I spent 22 years driving excavators of all sorts on civil engineering and railway contracts before moving on to the railway maintenance industry....you could be expected to drive any machine,360 or 180 that you are qualified to operate,and the pay is not brilliant as a rule unless you work silly long hours,stay away from home or railway jobs...A lot of people think they can jump in a mini digger and they are a plant operater,but its a different matter when you go to a job which has time schedule and is complicated,requiring experience and being safe at all times...I left the job as it involves sitting down for long periods and i was getting back pain and bored! I still drive a mini digger about 4 or 5 times a year for a friend who lays block paving to help him out on big jobs,and to give a example how experience counts,he tells me that the driver he uses for smaller jobs is about 4 times slower and he ends up ordering more materials as he is not accurate.

regards mark