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> Bucyrus-erie wheel excavator san luis dam photo 10
Bucyrus-erie wheel excavator san luis dam photo 10
A new high quality 8x10 full color photograph printed from an original progress photo on High Gloss HP Premium Plus Photo Paper with HP 02 inks. The photo was taken in May of 1964 at the San Luis Dam construction project near Los Banos, CA. The Bucyrus-Erie wheel excavator was the largest and first of its type ever used on a construction project. The massive machine was 64 feet tall and weighed 815 tons. The "wheel" had ten 2.5 cubic yard buckets and was capable of production rates as high as 3,500 cubic yards an hour. The machine is seen here working in borrow pit C. Here the wheel buckets are breaking through a cut face and ready to start a return swing. The straight face of the cut is accomplished by setting a guide line for the operator to follow. The dam required 77.5 million cubic yards of earthfill which ranked it has the fourth largest in the world at the time. The $86 million dollar project was built by Morrison-Knudsen (sponsor), Utah Mining and Brown & Root.
