TIL that old 'more power equals faster work' advice was dead wrong for deep dredging

I ran a small cutter dredge in a silted-up canal near Biloxi last spring, and the older guys kept telling me to crank the engine to max for tough spots. After three days of burning fuel and chewing through cutter teeth, the site foreman finally showed me that running at 70% throttle with constant swing actually cleared the channel faster. He had me time it side by side for an afternoon, and the slower pass beat the high RPM run by 9 minutes on a 50 foot section. Any of you guys found a similar speed trick that goes against the usual advice?

2 comments

2 Comments

oscarcooper1mo agoTop Commenter

My old welder buddy down in Pascagoula swore by running his 7018 rods way hotter than the box said on heavy plate. Said the slower, cooler passes left too much porosity in the slag. He'd crank the machine up to 150 amps and just move fast, and those welds held up on dredge pipes for years. He told me the book numbers were made for guys who never get their hands dirty.

oscar_hunt611mo agoMost Upvoted

Found the same thing on a hard clay job in Louisiana. Running lower RPM with steady swing kept the cutter from bogging down and let it actually dig instead of just spinning. Counterintuitive but saved us a pile of money on fuel and parts.