One of the world’s largest demolition excavators has gone to work in Italy. And DemolitionNews was granted exclusive access.
The first thing that strikes you about Despe’s new Jumbo machine is not its size but its colour. It is purest Despe white from nose to tail. It is a brilliant white, the colour of glaciers. If for some inexplicable reason Apple and Audi forged an alliance to build a demolition excavator, this is what it would look like. It is as sleek and as elegant as anything that has ever sashayed down a runway in the nearby fashion capital of the world, Milan.
The second most striking feature of the new Jumbo machine is that it looks “normal”. Many modified demolition excavators, particularly those in the Ultra High Reach class, have something of the Frankenstein’s monster about them. They look like they have been assembled from spare parts that do not necessarily belong together. They are over-large and out of proportion.
The greatest compliment I can pay the team at Laurini that modified the Jumbo is that there is no sign of them having done so.
Yes, the machine is carrying some additional “junk in its trunk” to counterbalance the 12 tonne tool. The undercarriage it stands upon has been lengthened and widened to provide a more stable base. And the machine looks somehow muscular. When it raises the TreviBenne FR 100N tool off the ground, you fully expect to see a defined bicep flex at the base of the boom.
But in every other way, the machine could easily have rolled off the production line in Batam, Indonesia where the standard Cat 6015B is built.
In fact, it is only when you see the Jumbo alongside a 50-tonne class excavator that its sheer scale becomes apparent. This is a 351-tonne machine. It is more than twice the weight of the Caterpillar machine upon which it is based; and it is operating in a city centre. Yet rather than looking like an over-large fish out of water, the Jumbo looks perfectly at home.
It quickly becomes apparent that the Gewiss Stadium’s Curva Sud Morosini stand is no match for the Jumbo or for the fearsome FR 100N tool it is wielding. That stand may have withstood decades of bouncing Atalanta fans but it crumbles like a leaky footballing defence against the Jumbo’s might. In fact, the machine proves so formidable that the destruction we expected to last for three hours or more is over in less than half that time. I have rarely seen such a display of raw power from a demolition machine. The Jumbo could eat power stations for breakfast, followed by a refinery or offshore oil rig for lunch.
And that is precisely the point. The Jumbo is the living embodiment of demolition productivity. It has been developed and built not out of vanity but out of need. The machine is not there to satisfy the egos of the Despe team. Rather, it has been produced to give the company a significant competitive advantage in the years and even decades to come.
That longevity is a key to the Jumbo’s viability and success. The machine is not cheap; far from it. But with the back-up of Caterpillar, Laurini and Despe’s own in-house maintenance department, the latest Jumbo could easily last as long as the company’s Liebherr 984-based original. If the new Jumbo is still in the company’s fleet 10, 15 or 20 years from now, it will have earned its keep many times over.
This is an extract from an exclusive mini e-book that is on sale RIGHT NOW for just £3. The book tells the story of The Jumbo, the company that owns it, and of its maiden project.
You can buy your copy of The Jumbo HERE.
