[TowerTalk] Digging a 5'x5'x8' tower footing

[Scott McClements]

Hi,

I am in the process of trying to find a excavator to dig the footing
for my HDX572 tower.  To the 5 people I've talked to so far, this
5x5x8 hole is difficult. I think mostly because none of them have a
small enough backhoe. Most of them want to dig a big hole and have me
pour into a concrete form and backfill later.

They claim they can backfill and bring the soil back into
"undisturbed" condition around the footing by compaction - even
claiming that this might be more reliable than just digging a hole
just to the size I need.

I am lining a couple people up for estimates, but I think this already
sounds like the are trying to wring a couple days of work out of this
- maybe I am wrong here. I have even have one person decline giving an
estimate altogether. Should this be an easy task for a skilled person
to dig on a mini-excavator? I was told that if the hole is deeper than
4', that no person can enter it unless walls are built up.

Any ideas?

-Scott, WU2X