Bulldozer Training – What Skills Will I Learn?

Bulldozers are fairly straightforward units of heavy equipment and an operator can be effective with fairly basic skill levels. However, being a competent operator goes beyond knowing which levers to push or pull and when – there are many others factors that are required. If you undertake a heavy equipment training program through ATS Heavy Equipment Operator Schools, you can expect to learn how to operate:

• backhoes
• wheel loaders
• scrapers
• excavators
• bulldozers
• road graders
• rock trucks
• Skid Steers, and
• All-Terrain Forklifts

As you can see, bulldozers are included in the range of heavy equipment that you can learn to operate. This gives you more variety when it comes to employment opportunities in the future. Operating skills are only one part of what is needed to become an effective operator. Other skills required include:

• the ability to read and assess grades
• ability to use laser levels
• knowledge of different soils and soil structures
• understand and work to safety guidelines
• ability to read and understand site layouts
• knowledge and ability to carry out basic heavy equipment maintenance

These complementary skills are what separates average operators and good operators. This is particularly true of bulldozer operators who are often required to work on a construction site when it is still virgin bushland. Reading plans, understanding the soil, and working to a site plan are essential to achieving a finish ready for construction. Good operators will get the job done on time and leave a ‘clean’ building site. Cowboy operators will tear the area up but often leave it ‘dirty’ – by ‘dirty’ I mean an uneven finish with huge gouge marks and little piles of dirt everywhere.

If you want to be a bulldozer operator, or any type of heavy equipment operator, make sure you undertake your heavy equipment training through an accredited training body like ATS – you are then assured of quality training that prepares you for the workplace.