Plant Equipment and Hire October 2018 | Page 26

PRODUCT FOCUS Dezzi Equipment offers a variety of attachments for fitment with its range of equipment. Seen here is a cane grabber for use in the sugar industry. offers different configurations for all applications such as trenching, scaling, and excavating.” Dezzi Equipment, on the other hand, proudly mentions that the OEM focuses on bespoke equipment generally and Gutzeit, adds: “We offer all types of attachments built by us for our own machines; therefore, when there is a problem, we are correctly geared to sort the problem quickly. We build log grabs, cane grabs, brush handling grabs, forklift attachments, sweeper attachments, silage rake attachments, and compost turning attachments, all proven for many years. Customers that use our grabs are in a spectrum of industries, from timber and sugar, to mushrooms.” Liebherr prides itself in being customer- centric and takes close note of trends and requirements. If a customer approaches the OEM with a special request for a modification and/or a bespoke attachment, the request is elevated to the manufacturers. “If we cannot source such an attachment externally from an OEM, 24 OCTOBER 2018 we would look at it from REO to assess meeting the customer’s requirements, as long as it’s in line with what we are currently undertaking. We have never had a request for bespoke attachments,” he adds. Of all the working tools available through Liebherr, Rudolph claims that generally, ditch cleaning buckets, hydraulic breakers, backhoe buckets, wood grapples, and five-tine grapples for scrap handling are the attachments most in demand, with crawler excavators as the carrier machine, while Gutzeit says that its Dezzi D1700 and D2500 wheel loaders and its 883 4 × 4 TLBs are most in demand for use with attachments. Van der Merwe adds, “I would say our rippers and crusher buckets are the most in demand when it comes to our attachments.” Warranties Warranties being affected by using different attachments on carrier machines is not an issue, generally, as Van der Merwe claims: “Our attachments do not affect the warranties of the OEM’s excavators,” and Heslop agrees: “Using different attachments should not affect a machine warranty at all, because the correctly sized attachment will function within the machine’s capabilities. Some OEM machine suppliers have their own attachments and using cheaper generic ones may cause a reaction, but this should easily be overcome.” Other OEMs, on the other hand, have strict procedures around the use of work tools from other manufacturers. One is Liebherr. Human error is always a possibility in all aspects of construction, and attaching tools opens itself to this likelihood — with the potential of attaching a tool incorrectly or using the incorrect tool for the desired application. Liebherr’s Rudolph adds: “Interchanging OEMs’ tools has no effect on warranties, as long as the specific working tool is approved for use on the designated carrier by Liebherr and it is configured correctly. “If the tool has not been approved, we have a checklist with the specifications of