Old Demag Converted to Dredger

An ageing Demag H135S has received a makeover in Sweden having had its tracks removed and been modified extensively to be mounted on a pontoon to take the title of Sweden’s largest dredger.

Håkan Larsson and his Company (Hakan Dredging Company) have many years of experience in dredging and have performed several dredger builds over the years including one named Big Bertha which was sold in conjunction with building the current P10 machine. The name P10 originates from the barge or as we would say in English pontoon, which is the basis for the dredger.

Håkan started the construction by buying a used Demag H135S, hydraulic excavator which was in face shovel configuration, which he has transformed into the largest Swedish-owned dredger with a digging depth of about 14-15 metres. Of course there are bigger dredgers in the Nordic countries but the question is if any of them is as versatile as the P10.The engine has been upgraded and is now apparently fitted with a Cummins 28 Litres V12 engine (Cummins VTA 28-C-800) and in the early days it was fitted with a direct mount bucket of some 6,300 litres capacity.

In 2012 the machine was ready to be put to work, and its first job was nearly as far north as possible in Sweden with a dredger to a port outside Kalix, during the summer of 2012 when HDC was commissioned to dredge the harbour. This was actually the first time that Northern Swedish machinery photographer and videographer Alexander Lipkin aka bm1113 on You Tube saw the Demag dredger lin real life even though he had seen and met Håkan at Maskinexpo events in previous years and followed the construction of P10 on the Maskinisten.net forum.

Jumping forward to 2019 now and apparently has changed a few things on the machine, including the fitting of a hydaulic quick coupler, and the orginal large bucket has now been replaced as the main digging tool by a smaller 4000-litre bucket (around 4-cubic metres) similar in size to that fitted to a Volvo EC750 or other machines in that size class, which he feels is better suited to the work.

In recent months, October and November to be precise, the HDC P10 was back in Kalix excavating for a bridge project. The existing 300 metre bridge over the river Kalix was built in 1957 and is now reaching its end of lifespan. A new bridge will be constructed to carry the E4 road across the river able to cope with the anticipated rise in traffic flow. The new bridge is expected to be completed during the winter of 2021-22. The large machine has been excavating for the new bridge supports out in the river. The operator uses GPS guidance coupled with many years of experience in the dredging game. He is loading barges which are transferred to the shore where a waiting Hitachi Zaxis 300 loads the material onto road going trucks to be tipped elsewhere. Rock and stoney material is retained to be used as backfill in due course.

There has been a great ongoing thread on this machine with lots more in depth information on the fantastic Swedish forum www.maskinisten.net which you can read by clicking on the link (providing you are a member).

So, grab yourself a coffee and check out the video from BM1113 who we thank for sharing this material.