Had a post hole auger snap clean off in a Denver backyard

I was setting a 6-foot cedar fence line in this tight yard near Sloan's Lake. The ground was pure clay, baked hard from a dry summer. I was about 18 inches down on the third hole when the auger bit just sheared at the shaft. The motor kept spinning, throwing dirt everywhere, but the business end was stuck underground. My helper just stared at it. I had to shut everything down, dig around the broken piece with a trenching shovel for over an hour, and then weld it back together in my truck bed with a portable rig. The whole job got pushed back a full day. Anyone ever have a tool fail that catastrophically in the middle of a dig?

3 comments

3 Comments

dylan4132mo agoTop Commenter

Man, "snap clean off" is the worst sound. My buddy had a similar nightmare with a rented post pounder on a ranch job. The whole head assembly cracked right at the weld on the fifth post, sent the heavy metal cap flying like a cannonball into his truck door. Left a huge dent and the tool was just dead weight in the hole. He had to drive an hour back to the rental place just to argue about the damage fee.

xena_rivera632mo agoMost Upvoted

Yeah, that's rough. We ended up just eating the cost on ours (the rental place was a nightmare to deal with).

william_miller15d ago

Heard a contractor say those rental pounders are basically junk half the time.