I finally get why old timers run their cutter heads slower

Saw a video from the Army Corps of Engineers showing how cutter speed affects sediment suspension and realized I've been spinning mine way too fast for years. Anybody else find out they were doing something basic completely wrong from a random government video?

2 comments

2 Comments

nathana481mo agoTop Commenter

Huh, I gotta push back on this one a bit. Running a cutter head slow on purpose, I mean, yeah you get less sediment cloud but you also lose a lot of your cutting power. I tried slowing mine down after watching some dredging tutorial and ended up just chewing up the same spot for way longer, made the whole job take twice as long. If you're not kicking up some stuff then you're probably not really cutting anything either, it's like trying to saw a board with a dull blade.

mark_thomas1mo ago

You ever accidentally find the sweet spot for something and then can't get back to it? Couple years back I was running a stump grinder and hit this weird RPM where it just shredded through oak like butter. Tried to replicate it the next day and spent three hours cussing at the machine. Never figured out what I did different. Now I just let the thing run however it wants and pretend I meant to do it that way.