What is a Rod Arm System?
The UNI 250x400 directional dill is equipped with a Rod Arm System for increased productivity, enhanced safety and reduction in loading time. Unlike short-range and mid-range HDD rigs, long-range rigs lack the typical implementation of a rod-loader. There most common reason for that is a lack of rod basket on MAXI rigs. Since there is no on-board rod basket, a rod-loader would need to extend much further to pick up and load a drill rod on to a rig. This would make a rod-loader significantly bigger and would require a lot of space. Furthermore, long-range rigs feature 20-30 feet drill rods, which means considerably higher weight and size.
To save time and operating cost, the UNI 250x400 features a Rod Arm System which solves the above-mentioned problems. A drill rod is lifted with a crane and loaded on to a Rod Arm. Once the drill rod is loaded, the Rod Arm System clamps the rod and moves it precisely into position for drilling. There is no aligning or tinkering to get a rod positioned. Such an operation can be completed within minutes with a single worker operating a crane. It reduces the lifting of drill rods and enhances safety, productivity, and reliability. The same operation can be reversed to unload a drill rod.
Advantages of a Rod Arm System:
- Reduces manual or specialized equipment for the lifting of heavy drill rods
- Requires single crane operator
- Reduces fatigue in rod-handling operations
- Safer rod loading operations
- Quick load and unload time
- Reduces time for aligning a drill rod to zero