Product Spotlight
Compact Prodigy Hydroexcavator Offers Air or Water Digging
By Ed Wodalski (download PDF)

Vactor Manufacturing has designed a compact hydroexcavator specifically for the municipal market and smaller contractor jobs.

With a wheelbase nearly four feet shorter than its full-size HXX cousin, the maneuverable HXX Prodigy is made to take on tough jobs while navigating narrow streets, around parked cars and through obstacle-laden construction sites. The unit also is significantly lighter (39,000 pounds GVW versus 66,000 pounds for the HXX).

“We have the big truck, and that’s mainly for big digs,” says Deepesh Nayanar, Vactor project manager. “But for municipalities and utilities to adopt hydroexcavation, or vacuum excavation, we needed to come up with something more compact and affordable and still be versatile for city applications.

“So we went with the shorter wheelbase, a lighter truck — single axle — and the choice of air or water as a medium for digging. So this is our basic concept: providing air and water, making it small and maneuverable and yet keeping it productive. There are trailer-type available units with 3- or 4-inch hoses, but we said, no. We’ll stay with the 6-inch hose and higher airflow blower so there’s enough production.”

The unit’s air-water excavation and heated water options enable it to dig through almost any soil condition. Designed for mobile applications, it has an above-deck compressor system that does not need a holding tank to build pressure.

Standard equipment includes a 600-gallon water tank for 3.5 hours of continuous work, positive displacement blower (16 inches Hg, 3,200 cfm), 6-cubic-yard debris tank, and 10 gpm/2,500 psi CAT water pump. A tandem-axle configuration with 8-cubic-yard tank is available.

Other options include a 20 gpm/2,500 psi water pump and 400,000 Btu or 900,000 Btu onboard water heater for digging through frozen ground or heavy clay. The optional 16-foot extendable boom with 320-degree rotation and telescopic boom (16.5-foot reach) can be controlled from a panel on the side of the truck that regulates and monitors air and water pressure, engine rpm, blower speed and lights. Operators also can control the unit using the pendant remote or optional wireless remote.

The unit’s variable-pressure triplex pump allows operators to adjust water pressure with the push of a button for controlled digging in a variety of applications: slot trenching, potholing, water valve box repair and location of buried utilities.

“Say you’re at the dig location or at the end of the hose and you want to start out the dig: You want to minimize the splashing of the water,” Nayanar says. “You just drop down the flow, and once you cut through, say about half a foot, you can turn it back up.”

Where dry digging is preferred, there’s the 180 cfm/150 psi air excavation system. “For small digs and doing locates, you can use air and backfill the same soil,” Nayanar explains. “You don’t end up with wet spoils and have to go back to a dumpsite to dump it and lose hours going back and forth.”

While there are pluses and minuses to excavating with air or water, water will work in frozen ground or heavy clay, whereas air will not, Nayanar says. “That’s why we combined both in the same truck.” For more information, call 800/627-3171, or visit www.vactor.com.

Reprinted with permission from Municipal Sewer & Water™ / May 2007 / COLE Publishing Inc., P.O. Box 220, Three Lakes, WI 54562 / 800-257-7222 / www.mswmag.com