Cat Man adds a Bobcat

Taking a look at one of my articles previously published in Earthmovers Magazine, and bringing it to life on the internet un-edited and with alternative photos and video.

Some seven years have past since I last caught up with Basingstoke based family business R. Beere & Sons Ltd, which is now solely headed by Nick Beere following the retirement last year of Nick’s father Rod Beere who had originally founded the company some 43 years ago.

Things have changed quite significantly in the intervening years since our last soiree to North Hampshire to take a look at Nick’s first Caterpillar 432F backhoe loader as featured in the January 2015 edition of Earthmovers.

Nick reports that in a move away from the general building side of the business, three quarters of today’s workload involves machine work and to cope with demand they have invested quite heavily in new equipment to replace some older items that were on the fleet.

They have started doing more remedial work for Taylor Wimpey, like compound uplifts and reinstatement and some of their “Section 106” related work, like pathways through open space land, the type of work that the other contractors aren’t really interested in, plus an ever-increasing amount of work for their private clients.

The company is now providing regular work for around 10-16 individuals, all of whom are working on a self-employed sub-contractor basis.

Nick is a massive fan of the backhoe loader and still rates them as one of the best all round machines in the business. It’s a machine that, in his own words, “Puts a smile on my face every day” and has certainly played a pivotal role in the success of the Beere business, so much so that it continues to be the prime piece of equipment on the fleet.

Nick tends to run the backhoe loaders for around 4 years, before they are traded in for new, his current 432F2 model was originally purchased from Reeds who were the Compact Cat dealership at the time and it is just coming up to 3 years old and as I expected, still looking in immaculate condition. Nick reports that the machine has been absolutely fantastic, reliable and has not given any problems whatsoever.

Going forward Nick is unsure about what to do next, with Reeds no longer selling Cat equipment, having become Wacker Neuson dealers, he says he will either have to deal with Finning, or look at an alternative brand of BHL.

Talking about the backhoe loader Nick said, “Driving the BHL is a dream come true to be honest, it was always my ambition as a boy to have one and I cannot ever foresee me moving away from running a backhoe, especially on these private estates that we work on, its just such a versatile machine in so many different applications”.

Nick finds it hard to see why these venerable machines are not as popular as they once were saying, “I think a lot of people are scared of them to be honest, but what you can achieve in a day with that machine makes them great value for money, in addition I have all my buckets and various attachments at my disposal and they all fit on our 308E2 compact midi excavator too so we are well set up!”.

In a move away from his usual choice of machinery brand, Nick has recently added another mini excavator to the fleet this time in the form of a Bobcat E20z, but there is more to this than meets the eye as Nick explained, “I bought the Bobcat from my local dealers TVE Hire & Sales, the main reason for this was as we all know, this game is a people business, and I like to deal with Richard Young, who is a good old-fashioned salesman, who I get on well with. It was Richard who had sold me my previous two Cat backhoe loaders during his time working for Reeds and he had always looked after me well, he’s a man of his word, and has never let me down.

We were previously running Hitachi mini excavators, a ZX19u and a ZX17u which was unfortunately stolen from a site, so I needed another 1.9 tonne to replace it as we had so much work on, Richard sourced me one, but I quickly realized that I should have gone for a cabbed model instead of a canopy one, as I’m 42 years old now and need a bit of comfort in my life! and of course, for other people operating it, I feel it’s the way forward in this day and age, but we soldiered on with it for the time being.

I also bought our new 2-tonne Mecalac TA2 SH site dumper from Richard, this one has no cab, but going forward I am going to be looking at cabbed dumpers as we expand and upgrade our current machines and I already have my eye on a Mecalac 6 tonner”.

Nick continued, “Anyway, recently Richard gave me a call and asked me to go and have a look at the Bobcat E20z in the showroom, to be fair, Bobcat was never really a brand that was on my radar, if I’m honest, I’d always thought of them as a hire fleet machine not really an owner/operator piece of kit.

But anyway, I went along and had a look and to my surprise I was very, very impressed with how they have come on over the years, so I basically said to Richard, you better give me top money for my Hitachi and I’ll have this Bobcat off you!”. 

Earthmovers caught up with Nick and his latest addition on a private estate in the rural countryside outside of Basingstoke, where they have worked for the past 12 years doing a wide variety of work for the owners. He had only had the machine for a few weeks but was clearly delighted with the little zero tail swing 2-tonner.

Nick said, “I’m very pleased with it, and the service we have received from both TVE and Richard has been excellent. A couple of weeks after taking delivery I decided I wanted a thumb fitted, we had previously had a manual one on our old Hitachi, and I find them so handy for picking materials up, it’s a game changer for us. In my eyes, less manual handling in today’s health and safety focused world has to be the way to go.

This one is a dedicated Bobcat fully hydraulic attachment which works really well. We also opted for a manual quick coupler which was supplied by those good people over at Keen Attachments, who I also get on well with”.   

“The Bobcat features the long dipper arm option which gives me a lot more reach compared to our old Hitachi, breakout force is pretty good, and it’s just an impressive all-round digger to be fair. I believe they have a new 8.5 tonne model coming out at the end of this year, and based on my experience with this small mini excavator, I will be taking a close look at that as a potential replacement for our Cat 308E 2 CR when its time to trade her in!”.

The E20 model has actually been around in the Bobcat range since it was first launched towards the end of 2014, but was subsequently renamed as the E20z to further emphasise its ZTS characteristics.  

The cabbed variant of E20z with long dipper stick as specified by Nick, has an operating weight of 2,025 kgs. Power comes from a Stage-V-emissions compliant 3-cylinder Kubota D722-E4B diesel engine which offers a power output rating of 10.2 kw @2,500rpm.

The machine is fitted as standard with 230mm wide rubber tracks, and the overall track length is 1,620mm, also fitted as standard is the extending track frame which when retracted gives a machine width of 980mm, which extends to 1,360mm for general work and digging for increased stability, dozer blade extensions are also provided to match the blade width to the track width.

With the long dipper-stick configuration the machine has a reach at ground level of 4,264mm, and a maximum dig depth of 2,565mm. The main lift ram is mounted on the back of the boom completely out of the way of any potential damage from accidental contact with the bucket, whilst also allowing the operator to dig deeper if the blade is set up to the front of the machine when digging.

The boom offset which is all easily controlled by means a roller thumb on the joystick offers 80^o swing to the left and 60^o swing to the right, this positioning of the control leaves the floor clear of any additional foot pedals, with only significant sized fold away foot pedals for the tracking on the floor area. Upper-structure slew speed is rated at 8.4 rpm.

The fully heated cabin looks a nice place to spend a shift and even on this zero-tail offering Nick, who is a fairly tall chap, suggested there is still plenty of leg room even for someone of his stature. Having said that, there is literally no room at all behind the seat for any storage of a lunch bag or other personal affects.

The machine features keyless starting and all controls are nicely grouped over on the operator’s right-hand side, two speed tracking is achieved by pressing the button on top of the dozer control lever, something that is becoming ever more popular with manufacturers, while its nice to see the deployment of an old school style manual throttle lever.

The cab features plenty of glass and visibility is excellent all around, for those who prefer fresh air, the top front screen can be stored in the roof, while the door can be locked in the open position, while the offside window slides open for even more air flow. The only concern for me would be the curved rear window, which could be expensive to replace if smashed.

All in all, the E20z looked to be a very capable mini excavator and I suspect it will not be the last one of its kind to join the Beere fleet.

However, Nick’s favourite machine is still clearly the Cat backhoe loader and as we watched him skilfully perform levelling out spoil in one of the fields, the beaming smile on his face said it all, it was an absolute pleasure to watch a true professional in action enjoying what he does best with one of the most versatile machines ever invented.

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