backhoe

English

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backhoe

Wikipedia

a backhoe added to a farm tractor (sense 1)

a backhoe in the 21st century (sense 3)

Etymology

From back +‎ hoe.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈbæk.həʊ/

• Audio (General Australian):

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• Audio (US):

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Noun

backhoe (plural backhoes)

2. A piece of excavating equipment, either an integral subassembly or an attachment, consisting of a digging bucket or scoop on the end of an articulated arm, drawn backwards to move earth; used in excavator/digger and backhoe tractors.

   Coordinate term: front-end loader

3. Ellipsis of backhoe tractor: A specialized tractor with the backhoe subassembly. This type of tractor has been superceded by the backhoe loader and trackhoe in most roles.
5. (chiefly US, Canada, Australia) Ellipsis of backhoe loader: A multi-purpose tractor with a front-mounted loading bucket and a rear-mounted digging bucket. The tractor combines a front-end loader/loader (component) and an excavator/digger (component).

   Synonym: digger

   Hypernym: heavy equipment

   Meronym: front-end loader

   Coordinate terms: trackhoe; front-end loader; bulldozer, grader

   • 1967 June, Charles E. Rhine, “How to Rent a Backhoe”, in Popular Science, page 149:

     The backhoe is only one type of heavy equipment for rent. […] I heard about a couple of tool-rental outfits near Chicago that were doing a brisk business renting backhoes and other heavy equipment to homeowners

   • 1987, Dave Roberts, Pipe and Excavation Contracting‎, page 173:

     I'll recommend a good way to calculate backhoe production rates. Then we'll look at the two backhoes you'll be using, the wheeled backhoe and the tracked backhoe.

   • 2010, Robert Day, Foundation Engineering Handbook, 2nd edition, page 2.49,

     Backhoe pits and trenches are an economical means of performing subsurface exploration. The backhoe can quickly excavate the trench that can then be used to observe and test the in situ soil (see Fig. 2.29).

Synonyms

• (multi-purpose): backhoe loader, loader excavator, backhoe endloader

Derived terms

• backhoe loader

Translations

a piece of excavating equipment

Bulgarian: багер (bg) (bager) Chinese: Mandarin: please add this translation if you can Finnish: kaivinkone (fi) French: tractopelle (fr) f, rétrocaveuse (fr) f German: Baggerschaufel (de) f Indonesian: bakhu Polish: koparka (pl) f Russian: ковш (ru) m (kovš) Thai: แบ็กโฮ, รถแบ็กโฮ

a multi-purpose tractor

Arabic: عقرب Bulgarian: екскаватор (bg) m (ekskavator) Catalan: retroexcavadora f, retrocarregadora f, excavadora carregadora f, excavadora mixta f, carregadora mixta f, pala mixta f Chinese: Mandarin: 反鏟挖土機 / 反铲挖土机 Danish: rendegraver (da) c Finnish: traktorikaivuri French: rétrocaveuse (fr) f, tractopelle (fr) f, chargeuse-pelleteuse (fr) f, (Canada) pépine (fr) f, (Switzerland) trax (fr) m German: Baggerlader m Hungarian: kotrórakodó Italian: terna (it) f Malay: pengorek-kaut, ڤڠوريق کاءوت (pengurik ka'ut) Polish: koparkoładowarka f Portuguese: (Portugal) retroescavadora f, (Brazil) retroescavadeira f Russian: экскаватор (ru) m (ekskavátor) Serbo-Croatian: građevinska kombinirka Slovene: traktorski kopač Spanish: retroexcavadora (es) f, retrocargadora f, excavadora mixta f, cargadora mixta f, pala mixta f Swedish: traktorgrävare, grävlastare Turkish: beko loder, kazıcı yükleyici Ukrainian: екскавáтор (ekskavátor)

See also

• bobcat
• excavator
• front-end loader
• JCB

Verb

backhoe (third-person singular simple present backhoes, present participle backhoeing, simple past and past participle backhoed)

1. To excavate using such equipment.

Further reading

• Category:Backhoe loaders on Wikimedia Commons.Wikimedia Commons
• “backhoe”, in Collins English Dictionary.
• “backhoe”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.
• “backhoe”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
• “backhoe”, in Cambridge English Dictionary, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: Cambridge University Press, 1999–present.