Austin Engineering has been recognised globally for its design and maintenance of excavator buckets.
The two-piece buckets, which Austin Engineering designs and manufactures in Australia feature a reusable upper section to maintain structural reliability.
This gives operators a predetermined service life through multiple change-outs of the lower consumable section.
The service life for the upper section is estimated to be about 30,000 hours, which is four to five years based on conventional one-piece buckets of similar size, according to Austin Engineering.
The Queensland-based company has also placed second in the 2019 Swedish Steel Awards in recognition of the buckets and were presented with the People’s Choice Award.
The jury votes were based on applicability, profitability, environmental benefits, performance, innovation and creativity.
“Austin Engineering has taken a significant leap in innovation for the design and maintenance of excavator buckets,” the jury stated.
“With a modular approach, they have developed an innovative concept that combines low weight with optimal use of the complete product before scrapping.
“The solution utilises the characteristics of high strength and wear resistant steel and has extremely low barriers for implementation.”