A ride on trencher is the step up from a walk behind: a seated machine that cuts roughly 3 to 6 ft deep and 4 to 12 inches wide, hiring at about $350 to $700 a day. It earns that rate on long runs, hard ground and anything past a couple of feet of depth, and it is wasted on twenty feet of soft garden soil.
Depth and width are set by the chain you order
Boom length fixes the maximum depth and the digging chain fixes the width, so both are specified when you book rather than adjusted on site. Order the narrowest width that takes your pipe or cable with its bedding, because every extra inch is more spoil to handle and more backfill to compact afterwards.
When it beats a walk behind machine
A walk behind trencher runs out at about two to three feet and fights the operator in stony ground. A ride on has the weight to hold the chain in the cut, the speed to make long runs pay and enough power to keep going in hardpan. Below about a hundred feet of shallow trench, the smaller machine is still the cheaper hire.
Locate services before the chain turns
A trenching chain does not stop for a gas line or a fibre duct. Call the national 811 service before you dig, mark what comes back, and hand dig within the tolerance zone around every mark. Federal excavation rules make locating and protecting underground installations a condition of the work, not a courtesy.
Rock, dust and the wrong ground
Where the ground turns to rock, a chain trencher slows to a crawl and yards will steer you to a rock wheel or a saw instead. Cutting rock or concrete releases respirable silica, which carries its own control duties for water or dust collection, so say what you are cutting when you book rather than finding out at the face.
Getting it to site and back
These machines are trailer loads rather than pickup bed loads, and most renters take delivery. If you tow it yourself, check the trailer rating with the machine and its spare chain aboard, and remember that a trencher is loaded and unloaded on ramps under its own power, which is where care is needed.
Questions people ask about ride on trencher
How deep can a ride on trencher dig?
The usual hire range is three to six feet, set by the boom fitted. Deeper runs, or trenches anyone will enter, become an excavation with shoring and sloping duties rather than a simple trenching job, and that is a different machine and a different plan.
How fast is a trencher compared with digging by hand?
In workable ground a ride on machine covers in an hour what would take a crew a full day with shovels. The saving disappears if the run is short, because setup, delivery and service locating take the same time whatever the length.
Can a trencher cut through tree roots?
It will cut small roots, but large roots and buried stumps stall the chain and can throw the machine off line. Where a run passes near mature trees, expect to hand dig sections, and consider whether the tree's root plate should be avoided altogether.
What do I do with the spoil?
A trencher lays a windrow along one side of the cut, which is convenient for backfilling once the pipe is bedded. Keep the pile back from the edge, and if the trench is deep enough for anyone to enter, that spoil is a surcharge load the competent person has to account for.