A Fife-based supplier of sand and gravel has been singing the praises of a new 25-tonne Volvo L150H loading shovel complete with 4.3m³ rehandling bucket.
Angle Park Sand & Gravel is a family-run business operating two sand and gravel pits close to Ladybank, Cupar, in the Howe of Fife.
The firm was founded in 1961 by Frank Cuthbert and is today run by father Ian and son Peter, representing the second and third generation of Cuthberts at the Melville Gates and Mountcastle pits.
Peter said, “We’ve been working the Melville Gates site since 1971 and have owned and operated Volvo equipment pretty much from the start. We moved into the adjacent Mountcastle site five years ago and as the development of the site has progressed, we saw the need for a large loading shovel to take care of our production requirements.”
The L150H – which was on display at this year’s ScotPlant exhibition – is the company’s largest loading shovel to date. The machine’s tasks include digging, feeding the plant and loading out road going wagons.
“We specified the machine with boom suspension for long load and carry work but also, with the larger capacity bucket, we can turn vehicles around much quicker too,” Peter added. “Another important point for us was opting for the Volvo Load Assist feature and this is really paying dividends towards the machine’s efficiency on site. There is less than 1% discrepancy between what the machine is loading to, to what is weighed on the weigh-bridge and this saves significant time when loading vehicles, forgoing the need for them to top up or discard excess loads which makes our production flow faster.”
The L150H is powered by a 13-litre 300hp Volvo stage-IV engine. SMT GB said one of the key features is that a maximum torque of 1317Nm is achieved at just 1,450rpm, with resultant fuel savings further enhanced by the Volvo Eco-pedal.
