Diggers Hillhead Highlights (Part Three)

Concluding our report on some of the highlights from last weeks excellent Hillhead Show.

Star attraction on the Kubota UK stand was the U145, which was first revealed in public at last years Bauma Trade Fair in Munich and ironically, I’m still waiting to get some stick time in. But in all fairness, we know the Sumitomo based product very well, having operated them in the past in a variety of colours, it’s a class machine for sure and was attracting a lot of attention on the stand.

Photo: Courtesy of Kubota UK Facebook Page.

Something else that gained a lot of attention was the Kubota “Scrabble” challenge competition, which saw a steady stream of contenders looking to beat the best time every day, and to top it all off, there was Kubota pizza to be had too!

On the Thwaites stand the team brought along the full production model of their 9-tonne class ROTATOR cabbed dumper, having previously displayed the prototype version at Hillhead 2 years ago.

Double view, fully cabbed, site dumpers, have become increasingly popular on job sites across the UK in recent years and it’s not hard to see why. Being able to rotate the seat totally eliminates the need for any dangerous reversing operations, enabling the operator to perform his work safely, with great visibility whilst always facing the direction he needs to be when driving. It would be great to get a "Hands On" test drive opportunity with the ROTATOR for a full report in Earthmovers in due course if its possible, Thwaites, please hit me up if we can make this happen! 

Another Chinese manufacturer making in-roads into the UK market is Zoomlion, this is another brand we have been seeing for many years at the big European trade shows such as Bauma and Intermat. Most recently we caught up with the UK division at Plantworx last year, and this time around they were appearing at Hillhead with a variety of machines from their range of mini excavators, medium sized excavators and telehandlers.

It was interesting to see the 21-tonne class ZE210GLC hydraulic excavator sporting the livery of Manchester based long established business Total Plant Hire (T.P. Halligan) who are adding some of these to their extensive fleet of machinery.

It was fantastic to see Caterpillar back at Hillhead this time around who showcased a trio of machines, including a magnificent example of a Cat Certified Rebuild, in this instance being a Cat 972M XE wheeled loader, which is 2016 model and had amassed 16,250 hours on the meter.

Undertaken by the team at Finning UK's facility in Llantrisant in South Wales, the amount of work that goes into these rebuilds is phenomenal and it’s a very cost-effective way to give the machine a second working life, complete with a new 5 year/ 10,000-hour powertrain & hydraulics warranty.

Engcon UK are ever present at the shows demonstrating their latest developments in the ever-expanding tiltrotator market. And at Hillhead they were located in their regular spot, this time with a large number of static machines on the stand, in addition to tiltrotators.

Whilst around the back on the demo plot, long standing Engcon tiltrotator owner Owen Mays was showcasing the benefits of these game changing attachments with a used JCB 245XR.

The UK arm of Danish manufacturer Hydrema also presented a trio of their latest models including the MX17 G-Series wheeled excavator, which coincidentally was also sporting an Engcon tiltrotator. Also presented was the all new DT22 articulated dumptruck, which looked super stylish with its new design.

There has been a change in staff at Hydrema UK and I didn’t recognise anyone this time around, so I need to reach out to these guys at some point.

And finally, it was a great privilege to be asked to take photos of members of the Gallagher family with representatives of Hitachi Construction Machinery UK sales team in front of the new Zaxis 490 LCH that has been purchased by the Kent based Gallagher Group.

Checkout my You Tube short walkaround video. 

So that's Hillhead done for another year, but lookout for my Hillhead Compact Kit report in a future edition of Earthmovers.