Top 100: Three Teeth Rip Faster

Sept. 28, 2010

Leading Edge Attachments claims its Multi-Ripper can dig 10 times faster than using a single ripper tooth, and four times faster than a hydraulic hammer. Under severe conditions such as excavating frozen ground, coral, sandstone, shale, and caliche, it out-works the company's own DigNRip Buckets. Multi-Rippers are available to fit excavators and backhoes of 11,000 pounds and larger. Rolling the tool into the material by extending the backhoe bucket cylinder delivers full breakout force to one tooth at a time. The following tooth engages the material near the already-fractured face just as the lead tooth clears the work surface. That's how Leading Edge explains its production advantage (even while acknowledging that it can't replace a hydraulic hammer in all situations). Estimated list price: $1,134 to $19,131.