Rust – How to Use Giant Excavator

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Rust players will spend at least 80% of their game time just looking for resources, as they need them to craft weapons and ammo and build their base, resources such as HQM, Sulfur, Metal Fragments, and Stone become the main economy of the game.

The Giant Excavator is one of those structures in Rust that players can use to their advantage to get resources without having to waste hours of their lives hitting rocks.

Recommended Read: How to Throw a Molotov Cocktail in Rust

This huge machine that works as a Monument exists only to help players quickly get a lot of raw resources. However, since it is such a huge machine, it is very hard to handle by yourself. Often enough, you will fail to get the resources due to attacking clans coming to stop you.

To use the Giant Excavator in Rust, players will need to place Diesel Fuel inside the engine room’s fuel storage tank, activate the engine, and then head over to the control room to choose what kind of resource they want to excavate. To get the resources, you will need to go to the end of the conveyor belt and loot from the two different piles of stones.


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How to Use the Giant Excavator in Rust

The Giant Excavator is an incredible Monument in Rust that will allow you to quickly get a lot of resources with minimal effort.

The only risk with using this machine is that all the players around the map will know what is happening, and they might come to steal your loot.

To get to use the Giant Excavator in Rust, you will first need to defeat the scientists at the location. You also can’t enter the location if you don’t have some kind of minimal protection from Radiation.

There are around 17 scientists protecting the Giant Excavator, so prepare accordingly for the fight.

A Compound Bow and some Medicine should be more than enough to get through them if they don’t get some lucky shots on you.

Getting the Giant Excavator Started

Rust - How to Use Giant Excavator All Rooms Map

In the image above, you will see that there are three important locations when it comes to the Giant Excavator in Rust:

  • Engine Room
  • Control Room
  • Loot Piles

To start using the Giant Excavator, you will first need to reach the Engine Room. You can see it in the screenshot shown with the orange arrow. In this room, you will need to place Diesel Fuel inside a large fuel storage tank in the middle of the room.

Diesel Fuel is very different from Low Grade Fuel, as you can only find it at specific Monuments, such as the Oil Rigs, Junkyard, and the Dome. It is a large black barrel with an oil sign on it.

You can only place a maximum of 20 Diesel Fuel barrels inside the fuel tank. Once you place the fuel inside the tank, you will need to climb the stairs in the room and activate the Engine.

You will realize you found the button to start the Giant Excavator if you see “Engine Startup” when approaching the panel.

Choosing the Resource You Want to Get

There are four different raw resources that you can get from the Giant Excavator in Rust:

Players can change the output of the Giant Excavator at any time in the Control Room. There are two Control Rooms that are situated right next to the sharp part of the Excavator. You can see it in the image above inside the orange circle.

There is one Control Room on either side of the Excavator, and you can change the type of resource you get by approaching the panel inside the room and holding down E.

You will see the four resources that you can get now inside a wheel. Choose the one you want.

Depending on how much Diesel Fuel you placed inside the fuel tank, you will get different kinds of rewards from the Excavator.

For one single Diesel Fuel barrel, you will get these amount of resources, depending on what you chose in the Control Room:

  • 100 HQM
  • 2k Sulfur
  • 10k Stone
  • 5k Metal Fragments

You will get this amount of resources from one barrel of Diesel Fuel in exactly 2 minutes. This means that placing all 20 Diesel Fuel barrels inside the tank would take 40 minutes to fully deplete, and you would get one of these results:

  • 2k HQM
  • 40k Sulfur
  • 200k Stone
  • 100k Metal Fragments

Where to Loot the Resources From the Giant Excavator in Rust?

After you’ve started the engine and set what resource you want to get from the Giant Excavator in Rust, you will have to go all the way to the back of the machine to loot what you just worked for.

There are two places where your resources will spawn, and that is at the end of the conveyor belt.

You can see the two loot locations in the image from earlier that the two orange rectangles point out.

The resources that you get will be split and sent to both of the loot locations.

To get the maximum amount of loot, we just described earlier. You will need to go to both rock piles and loot your resources.

Due to these mechanics, it is very common that other players will steal your resources, as you can’t defend both rock piles at the same time. This is why you will need at least one or two people to successfully use the Giant Excavator.

There is a lot of running around, there are a lot of scientists that protect the place, and the only type of players that you will face here will have higher-tier gear. This makes the Giant Excavator extremely dangerous but very profitable for lazy players.


That’s everything you need to know about how to use the Giant Excavator in Rust!

Have any input or suggestions for this guide? Let us know in the comment section below.

Adrian Oprea

Based in London, United Kingdom, Adrian Oprea is a Guides Writer. As a professional single-player RPG player, Adrian has often been stigmatized. He has decided to pour his frustration into writing guides!

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