In the last 20 years, the excavation process has greatly changed. There is far more emphasis on safety and the protection of utilities, pipelines, structural elements, and trees. Because of the inherent dangers of traditional mechanical excavation methods, hydrovac excavation has become an essential part of almost all excavation projects. Hydrovac excavation provides a safe and cost-effective method to keep your jobsite safe year-round.
Hydrovac excavation is the process of using pressurized water and a vacuum to remove soil, debris, and other materials from the ground. Most often it is used to expose or “daylight” underground utilities. Prior to the development of hydrovac technology, existing utilities were most commonly exposed by using hand excavation methods. However, there are inherent drawbacks to using shovels and pickaxes to expose utilities: Hand shoveling is slow, labor intensive, and expensive. And, there was still no guarantee that no damage would be done to existing utilities. Conduits and cables can be broken or pierced by a sharp shovel and pipeline coatings can be damaged. The use of a hydrovac to perform this work eliminates those hazards and frees up critical manpower to perform other tasks.
Hydrovacs are used in a wide variety of scenarios and jobsites. Traditionally, they are used to expose or daylight underground utilities. However, they are also used for a variety of other excavation scenarios such as cleaning/steaming out culverts, conduits, and duct banks; Sucking out water and debris from catch basins, manholes, and drainage systems; Safely disposing of contaminated solid and liquid materials; trenching in locations that are too small or narrow for buckets or shovels; creating pot holes, vault holes, and push/pull pits for directional drilling and utility installations; Cleaning and purging of tanks without having to use manpower in a confined space.

There are several benefits to using a hydrovac on your construction project: