The Turkey based construction machine manufacturer Hidromek issued a press release that made it evident that the company will be joining the foray of electric excavators along with other Japanese, American and European heavy machine manufacturers in 2022. The Turkish construction machine manufacturer indicated that they have already finished the base trial runs of their electric wheeled excavator hire services towards the end of August 2021 and are happy with the results. According to inside sources the excavator outmatches most other bigger industry players not just in terms of cost, but also in terms of robustness, longer battery life and versatility. These machines according to the press release will be available in the market by the end of 2022. The seven ton class Hicon 7W is claimed to be a first in the world to be operated totally on electricity and sport rubber tires quoted Mustafa Bozkurt who is currently the chairman of Hidromek in a statement to Anadolu Agency.
The standard 7 ton Hicon 7W was unveiled in early November 2021 by the company’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan earlier this month. In the event, the presenter attested that this particular excavator could run for up to 8 hours only after a 90 minute ‘quick charge session’. Almost 90 % of all the parts and products used to build and assemble the machine are sourced domestically and this according to Recep, ‘includes the batteries’. Currently the production plant for these future machines is being constructed and is expected to be completed by the end of this year and the company will be open to orders by the first quarter of 2022. This does not come as a surprise given the fact that the Hicon 7W was the winner of the 2020 German Design Award and subsequently the 2020 IF product design award. To win both awards within a single year is certainly no easy feat, which is a driving factor behind the interest that the HICON 7w has been garnering over the last few months.
The company is no stranger to the construction industry’s playing field as it derives nearly $150 million of exports on average per annum and the company has a strong presence in about 100 countries across the globe. The companies far reach to other parts of the world is attributed to the fact that Hidromek was established in 1978 by Hasan Bozkurt in humble workshop in Ankara starting with the production of parts which included pumps, cylinders and even torque converters for construction machines initially. Nevertheless, within a decade, the company was already involved in bigger projects that included producing and assembling loaders and attachments specifically for tractors used for agricultural purposes.
It was in 1999 that Hidromek produced a backhoe loader that carried the name Hidromek and the company has not turned back since. By the turn of the century, Hidromek made its first across border sale to Tunisia and from then on, everything snowballed to the extent that the company had to establish production facilities outside of Ankara and Izmir such as in Spain, Russia and subsequently in Thailand in 2013. The company has also successfully collaborated with Japanese manufacturers on several projects and supplies construction services companies such as excavator rental companies. Some of the more prominent collaboration that was significant for the Turkish company was its initiative with Mitsubishi Heavy industries involving a Motor Grader unit.