Classic Wabco scrapers stand the test of time.

Came across some video footage recently featuring two classic Wabco motor scrapers which are still doing a great job for a contractor down in New Zealand and thought it would be great to share it with the Digger Man Blog masses.

Many an old muckshifting man will tell you that they were not huge fans of elevating scrapers, but I assume that if the conditions were right these machines with their ability to self-load without the need for a tractor to push load them, could be very productive and cost effective. One company that are still using these beasts to full effect is Yeatman Brothers who are running at least two of these giants in New Zealand.

Wabco (Westinghouse Air Brake Co) were keen promoters of the elevating scraper concept throughout the 1960’s & 70’s.  One of their largest models was indeed the 32 cubic yard, 333FT which was a twin engine variant. It was only superseded in size by the 353FT, which was introduced in 1977 and had a 36 cubic yard bowl capacity. Sadly heavy operating costs on the big elevating scrapers saw sales drop off dramatically, signalling the end of Wabco’s involvement in scraper manufacture. The model in the shot here is seen working in the UK in 1978

Yeatman Brothers two 333FT’s have been working on an irrigation reservoir job in South Canterbury, on New Zealand’s South Island, regular readers of this blog will recall that these are the type of jobs that are taken on in the UK by Lionel Whitnell and his team and I’m sure Lionel as an old scraper hand, would love to add a scraper or two to his fleet one day. I look forward to covering them if he does! Enjoy the video action.