Overheard a foreman in Louisiana say his crew only runs buckets at half throttle for fine grading

Tried it on a marina job last week and it smoothed out the bottom way better than full throttle ever did, has anyone else messed around with running way slower for finishing work?

2 comments

2 Comments

lilyt909d ago

Ngl, the half throttle thing is old news for guys who have been doing finish grade for a while. Full throttle just blows everything out and makes a mess of the bottom. You need that slower bucket speed to let the material settle and get a clean cut. The foreman was right, but it's not really a secret trick, it's just how you do fine grading if you care about the finish. Running too fast leaves gouges and waves. Half throttle lets the machine feel the grade better instead of just ripping through it.

the_aaron9d ago

I got that same advice from an old-timer on a job in Baton Rouge back in 2022, and it completely changed how I finish out pond bottoms. On one marina project we had real silty clay that would just smear and rut up at full throttle, but dropping to half throttle let the bucket bite clean and leave a glassy surface. I actually found it helps a ton with getting that final depth tolerance too, since the machine isn't jerking around so much. Now I stick to half throttle for anything finer than rough grading and I haven't had a callback on finish work since.