Am I the only one who was dead wrong about using rock guards on the cutter head?

For years I figured rock guards were just extra weight that slowed us down. I ran a dredge on the Mississippi near Baton Rouge for about 6 years and never bothered with them. Then last spring we hit this patch of buried riprap from an old levee job. The cutter head got chewed up so bad we had to pull it and spend 18 hours swapping teeth and repairing the hub. My buddy who runs a barge up on the Missouri River kept telling me to use them but I blew him off. After that repair bill hit like $4,200 I finally ordered a set. Now I swear by them and I feel like an idiot for ignoring the advice for so long. Has anyone else gotten burned by skipping something simple then seeing the difference firsthand?

2 comments

2 Comments

aaron_flores841d ago

$4200 is way less than what a set of rock guards costs me in downtime every month.

the_cora1d ago

Huh... I mean, are we really talking $4200 in downtime every single month? That feels like either your margins are super tight or you're running a real high-volume operation where every hour matters. I'd be curious to see the math on that, not gonna lie.