by Nick Drew | Mon 22 Sep 2014
First scraper job in Sweden in over 30 years
I have been trawling through my blog archives and found some real gems from the Contract Journal era, which can no longer be found on the internet. In this one from 2009 my friend Peter Sjögren emailed us about a job in Stockholm, Sweden where a scraper was being used for the first time in over 30 years.
The tractor and box combination is owned by Peter's friend who is also called Peter and features a Caterpillar D8R pulling a Cat 463 scraper which was converted from cable to hydraulic control before Peter bought it.
When Peter first bought the scraper he decided to sand blast it and give it a new coat of paint and as you can see he has done a fantastic job of it, sadly it has been sitting around unused ever since.
According to Peter Sjögren there are not many places in and around Stockholm where the ground conditions are suitable for scraper use. Peter explained that there is a lot of granite in the Stockholm area and where clay is present one usually gets down to where its too loose for scrapers pretty quickly but on this particular job it was considered a viable proposition and so the decision was made to use the D8 and box.
In most parts of Sweden excavators and articulated dumptrucks are the preferred tools for muck shifters as they are in many countries these days and so it was no surprise to Peter that many people have been stopping by to take photos of this rare event including many younger machinery enthusiasts who had never seen a scraper in action before!
Scandinavian company Skanska apparently used to run three Caterpillar 627 twin engined motor scrapers many years ago, but after the last job they were used on finished they were sold to a customer in America, where these elite earthmoving machines are still more widely used. And finally a cracking photo of the power source, Peter's very well cared for Cat D8R dozer.
It will be interesting to find out if this combination is still in operation today and I am sure Peter will update us on that. In the meantime we thank Peter for sharing these photos with us on the Digger Man Blog.