Cat® Utility Vehicle Makes the Grade on Harsh Job Site

St. Paul, MN-based Frattalone Companies got its start in excavating and grading work in 1970, and has since earned a reputation for delivering the highest quality of work for its customers. The contractor is currently working on a multiyear, multiphase demolition, grading and construction project to develop a new sports center complex in Eagan, MN. The project is no small undertaking, with a job site spanning 200 acres and the development of office spaces, a training facility, two medical facilities, five practice facilities and a 6,000-seat stadium at completion.

Since the project started in in mid-2016, the crew has had to contend with two seasons of nearly constant rain, creating an extremely muddy, difficult work site. In addition to their fleet of construction machines, Frattalone Companies needed a utility vehicle that could navigate through the rough terrain.

“We have been using and testing utility vehicles on large projects for more than five years, and they are a very big part of our fleet,” says Tony Frattalone, president of the company. “If you think about it, it’s more economical to transport people and tools across a site using a $15,000 UTV compared to a $65,000 pickup.”

The particularly harsh conditions of this project presented the perfect opportunity to put the new Cat Utility Vehicle through a rigorous field test. And as a long-standing Caterpillar customer, Frattalone Companies was on board, and ready to put it to work. So the product team worked with Frattalone’s dealer, Ziegler Cat, to deliver a Cat CUV82 Utility Vehicle prototype to the site to see how it would perform in the unforgiving environment.