UK’s First Doosan DX235LCR-5 Excavator at J.J. Mullins
J.J. Mullins (C.E.) Ltd, based at Farnworth in Greater Manchester, has purchased the UK’s first Doosan DX235LCR-5 24 tonne Stage IV compliant reduced radius crawler excavator. The new Doosan DX235LCR-5 excavator was purchased from Wigan-based Norwest Plant Ltd, the Authorised Doosan and Bobcat dealer for North-West England and North Wales.
The new DX235LCR-5 offers superior digging performance together with flexibility, convenience and low operating costs in a compact design with a minimum swing radius of 2310 mm. The DX235LCR-5 meets the growing demand for reduced radius machines for work near buildings and in confined areas. The trend towards reduced radius machines has been accelerated by the space premium on construction sites and, in particular, with road and rail construction, the requirement to keep adjacent lanes and track open while working alongside them.
Increased Market Confidence
Paul Mullins, Managing Director of J.J. Mullins (C.E.) Ltd, commented: “We are a well-established family owned and run business offering a range of civil engineering and groundwork services using a combination of the latest technology and traditional techniques, providing the complete package of labour, plant and materials.
“We run a fleet of Doosan machines from 3 to 30 tonne - the DX235LCR-5 offers the latest technology and we purchased the new machine based on the increased confidence and optimism we are seeing in the construction market in the North. With its weight, power and digging depth, we see the DX235LCR-5 as a multi-utility machine and its reduced radius design is very well suited to our projects especially those for housing associations and private developers, where we are often working on confined space sites.”
Jonathan Campbell, General Manager of Norwest Plant Ltd, said: “We have been working closely with J.J. Mullins (C.E.) Ltd for over 20 years as a longstanding customer of Norwest Plant and before that Plantlink. As in their predecessors, one of the many attractive features of the latest range of machines from Doosan is the wide selection of innovative features they have as standard, which are only available as options on other machines on the market.
“We have recently invested quite heavily in our aftermarket team with the appointment of an experienced Aftermarket Manager plus we have recruited an additional 3 service engineers in the past 12 months. We at Norwest Plant firmly believe our customers deserve 5 star aftermarket care and we trust that we can deliver this level of service to them.”
The range of applications for the DX235LCR-5 runs from general construction to renovation and refurbishment of roads, highways and other civil engineering projects, where a reduced radius is an important feature to minimise disturbance to surrounding traffic as well as the potential for damage to the surrounding environment. At the same time, the long carriage (LC) design of the DX235LCR-5 is intended to offer exceptional stability in all operating conditions, including heavy digging and lifting operations.
Paul Mullins added: “We are very pleased with the performance of the DX235LCR-5 and the fuel economy it is giving us, which is providing a significant reduction in running costs. I have always found the Doosan range to be very good value for money, combining market-leading productivity with excellent operator comfort and controllability. The aftersales support from Doosan and Norwest Plant is always of the highest standard and any issues we have are dealt with very promptly, reducing any downtime to an absolute minimum. It will come as no surprise then that we have been buying Daewoo and then Doosan excavators since 1998 and have always found that they compare very favourably with other machines on the market.”
High Fuel Efficiency
The DX235LCR-5 is powered by the well-proven 6-cylinder, turbocharged Doosan DL06P water-cooled diesel engine providing a 9% increase in engine power of 180 kW (242 HP) at 1900 rpm and 8% more fuel efficiency compared to the previous Stage IIIB model. Like all Doosan ‘LC-5’ machines, the DX235LCR-5 offers convenience and lower costs by meeting Stage IV emission regulations without the need for a diesel particulate filter (DPF), through the use of cooled exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) and selective catalyst reduction (SCR) after-treatment technologies.
Presented in a distinctive new machine styling scheme that is common to all new Doosan Stage IV compliant machines, the performance of the DX235LCR-5 has been increased significantly from the previous model, including a 5% increase in torque; an increase of around 13% in bucket force in both standard and boost modes; a 3% increase in arm force in both standard and boost modes and higher lifting capacities, up by 9% over the front and nearly 16% over the side.
The DX235LCR-5 has an operating weight of 24.3 tonne, with a bucket breakout force of 16.0 tonne (ISO) and an arm breakout force of 11.1 tonne (ISO). Maximum digging reach is 9.82 m at ground level in the standard configuration and the maximum digging depth is 6.67 m.