Software for the yard running directional drills.

A directional drill bores underground to pull in pipe and conduit — gas, water, fiber, electric — without opening a trench across a road or a yard. The rig pushes a steerable head out on jointed drill rod, pumps drilling fluid to cut and carry spoil, then reams the hole and pulls the product line back through. That makes it the tool of choice where trenching is not allowed or not worth it, and it makes the rig hard to run as a rental asset: it never travels alone, it needs mud and rod and a locating system to do anything, and the duty cycle grinds rod, pumps, and wrenches. EquipFlow handles directional drills the way the yard that built it handles its fleet — dispatch, billing, maintenance, and return inspection on one record per rig.

Built inside Rental King, right now.

Rental King is a heavy-equipment rental yard in Odessa and Midland, TX. They run directional drills, manlifts, forklifts, light towers, generators, compressors, and water trucks on MSA contracts through the Permian Basin — 24/7, oilfield pace. EquipFlow was designed and first deployed inside that yard. Every feature was tested against their live operation before it shipped. The product runs there today.

Directional drills are package units with long idle windows, and both facts are where money leaks. A rig out on a utility build earns nothing extra if the standby hours from a locate hold or a crossing never reach the invoice, and it loses money if a return goes out the gate with a bent rod or a fouled mud pump uncaught and uncharged. The hour meter is the spine of both maintenance and billing, so it has to be captured the same way every time — at return, on the inspection, against the rental record. When dispatch, billing, maintenance, and inspection all read from one rig record, the dispatcher confirms the full package and the right rate, the mechanic services against real hours, and the bookkeeper closes the month without rebuilding a job from memory. That single-record discipline is what keeps a high-churn HDD fleet honest.

Directional Drill specs the rental record tracks.

Every number below is a sourced specification range. The render layer is the only path these values reach the page — they live on the unit record, not in a dispatcher's head.

Max thrust / pullback force

20000-60000lb

Max rotary (spindle) torque

2200-9000ft-lb

Engine power (gross)

100-202hp

Max drilling-fluid (mud) flow

25-70gpm

Max carriage (thrust) speed

175-216fpm

Max spindle (rotation) speed

200-220rpm

How EquipFlow handles directional drills on the dispatch board.

A directional drill rarely travels alone. The bore needs a locating system to track the head, a mud-mixing system to feed drilling fluid, drill rod, and often a vacuum excavator to handle spoil — and a rig dispatched without those is a stalled crew, not a working one. The board treats the rig as a line on the driver-by-hour view and confirms the package on the rental record before the truck leaves. Because the same rig class gets double-booked across overlapping utility jobs, conflicts surface at the point of assignment, not at the gate. The board also tracks the trailer or float the rig moves on, since a track-mounted unit cannot be dropped on a curb. Dispatchers see which rigs are boring, which are loaded out, and which are due back, on the same responsive screen at any hour.

Billing directional drills — MSA, standby, and site-level tax.

Underground utility work runs heavily on master service agreements, so the directional-drill rate override lives on the customer record per equipment class, not in a sheet the dispatcher has to remember. A rig rented to that account picks up the negotiated rate on its own. HDD jobs stall constantly — locate tickets that have not cleared, an unexpected utility crossing, a vac truck that has not arrived to handle spoil — and the rig sits on site earning nothing unless standby is captured. Standby is billed at a rate separate from active drilling hours; the dispatcher marks it and the invoice carries both lines without a month-end rebuild. Delivery, pickup, and any mud-mixing or rod add-ons ride the same invoice. Tax jurisdiction is set on the delivery-site record, so a bore that crossed a county line still bills at the right rate per site. Invoices post to QuickBooks Online on close.

Maintenance on directional drills.

Directional-drill PM is hour-meter driven, not calendar driven, because a rig on a fiber build can run long days for weeks while a yard spare sits idle. The hour reading posts when the return inspection records it, and the maintenance module advances the PM clock from that reading so the next service lands on real usage. HDD rigs are mud-and-hydraulics machines, so PM leans on the drilling-fluid pump, the carriage and rotation drives, vise and breakout wrench wear, and hydraulic oil, filters, and hose condition alongside engine and transmission service. The rod box is part of maintenance too — bent or fatigued drill rod gets pulled and logged against the unit. Work orders, parts, and meter history live on the rig record, which is also where a damage charge from a return inspection becomes a repair ticket.

Directional Drill return inspections.

Two inspection rhythms apply. The operator-facing pre-shift check is a daily requirement under the manufacturer manuals and the crew's responsibility while the rig is on rent. The yard's own control is the return inspection: before a directional drill comes off rent, the driver runs a mobile-web checklist on a phone — no app install — captures the hour-meter reading, and attaches required photos that cannot be skipped. HDD-specific checks matter here: drill-rod straightness and thread condition, the mud pump and fluid system for caked or hardened drilling fluid, vise and breakout-wrench jaw wear, the carriage chain or rack, tracks and undercarriage, and any hydraulic weep. The return inspection ties to the rental record before the truck leaves the customer site, so a dispute over a bent rod or a worn wrench has photos and a timestamp behind it.

Common directional drill classes in the field.

The product, the same way it runs for directional drills.

The sections below are the EquipFlow modules that matter most when running directional drills — each links to the full feature detail.

Operator guides for running directional drills.

Field-tested playbooks that go deeper on pricing, dispatch, billing, and maintenance for fleets like this.

• Trenching Equipment Rental Guide →
• Adding a New Equipment Category to Your Yard →
• Aerial Lift Inspection Requirements →
• Air Quality Equipment Rentals →

What you give up running directional drills in EquipFlow.

EquipFlow is a web app, so the return inspection needs a signal to load. On a remote bore site with no coverage, the driver cannot complete the mobile inspection at the customer location; most yards run it at the yard on return, which means the photos and hour reading land later than ideal. There is no built-in telematics integration today, so engine-hour and fault data from a manufacturer's own portal is not pulled automatically — the hour meter is captured at return instead. The system also does not track individual drill-rod counts or bore footage as a metered line; it bills by the rig and its add-ons. A yard with an unusual billing structure should bring it to the demo to be scoped honestly.