturing agreed to customize one of its LoadMax buckets for the contractor. By using higher quality steel, Craig was able to reduce the amount of steel on the bucket. That in turn reduced suspended dead weight while at the same time increasing payload to 6.1 cubic yards.

“Most people are used to 5 and a quarter, maybe 5 and a half, if they’re lucky,” Anhalt says in a McCoy promotional video for the bucket. “And we were able to put a whopping 6-yarder on there, which cuts a pass off their truck and increases their production.”

“Not only are we moving the dirt quicker, we’re spending less,” adds Sam Pinkley, vice president of finance at Rawso. “We’re getting about 10 to 20 truckloads more every day. So that equates to big dollars for us.”

Craig offers the LoadMax bucket for excavators weighing 35 metric tons or more. It touts the buckets as “ideal for materials such as well-blasted rock, shale, limestone, hardpan clay, gravel, abrasive industrial sands, silt and loam, and loose dirt.”

It says the buckets can achieve up to 30% more productivity on earthmoving jobs and is as easy to use as a conventional bucket. The company will also customize the bucket to a contractor’s needs to get the best match for the trucks and excavator’s specs and the material being moved.

McCoy, which has 25 locations among eight states, is now offering the 6-yard bucket paired with Deere 470 P-Tier excavators.