What size BH bucket to purchase

[KeithInSpace]

The Woods BH6000 has several different sizes...12" is standard, then they have a 9" "Trenching" bucket and a 16" "Max Capacity" bucket.

I'd lean toward the 9" and 16" since I either move a bunch of dirt and dig tree holes or trench around trees and such. I see myself either wanting a narrow trench or move a bunch of material.

Is there any input on what would be the 'best' two buckets to get? I say two since I can't figure just one bucket would do...

I guess the root question is if a 16" bucket is "unwieldy" or otherwise would/could overcome the capacity of the BH itself. If it is always at the limit of its capacity, I'll just get the 12" bucket. But the wider bucket sounded nice for the extra width and capacity.

 

[rbargeron]

IMHO anything less than 16" is pretty narrow for working in the ditch. Some say less dig-out width, less backfill time - but a front loader fills wide ditch as fast as a narrow one. My BH bucket is 24" and it has never seemed too wide for anything I've done.

 

[gordon21]

My little JD 790 has a 16" bucket and it seems just right. Remember the bucket size usually refers to the maximum width at the outside edges of the teeth which are angled out a little. The INSIDE of the bucket could be up to 2" less. A 9" bucket is barely big enough to lay a single water line. A 9" bucket might be 7-8" inside measurement. Think of a sheet of paper that is 8.5" wide. Your trench will be NARROWER. I don't know about your hands, but mine sure won't fit down in a 2'-4' deep trench only 8" wide like that connecting water pipe. If you are laying electrical line it would be perfect. How wide is a common spade? 10-12"??? You certainly want to be digging a wider hole than a spade unless you want to take 6 months to do a 4 hour project.

Go for the 16" and buy only one bucket.

 

[shvl73]

I agree with the others, 16". That hoe should handle it just fine. Narrower would make for slow digging with little bites. I would only go smaller if I had special tasks that needed narrow trenching or a knowledgable dealer demonstrated the need (due to power) for a smaller bucket.
Enjoy the backhoe!

 

[KeithInSpace]

That's helpful. When I talk about trenching, I'm talking about irrigation lines and underground power lines. Not 6" water lines and stuff like that. Simple home things. Also, I was thinking the narrower bucket would help when taking out trees by concentrating on breaking the roots rather than making the hole two times larger than I actually need.

I'll definitely go with the 16" for the larger.

 

[shvl73]

That makes sense. I'm guessing your water lines wouldn't need to be 4' down like we'd put them up here. The 9" bucket would dig a fairly quick trench 2' down or so.

 

[dirtworksequip]

Bucket choice depends on a lot of varibles. Soil type, trench depth, trench use and machine size.

Soil types: If the soil you are going to be excavating is going to be wet or clay. Stay way from the narrower buckets. The material will stick in the narrow bucket so bad that it will make it ineffective and require you to clean it out frequently with a shovel or track spade. A wider bucket in this type of material will be eaiser to keep clean.

Trench depth: If you have the need to dig deeper than 4' the narrow bucket will do the job, but the ditch will be hard to keep open. This also depends on soil type.

Trench use: What are you installing in the ditch? If it requires you to get into the ditch to make connections............forget the narrow bucket.

Machine size: The max bucket size will be limited to the machine capability. Does the machine have the power to handle the larger bucket. Usually there will be a compatible bucket list for your machine.

Ultimately the size you choose will depend on a combination of the above list.You can't get a bucket that will fit every application just one that will serve your needs most of the time. I look at the narrow buckets of more of a speciality application for trenching only. One of the wider buckets will fit more of an all around application.

I'd lean towards one of the bigger buckets that are rated for your machine and it will cover most job task better than a narrower bucket.

One other thing....... if I need a narrow ditch for a certain application I rent a ride on trencher. Faster per foot, makes good fine backfill material and has less impact on the surrounding ground than digging with a hoe.

 

[Volfandt]

Well since you asked
I run a 12" bucket on a BX23 and for digging in clay and/or well compacted hard pack ground I recommend a 12". It's one of those compromise's between digging and material handling.

The 9" would be great if all you want to do is dig thin trenches and/or root & grub but it's not so good for all around use.
The 16" would be great for loose soil and/or general material moving but in tough hard pack I doubt you'd be able to get as much in one bite that a 12" will get you. I say this because I can easily stall my 12" out if I try to take too big a bite in hard pack.

There are times when I'd like to have either a 16" or even a 24" for working with loose soil or when working with the thumb to move material and swap to a 12" for serious digging in hard pack.

And in my experience in rooting & grubbing, I'd say the 12" will out work the 16" on a BX machine. Again this is due to not wanting to take too big a bite around the roots.
But when rooting & grubbing a 9" will out work a 12" too as you don't want to split your breakout power between busting roots and digging dirt, the more power you can concentrate on the roots as opposed to the dirt = quicker root removal.
Someone once posted a homemade heavyduty knife blade/middle buster attachment that pinned where the BH bucket went and this thing was a monster in rooting. I've thought about coming up with something similar since.
Course it wouldn't be any good for digging but it would wear out the roots

Anyways, it's JMHO for what it's worth. In any case a BH is hard to cost justify but it sure makes so many tasks so easy that I don't even worry about justifying it. It saves both your back and time and thats good enough for me. Not to mention it is fun to work

 

[john_bud]

Anyways, it's JMHO for what it's worth. In any case a BH is hard to cost justify but it sure makes so many tasks so easy that I don't even worry about justifying it. It saves both your back and time and thats good enough for me. Not to mention it is fun to work

Hard to justify??????

Do you want it? (Y/N)

If yes,
Can you afford it (Y/N)


If you circled yes one or more times, you have justified the purchase of a backhoe. If you only circled the top Y, you need to look into financing....

;-)
jb

 

[KeithInSpace]

That's great insight. Volfant's comments were really what I was digging for. Pun intended.

My fear in the 16" bucket is that my digging would be diminished to a 'nibble' because it is so wide. I live on crappy hard slippery red clay that can be quite tough. If I exceed the dig/draw capacity regularly, that would kill any advantage to having the bigger bucket and add to the frustration, too.

I figure quite a bit of my "digging" would be with the BH and quite a bit of my "filling" would be with the loader, so the volume advantage wouldn't be that huge.

I'd rather be able to "blow and go" than continually stalling the BH. And having that amplified by being overly ambitious with the bucket size.

And fortunately (or unfortunately for the checkbook), I'm yes to both, JB.

Honestly, I brought the BH up to the wife and the first thing she said was "Gee, I thought that was the very first thing you were going to buy...surprised you've waited this long". Pretty good response.