Choosing a Bucket for Track Loaders

Most track loaders will come with a bucket already equipped, but this is usually a general-use design. While a utilitarian bucket will do good work and move a lot of earth and material around, specialized jobs greatly benefit from specialized equipment. Picking the wrong bucket or just a cheap bucket won’t necessarily lead you down a solid path. We believe pairing the right equipment with the right job makes all the difference. In that spirit, we’ve put together this short guide to track loader buckets, so read on to learn more!

Types of Track Loader Buckets

Finding the right bucket begins with knowing what’s out there to choose from. Here are a few of the most common buckets. 

General-Purpose

These types of buckets come standard on most track loaders. They’re heavy-duty attachments designed to maximize filling and material retention. General-purpose buckets handle a variety of jobs well and are especially fit for stockpiling and rehandling material.

Multipurpose

As the name suggests, these buckets are versatile and can handle several types of operation, from dozing to material transport, backfilling and dragging, grading, grappling, excavating, dumping, and whatever else you can get to work!

Light Material

Designed to deal with loose or lightly packed material, light material buckets are great for peat, snow, wood chips, and gravel. 

Rock Bucket

Rock buckets are designed specially to deal with heavier and more agitating materials, like concrete debris, rock, and other applications that need durable construction to handle them.

There are more than just these four, but most are for such specific applications that they aren’t worth mentioning. Just know that no matter what you have in mind for your loader, there’s likely a bucket designed specifically for handling that job.

Matching the Bucket to Application

Having the right bucket for your track loader can decrease the number of passes it takes to get a job done. So if you’re working with a wide range of materials, you might want to focus on general-purpose buckets. However, if you have work to do with the loader that isn’t just general-purpose material transport, you could use a multipurpose bucket. Larger loads of loose material will be best served by a specialized light material bucket.

Picking the right track loader bucket doesn’t have to be hard, but if you’re still having trouble, don’t hesitate to head into Bobcat® of Fort Wayne. We can help you make the best decision possible based on the work you do. Come in today at our location in Fort Wayne, IN, and speak with our dedicated team of experts. We also proudly serve our neighbors in Indianapolis.