Skid Steer Hire Perth
A skid steer loader carries its bucket out front on two lift arms and turns by driving the left and right sides at different speeds. There is no steering wheel and no turning circle. The machine pivots inside its own footprint, which is why it gets into places nothing else on site can reach.
We hire them tracked and wheeled. Tracks spread the weight and float over soft sand and fill. Wheels are faster and kinder on a finished driveway. The ground you are working on decides it, not the job description.
Every loader goes out on wet hire with our operator or dry hire for your own. Same machine, your call on who runs it.
Zero turning radius, the loader spins inside its own footprint
4-in-1 bucket as standard, it grabs, dozes, spreads and loads
Tracked or wheeled, matched to the ground rather than the job
Wet hire with our operator or dry hire for your own crew
What A Skid Steer Loader Actually Is
Skid steering is the whole design. Each side of the machine is driven independently, so slowing one side and driving the other skids the loader around on the spot. That is where the name comes from.
The payoff is a machine with no turning circle at all. It works a corner, a side access or a fence line that a wheeled loader would need three passes to reach. The trade-off is that skidding scrubs the ground underneath it, which matters on turf and on a finished surface.
Why Everyone In Perth Calls It A Bobcat
Bobcat is a manufacturer, not a machine type. They were early and they were everywhere, so the brand name became the everyday word for the whole category, the same way every vacuum became a Hoover.
Same Machine, Two Words
If you rang us asking for a bobcat and someone else rang asking for a skid steer, you would both get the same loader off the same trailer. Use whichever word you are comfortable with. Our bobcat hire page covers the everyday jobs these machines get booked for.
Not Sure Which Machine The Job Needs? Ask Us.
Call Us NowTracked Or Wheeled For Your Ground
This is the decision that actually changes how a hire goes, and it is the one most people never get asked about. Perth throws sand, limestone and compacted clay fill at these machines, sometimes on the same block.
Tracked Loader
- Spreads weight over a long track, floats on soft sand and loose fill
- Keeps pulling on a slope and in wet ground where tyres spin
- Also sold as a posi track or a compact track loader, same machine
- Slower across a site, and tracks scuff a finished driveway
- The pick for a raw block, a sand pad or anything freshly filled
Wheeled Skid Steer
- Faster between piles and around a working site
- Easier on paving, concrete and an existing hardstand
- Cheaper to run, no track wear to pay for
- Digs in and spins once the sand gets soft or the ground turns wet
- The pick for hardstand, yards, warehouses and finished surfaces
Tell Us The Ground, Not Just The Job
Two identical levelling jobs can need different machines. Fresh sand fill wants tracks. The same levelling job across an existing paved yard wants wheels. Describe what the loader will be standing on when you call and we will send the right one.
How To Read A Skid Steer Spec Sheet
Hire listings quote four or five numbers and most of them get ignored. Here is what each one is actually telling you before you book.
| The Number | What It Measures | Why It Matters On Site |
|---|---|---|
| Operating weight | What the loader weighs ready to work | Decides what your slab, driveway and float can carry, and whether it can cross a suspended floor at all |
| Rated operating capacity | The safe load in the bucket, set as a fraction of the tipping load | Push past it and the back end gets light, you lose steering and the load comes off the front |
| Bucket width | How wide a pass the machine cuts | Sets how many passes it takes to level an area, and whether the loader clears your gate at all |
| Ground pressure | The weight spread over the tracks or the tyres | Low pressure floats on sand and soft fill, high pressure sinks into it |
| Lift path | Whether the arms curve out as they rise or travel straight up | A curving path suits digging and grading, a straight path suits loading over the side of a truck |
The short version is that operating weight tells you whether the machine can get there and rated capacity tells you how fast it will work once it has. Booking on weight alone is how people end up with a loader that fits the gate and then takes twice as long.
Rated Capacity Is Not The Bucket Volume
A bucket that holds half a cubic metre of dry sand will hold the same volume of wet clay at nearly double the weight. The rated capacity is the limit, not the brim of the bucket. This catches people out on soaked spoil more than anything else.
The Quick-Attach Plate Is The Whole Point
A skid steer is really an attachment carrier with a cab on it. The plate on the front is a common standard, which is why one loader can cover work that would otherwise take three machines.
What Comes Fitted As Standard
- 4-in-1 bucket on every loader, it opens to drop, closes to doze and hinges to grab
- General purpose bucket where a plain push and carry is all the job needs
- Operator handover covering the attach plate, the controls and the machine's quirks
Anything beyond that gets confirmed when you book rather than promised here. Powered attachments in particular need the loader to have the auxiliary hydraulic flow to run them, and not every machine in every yard does.
Ask What The Machine Can Run Before You Hire The Attachment
If you are planning on a powered attachment, tell us at the booking. We will confirm the loader coming to you has the hydraulics for it. Turning up with an attachment the machine cannot drive is a wasted day for everyone.
Getting A Skid Steer Onto Your Perth Site
Loaders are compact but they still arrive on a truck, and the truck has to stop somewhere. Most access problems are found on the day, when they could have been sorted on the phone.
Check These Before The Machine Is Booked
- The narrowest point on the way in, usually a side gate or a path between the house and the fence
- Somewhere flat and firm to pull up and unload, ideally off the road
- Overhead power, verandah eaves and low branches on the route in
- Whether the loader has to cross a finished driveway, paving or a slab to reach the work
- Room to turn once it is in, a skid steer needs almost none, but it needs some
- Soft sand between the unload point and the job, which is where a tracked machine earns its keep
Send A Photo Of The Access
A single photo of the side gate or the driveway answers more questions than five minutes on the phone. Send one through with your enquiry and we will tell you straight away which loader fits and how we will get it in.
Wet Or Dry Hire On Every Loader
Every skid steer in the fleet goes out either way. On wet hire we supply the operator, the fuel and the daily checks in the day rate. On dry hire the machine is delivered fuelled and serviced and you run it with your own competent operator.
As a guide, dry hire on a compact loader starts from around $450 a day and wet hire from around $1,500 a day, transport charged separately. The full fleet and the rates for every machine sit on our dry hire rates page and our wet hire page.
Dry Hire Needs A Competent Operator
Skid steer loaders are notifiable plant under WA work health and safety law. Whoever runs the machine has to be competent, and a high-risk work licence applies in some applications and on some sites. If that is not sorted on your side, take it on wet hire and the question goes away.
Jobs We Have Done With Skid Steer Hire
Finished work off our own machines, written up with the ground conditions, the method and what came off site.
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Wet Hire PerthSkid Steer Hire Questions
There is no difference in the machine. Bobcat is a manufacturer whose name became the everyday word for the whole category in Australia, the way every vacuum became a Hoover. A skid steer is the machine type, a bobcat is one brand of it, and both words get you the same loader from us.
Close enough for hiring purposes. A posi track, or compact track loader, is a skid steer running rubber tracks instead of tyres. It spreads the machine's weight over a much bigger footprint, so it floats on soft sand and keeps pulling on slopes and in wet ground where a wheeled machine spins.
Go tracked for raw blocks, fresh sand fill, soft ground and slopes. Go wheeled for hardstand, paving, yards and anywhere the surface is already finished and you do not want it scuffed. Tell us what the machine will be standing on and we will match it.
The bucket is the widest part, so measure that rather than the machine. A compact loader with a standard bucket generally needs a bit over 1.7 metres of clear width, and a larger one closer to 1.9 metres. Measure your narrowest gate or side path and send us the number before you book.
It can, because skid steering works by scrubbing one side against the ground. On turf and finished paving a tracked machine and a careful operator do far less damage than a wheeled one spinning to turn. Tell us the loader has to cross a finished surface and we will plan the route and the machine around it.
Need Skid Steer Hire In Perth?
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