Compared these two cutterhead dredges on the Mississippi last month...

I ran an old Ellicott 370 on a sandbar job near Baton Rouge for three weeks. Then the company swapped us to a newer Dragon 950 and the difference was night and day. The Ellicott kept clogging on that sticky clay mix we hit after day two. The Dragon with its wider suction inlet just chewed through it no problem. I think we moved about 40% more material per shift with the 950. Has anyone else run both of these on heavy clay? Wondering if the Dragon was just luck or if it's really that much better.

2 comments

2 Comments

the_wren9d agoMost Upvoted

A buddy of mine runs a crew up near Vicksburg and he swore by the old Ellicott for years. Then they got stuck on a real nasty clay job last fall and he said it was like watching paint dry, constantly pulling it off to clear stuff out. The company finally brought in a Dragon 950 and he called me that night talking about how it just kept going through the same material like it was nothing. He said their yardage jumped way up and they barely had any downtime after that. So from what he told me, it's not just luck the Dragon really handles that heavy clay way better.

cooper.reese8d ago

@the_wren curious how much downtime he had with the Ellicott before the switch?