Rototilt and Steelwrist seek quick coupler standardization

Vindeln, Sweden-based Rototilt Group AB and Rosersberg, Sweden-based Steelwrist AB say they are working together to form for an alliance for “symmetrical fully automatic quick couplers for excavators.”

In a news release announcing the joint effort, the two firms state, “As fully automatic quick couplers continue to grow, and more manufacturers release solutions, the question about interchangeability between different manufacturers has become an increasingly important topic.”

The two companies continue, “The ambition with an alliance is based on Symmetrical Quick Couplers (S-type), the well-known open industry standard, which is the world’s fastest growing type of excavator quick coupler. The main goal of the Symmetrical Standard has always been to safeguard interchangeability between manufacturers of quick couplers, tiltrotators, buckets and work tools.”

Steelwrist and Rototilt add, “One reason for [the S-type’s] success is that it is open and not controlled by one specific manufacturer.”

States Anders Jonsson, CEO of Rototilt, “When we now launch and extend our QuickChange range of Fully Automatic Quick Couplers, it [is] only natural to build on the Symmetrical Standard, which we have followed [for] 20 years.”

Among the underlying reasons the two firms say they are forming an alliance is to:

• increase safety, flexibility and efficiency for excavator owners, excavator operators and ground personnel, as work tool interchangeability is ensured between different manufacturers’ products;
• strive for a competitive and open industry standard that is not controlled by a single producer; and
• make it cost-efficient to retrofit adaptor brackets to used and new buckets and work tools.

“The main reason why we have been working to create the alliance is that we do not believe in locking customers into proprietary solutions that they must live with forever”, says Stefan Stockhaus, CEO of Steelwrist.