Bucket wheel excavators are huge excavators used in raw materials mining and on large construction sites. Particularly large bucket wheel excavators in the size of several hundred metres are used in brown coal mining. Our model is that of the “Leopold” bucket wheel excavator, the biggest of its kind in Austria. Its gigantic dimensions: it weighs 500 tons, is 45 m long and 12 m high. It was used for many years for brown coal surface mining in Oberdorf. After the mine closed, this giant departed on its final journey that took it to the “Zangtal Mining and Exploration World” on 14 April 2004. Transporting the giant machine was by no means easy: street lamps had to be taken down, a high-tension line shut down and trees cut.
