Hydraulic Breaker/Hammer for TLB / Skidsteer

[JimMorrissey]

Does anybody have any experience with the capabilities of a hydraulic hammer on a skidsteer or a small TLB? I'm thinking about a hammer that weighs around 300lbs or so.

Reason being......I've got this large cistern that is a nightmare to break apart. -Used hammer drills to cut into it and then beat with a large sledge, I've rented a big jack-hammer and had-at-it for half of last Saturday and all of Sunday with lots of pain and minimal results. It's very old and extremely hard concrete full of rocks and steel. I also have lots of large rocks (boulders) that are going to be a problem when trenching for my electric lines and the sewer line next year.....I'd like to fracture these boulders so they are more manageable. It's also possible, although unlikely, that I will run into some limestone ledge while trenching for the sewer line.

Is a 300lb class hammer capable of breaking limestone within a reasonable amount of time? I'm certain it could given enough time, but I don't want to spend forever on this....OR, am I wasting my time with a hammer in that class.

I could rent a large excavator with a big hammer for about $800 bucks a day plus trucking....figure three days would be about $3200 +-, plus the loss of vacation time. I could buy a good used hammer for that $ on Ebay. It would certainly take a bit longer, but I'd have the breaker and more importanly, be able to work on the project as time allows.

I'm working on the hydraulic plumbing to the stick now and would fabricate a quick-attach plate to bolt the hammer to and be able to easily snag it with the hoe when necessary.

The other option is: Rent a bobcat style breaker for the quick-attach loader. Since it's attached to the loader it won't be nearly as versitile, since you need to be directly over the object. Thinking about it, I guess this would be the ultimate test to see if a breaker of this type would do the job.

Any experineces would be helpful.

 

[nasdaqsam]

Jim,

From experience with larger BH's and excavators they destroy the joints, , hydraulic cylindrs, hoses, pins and castings. Most construction companys only use them when absolutley needed and charge extremely high hourly rates because of the damage they know they will have to fix.

I often get to use the excavators (friend of mine and we use all the time for all our building needs) equipment when I need something big to do a job. You can not believe how sloppy the hoe gets after using a hammer. When you swing the boom and stop the thing travels another foot. And I can tell you this guy is maticulous with maintaining his equipment.

Just my thoughts

 

[RonR]

Agree that the hammer would beat your tractor senseless!

Son and I used an electic jack hammer to break up a 10x15 patio. It about killed us! If I ever am stupid enough to try that again, it will be with a rented bobcat and attached hammer........

I don't know how you get through rock for electric lines............ Would be curious to know as a buddy at Grand Lake is wanting to try it.........

Ron

 

[dummy]

Is there something we can't see in the picture? Why not just dig it out and then break it up?

 

[nasdaqsam]

Jim,

Looking at that wall, it looks like a little playing around with your BH might break it apart. Hard to tell from just a picture but I recently broke apart a small wall and slab very similar with my little BX. It takes patients.

Getting something started is the hard part. I usually start by tapping it here and there to see if there are any week spots and then pulling and pushing in a couple places for the same effect, stay away from the corners to start with as that is where it will be the strongest. If that doesn't work I will dig under it as much as possible and tap and pull again. If you can get under it to dig you can then put the weight of the BH on it and it should snap. Sometimes you can get an area to curl the bucket under and get it to lift just a bit (as you know the bucket has the most leverage of any part of the BH). Several of these manuevers usually gets it to start breaking apart. It doesn't take much once you get it to start it is only a little more work to destroy it. At that point picking and dropping works best. You only have to pick it an inch or two for the concrete to crumble.

From my experience you can work at it easily for hours with out doing any damage to the Bh then all of a sudden it just starts coming apart.

Good Luck

 

[JimMorrissey]

Interesting about destroying the machine......

I'll try to dig under it and see what happens.

 

[JimMorrissey]

I guess you can't see how big this thing is. The backhoe just scrapes along the concrete. "Digging it up" would take a machine about four time the size of my L39. This thing has six full inch thick walls and the slab is over 12" thick. There is absolutely no way to pull or pick it apart with the hoe, even with all the damage I did with the manual jack hammer.

It is possible to dig the underside out and see if I can get the slab to fracture, then try to pick some parts up and drop them. It's a long shot but worth a try I guess. This stuff is like rock and the rebar is everywhere in all directions. It's like a nuclear bomb bunker....

 

[HomeBrew2]

Sounds like it WAS a perfect beer/wine cellar /forums/images/graemlins/blush.gif

 

[nasdaqsam]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( ( It is possible to dig the underside out and see if I can get the slab to fracture, then try to pick some parts up and drop them. It's a long shot but worth a try I guess. This stuff is like rock and the rebar is everywhere in all directions. It's like a nuclear bomb bunker.... ))</font>LOL, I feel your pain my friend but be patient. It seems impossible then it just happens. Ya Gotta love rebar. Break and cut, break and cut.....(It's best to have torches or a saws-all handy.)

I worked at the one I did for quite a while. I was looking for seat time anyways so I was just playing around. All of a sudden I was able to get the bucket just under the edge and really hook it. If I tried to pick up it would lift the front of the machine off the ground so I just kind of balanced at that point, just barely off the ground and made small up and down motions, hung a while (about 15 minutes of this) and bam a crack....I knew I had won the battle. Just be carefull or you wil break a tooth or peel the bucket.

If all that fails you can also rent a demolition saw (much cheaper than renting an entire machine) and cut some lines to kind of coax it into breaking.

You'll get there.......

 

[5acres]

We ran into a similar dilema in one of our power plants recently. This was an old hydro dam built in the early 1900's and we needed to remove lots of old concrete. Most was removed by sawing (diamond cable saw) but some areas were not accessable with that method. The contractor used a method I had not seen before. They drilled approx. 1" holes about 24" deep (the concrete was about 60" thick) every foot or so and filled with some compound that expanded and would start to break up the concrete. There was still alot of work to get through the rebar, cutting grinding sawing etc. but it did get the process started. I never saw the name of the compound they put in the holes. They would drill, clean out the hole, pour the mix in, plug the hole and wait about 12 hours. It did't make big cracks but enough for the smaller jack-hammers to get started.

Elis G