Back around 2009 I worked utilities and brought up “why not use a vac truck like the city uses to clean out storm drains?”. We hand dug every pole hole for every pole set(wood, steel, concrete, fiberglass etc) in and around Baltimore. Everyone laughed and said that was a stupid idea. I should have started a company specializing it just that.

Very efficient as long as the only operator doesnt stop working when he is talking :)

that guy is really enthusiastic and knowledgeable. always feels good coming across people like that.

I once hit a 3 phase 440 line that was "supposed" to be 3+ feet deep... It was 6"!!! That ditch witch threw the prettiest blue sparks 4' into the air and sounded like thunder when I hit it!!! Scared the crap out of me and everyone who was watching :-) Neat rig and it sure does beat a shovel!!!

The pigs watching the slurry come off the truck, thought you brought them a new puddle to play in. Poor guys! Lol That was really awesome. Thanks for sharing.

Kudos to the hydro vac operator. He knew his stuff and seems genuinely excited about his job.

Your pigs were super-excited to see all that fresh slop! HA! I've always wondered how these trucks worked - now I know, thanks to LetsDig18

Very common in Germany. Have a nice day.

Cool truck. They rebuilt the power line on my road a few years ago. Set all the poles with one of these. Did almost four miles in two days and never called the locating service. They told me they didn't need to when they used the vac. Fiber optics on both sides of the road. Pretty impressive. Best regards from Indiana.

I've been seeing those type of trucks around Atlanta and had to "google" what hydro excavating was. You satisfied my curiosity WAY better then what I read. There is a whole 'nuther world that most people don't know about that you are sharing. Another one was the video about the roads covered with soil/cement. Fascinating!

Well that was different and cool! Thanks for sharing this one. Used to dig holes with a garden hose as a kid, never thought to pair it with a shop vac!

Hi Chris, that was quite interesting! Quick & safe, perfect. It's always cool to learn about new ways to get something done! Thanks !

I’ve been building roads and such for almost 20 years now and I have never ever seen or heard of doing a hard locate with a vacuum truck. Genius my boy. Absolutely genius.

He joked about boring right through it. Friend of mine started getting issues with blocked drains and weeks after getting it jetted clean it was blocked again. When they eventually ran a camera down the pipe they found the gas board had bored a replacement gas line to the neighbours house right through the middle of the sewer line and were causing the pipe to block with the solids.

That's the safest and quickest way to find utilities. Always something new with you Chris, keeping your viewers informed.

Hi from uk chris👋👍 great to see the excavac in service was good watch as never seen one on site👍 so much safer with this as you both said👌 here in uk we always expect tape and sand before services are found even when step benched! I witnessed a collegue loosing corner of his shovel as was no tape looking for street light power supply pot ended to connect to and struck gold when he was blew out the hole in smoke🤔😢 he was ok but (parden the pun) we where both in shock that day it was horrible watching as he was dazed on a round so I blocked road with my jcb 535-200 loadall/telehandler and tried to help him 👍 please be safe on this job chris I know you will be tho 👌 I always say your my magic man but this guy had the wand today epic to watch thank you for your time and be safe see you soon👍👋

That was awesome to watch. I actually had our gas utility do this yesterday at our plant to uncover a 6” high pressure gas line. Wasn’t able to watch it but this made up for it

Now that was very interesting. I still see them hand digging most everything around Ocala Florida. Thanks Chris enjoyed the hell out of this one.

Nice to see alternatives of locating lines . Glad you took the opportunity to show this Chris

My dad was operating a grader on a street repave. The gas line had been located and was supposed to be 3 feet deep. He was supposed to cut a foot deep because the street was just paved over dirt with no gravel bed. He was only 10 inches below the surface when he hit the gas line.

I like the random (behind the scenes) videos like these. Extremely effective and cost efficient way of pin-pointing utilities that I never knew existed. That line was alarmingly shallow even to a common mans perspective like me. Interesting videos as always my friend.

This is a time, financial, utilities and life saving excavation process - I must have been living in a bubble as it exists in my home town. Thanks LetsDig18 for waking me up.

That was just doggone fascinating to watch. What a novel idea ! Thanks Chris !!

I work for the utility company in my state, from the office. My team schedules work for the distribution crews and utilized Hydrovac companies all the time. I have always wanted to see this in action! Another great video!!

What a cool video! Thanks for sharing. I don't know what my back is worth? And while I enjoy the health benefits of manual labor as opposed to my office job. A truck like that would have saved me a s***load of frustration on the 1905 farm house I am fixing up. Plumbing and I mean 13 trips to the big box store and a lot of cussing. The pigs seem to find the slop super interesting at the 20:15 mark. "Hey we want in on that action..." LOL

What a magnificent piece of equipment? And a 1 man operation as well, worth every dollar. A similar truck was used on the boundary of my place & my neighbour to find the internet cable. Years before the previous owner of next door dug a massive hole to repair a storm water pipe & of course severed both internet cables, he did a dodgey repair on mine & didn’t bother to fix his as he decided to go satellite internet. The new owner wanted usual cable internet hence trying to see what the problem was. I was able to watch them do the whole thing, so interesting. Take care Chris & cheers🐨🦘🥰

Always wondered what those trucks did ! Great - Safe way to locate under ground see

Dumping out the slurry and you had an audience. Piggies, they were interested in that mud!

Super cool - thanks for the variety on your channel. Love watching and learning from you!

Love the pigs all drooling over the fresh slop at 20:25 lol.

That was pretty Cool !! And way, way, faster than digging any day... Thanks for sharing that Chris, enjoyed checking that out man !! Great as always , Have a Great Evening, and, On too the Next...

This is an innovative idea Chris, saves a lot of man hours on a shovel. Kyle is a nice young man, he enjoys a chat and is easy to communicate with unlike some who don't have anything to say. Bob. NZ.

We use hydrovac trucks all over Central Texas for telecom work to pothole existing utilities and to even dig bore pits and vault pits when we are in really crowded areas. Much safer and faster than conventional daylighting and digging. I've had to have a hydrovac truck dig me a 2' wide, 16' deep, and about 80' long. Took them a whole day and 3 trucks in rotation going to dump and fill with water just to lower 6 2" conduits in place. Love those trucks!

I had a front row seat for one of these machines just last week. The electric company was replacing the transformer box located right beside my condo wall. I could look down from my 2nd story window right into the hole they were blasting out. They had to take out an area about 5x6 feet to take out the old box, then splice the lines into the new box located a few feet away. There was fiber down there too as everything terminated into the building right there. Lots of conduit! The guys were really careful and did not destroy the trees and shrubs located just a few feet away. I was very impressed!

Chris, I work for a large class 8 truck dealership group that supplies a large manufacturer of these trucks with many red oval trucks. The company is Vactor Manufacturing out of Streator Illinois and they make a lot of what we refer to as “Super Suckers” We also have a customer who owns two or three of these units that contract them out to a frac sand supplier. They use them to clean up spilled sand from the trains they load the sand into. They are very cool and the use’s are nearly endless. Nice video.

Thanks for that video! I love to learn about new equipment! What a time saver!

Well now!!!! That’s awesome and my first time seeing one in operation. Thanks Chris.

When he emptied out it looked like a cow emptying out. What a great way to find utilities.

I can take that off my bucket list now. I've always wondered what those trucks did besides cleaning manholes and storm drains. very worthwhile

This specialist with his toolkit makes this video much more interesting and thanks for showing him.

Thank you Chris, I have never seen that before and the operator seemed really comfortable sharing his info with you. Cool.

That is a very expensive operation but high in demand on city and suburban jobs. Number 2 brother-in-law in Canada has very similar equipment and gets $285 P/H plus travel. He just had to replace 1 small pump last week that cost him $10K plus $700 shipping cost. Awesome video to show those another option to digging around buried high power lines.

Nice outfit, first time I have seen one of those work. Great video.

Thanks Chris. Definitely something new this old horse learned today. Really fascinating how fast and easy it was to locate those utilities that were slightly off from the marks.

Interesting Chris.....I've never seen this. I have seen the NC Highway dept use a straight vacuum to clean out storm drains on our street. Also, those are cool pants. I think letsdig18 needs some special logo'd pants like his! You could put the Logo across the seat!

This was great! I always wondered how those machines worked. Work Smarter Not Harder!

when i quit city services work 5ish years ago it was pretty much all vac truck locating by then...its safe, fast and easy

I had a hydrovac locate power and fiber around a main gas line when I moved the gas meter to the garage. It was pretty interesting watching them weld a nipple onto an 8" natural gas line for the new feed. The connector they put on sealed and pierced into the main via the nipple. Vac trucks are amazing, thanks for sharing.

I love seeing machines like this, that are made for special purposes. If I worked with one of these, I'd be making holes every where, 24/7 lol Thanks for sharing this, Chris.

the pigs are curious.🤣 They must think that mush is for them.

Awesome show Chris, really enjoyed seeing that new tech service.

Like the video on Hydro Excavating Utilities .

Been in oil and gas for many years and never got to see a hydro excavation. Thanks!

Clever set up. Reminds me of a water jet metal cutter, but much different.

Totally safe way to find utilities, thanks for thinking of us bro. Safe travels

Unique application of 2 existing hardwares, wish we'd had this when I was doing excavating. It would have saved two 2700 pair phone cables. Thanks for sharing!

How I miss operating one of these. Thanks for my moment or nostalgia! Another great video.

Some jobs can get real fun... Using a robot-mounted video camera to determine if a culvert needs replaced or not, then coming back after the locators have been there, sometimes there can be many, many paint markings on the ground that you just know will look like spaghetti once you locate everything over, under, and sometimes through the culvert that needs replacing.

Work on trucks like that sometimes. Always wondered how they operated. Pretty neat system. Clean hole, no mess outside the hole, don't seem to get too dirty, and the truck does all the work. Pretty much point and shoot.

Saves a back! Those pigs were giving you the stink eye, they wanted that mud!

called in a broken water line under a hydrant, this type truck showed up..No mess, no front lawn damage and quickly sucked a hole big enough and deep enough to do repair...A bit loud on a city street but quite impressive..

Wow that was pretty cool and safe way to find utilities! Thanks for sharing Chris!

You really could set an alarm to this guy, 430 on the dot. That's awesome Chris

This is awesome seeing these trucks work in the field. I build sewer cleaners/hydro excavators for a living. They are a fantastic piece of machinery. Excellent Job Chris and crew!!

Thanks Chris for sharing video haven't ever seen that done before.

“You can run this rig with one man”. Unless it’s a government job, then you need a supervisor, a foreman, a quality inspector, four flagmen to totally screw up the traffic, and the requisite six “standers”!

Chris, love the videos and I've been subscribed for quite a while. I do sewer and water for a living, State certified. Seriously THE CLEANEST vac truck operator I've ever seen... I'm talking about his bibs, his boots (99% of the time rubber - FYI waterproof work boots don't cut it) etc... Vac truck is a great tool without a doubt. Good video. BTW... That operator should clarify vertical or horizontal suction! I know the answer. I was in a lift station that we shut down the pumps and replaced an 8" valve and piece of pipe. Inlets kept flowing. We relied on alternating trucks to keep us working until the replacement was done.

Oh shit, here comes the “use it on a pond” remarks.

Good to see some who enjoys their work and is good at it.

One of my favorite trucks to run. It’s sort of gratifying.

the old days it was a man an a shovel , but time and money has changed. You can see the lines that are located and manuver over/ under or beside . The only way now a days. Great job !

The company I work for has used Badger Daylighting several times to locate utilities. I work in the natural gas industry and we basically aren't allowed to use mechanized equipment like excavators to dig over any utility. They have to be found by hand or with vacuum excavation. I operator an excavator and dig in the road pretty much everyday. The only thing I'm allowed to do over a utility is pull the blacktop or concrete. Vacuum excavation saves a ton of time and the laborers back!

Good thing is Justin recommended this company too you !!!!

Awesome machine & process, 1st time watching one in action.

Chris i sure hope you set this guy up with some LD18 swag… awesome video

Well that was pretty neat.Safe and big time saver for sure

That was very impressive to watch. It sure would save hours of hard shovel work on a hot summer day.

They basically did that to my house here in the UK. Long story short I moved into this house (social rented) and now and then a random room would smell like a fart. It was strange - could be any room and at random. After 6 months of me complaining to my landlord they gave up and got a large 'Dyna' company to investigate. They used cameras along pipes, everything. I can still remember being shown footage of them going along a sewer pipe and then it becoming 'nothing'. What had happened, many years before I got this house, was that an underfloor 90 degrees elbow from the toilet waste pipe had come undone and fell off. Quite literally beneath my floor was a massive 4 feet thick pile of poop with a crust on it. Those smells I'd gotten were the crust breaking and randomly releasing gas! I watched 4 workmen actually draw straws. The loser then stripped off into a special suit. Workmen had completely removed a whole room floor (bathroom). That worker then went beneath my house with a lance in one hand and a large vacuum pipe in another. They had a 8 wheel water tanker and an 8 wheel vacuum truck beside my property. It took a whole day to remove the monster beneath my floor. As they retreated they then covered every surface with lime powder. That toilet pipe elbow was GLUED on and not simply shoved on. The bathroom floor then replaced. My house doesn't fart any more.

Well, that was refreshing. Good 👍 show Cris. That’s why I like your show , your always doing interesting stuff . Pretty cool 😎

We use this piece of equipment when drilling new utility poles when surrounded by Urdu cables- 8 hr hand dig in just one hour

BP used these all the time when I worked there. Sure does make digging in a spaghetti of pipes every day a whole lot easier

As I drive down the road I keep seeing more and more of these kind of trucks around, thanks for showing how they work!

In the UK we use Vac ex's all the time, we however use air to break up the hole not water, we can then re-use the dry backfill. When we build housing estates we put the roads in, along side the roads we would put in the water mains 900mm down from the kerb, gas 700 down from the kerb (200mm away from the water) electric 1200 away from the kerb 500 down, but all of those would be kept inside the footpath as well as fibre which would be 300-400 deep......When we need to connect them to the houses everything is inside the footpath outside each house....You just suck out the hole, connect utilities, sand and tape them up, backfill then onto the next house.....This works well when building homes in mass.

Is that Logger Wades brother???? Lmao kinda acts like him and looks like him... Awesome video.

At my old job we used these working around gas and power mains, to fix sewer man's, I sometimes ran it but it was mostly one of the other guys that did it. They are extremely useful for keeping water out of a hole you are trying to fix a pipe in.

Like to see new ways to do things. But with my budget I would use a pressure washer and a shop vac.😉 Look at all that future bacon, yum.🎯

I remember when I first saw a vac truck to pothole. Was outside our phone central office to locate lines around a gas main. Major game changer in downtown streets littered with utilities.

Great Vid.... first time I've seen a Hydro-Vac truck as opposed to Vacuum excavation trucks which use compressed air to break up sub surface..... Almost 40 years in UK Gas Industry

All of the pigs lining up at the fence praying Chris is going to let them at that mud! 😉

Ya da Ya da Ya da. I imagine the operator was asked to explain his work for us. Then add highlights of previous interesting jobs.

This was was really nice of you Chris to be wanting to share something different for your subscribers.

That is cool! Thank you for sharing this with us!!

Always wondered how those worked. Thanks for sharing.

I worked as a hydro ex helper when I was younger and man I dont miss 4500 rpms all day. And always wet

Nice! We used to dig beside and crumb the dirt off a cable or pipe, you need to be able to read the soil. Never ever use a shovel or spade up against a cable, it damages easy. When fiber optics hit the area, no trace wire was buried with it. Poke and hope, read the soil to find the trench. Hours upon hours are spent to visually expose a utility and to date, I have never came close to cutting or damaging a line. One of your best informational video's Chris 👍

I’ve seen those trucks around and always wondered what they did, now I know. Thanks!

Years ago I watched a video on opal miners in Australia using compressed air and vacuum to dig shafts and adits. Lot of videos on air trenching or air spade but those don't vacuum out the material, just blast it out of the trench, dry.

We use these exclusively in the natural gas industry when excavating with buried pipe & conduit. It's a lot cheaper than having a line strike!

This thing is fascinating ! I could watch hours of this !

Chris the company that I worked for Leon Lowe and sons has their own vac truck and it’s amazing what those things will do we use them to clean out catch basins after we build a subdivision and either lay concrete or asphalt for the roads we will let it rain a few times and then go back and clean out all the catch basins but another great video my friend so you and John and yawls family stay safe and keep the videos coming brother. Oh can’t wait do you get back to the stumping job and get back on your D6