Asphalt profiler
hire rates.
Indicative hire rates per hour for cold planers from a 0.5 m detail machine to a 1.5 m road profiler — and the two costs that sit outside the rate.
Asphalt profiler hire rates in Australia
Asphalt profilers — cold planers, or milling machines — are priced by drum width, the width of asphalt they remove in a single pass. That one dimension drives almost everything else: the machine's weight, its engine, its fuel burn and the size of the crew and trucks it needs around it.
Benchmarks below come from the same data behind our machine hire rate calculator.
Indicative hire rates
| Size | Dry hire | Wet hire* | Wet day (8 hr)* |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wirtgen W50 Ri (0.5 m cut) | $105/hr | $220–$240/hr | $1,760–$1,920 |
| Caterpillar PM312 (1.2 m cut) | $168/hr | $340–$360/hr | $2,700–$2,860 |
| Wirtgen W 150 Fi (1.5 m cut) | $322/hr | $550–$580/hr | $4,430–$4,630 |
Wet hire shown at $2.00/L diesel plus 12% for lubricants, and a typical operator rate band for the machine — put your own fuel price and operator rate into the machine hire calculator for an exact figure. Machine and one operator only: the rest of the crew is not in these rates. Indicative benchmarks, ex GST, guide only.
Cut width, and the two costs that sit outside the rate
Width first. A 0.5 m machine is a detail tool — trench reinstatement, cutting around pits and kerbs, tie-ins, car parks and anywhere a big machine cannot turn. 1.2 m handles lane patching and medium works. 1.5 m is for road-width milling where you are taking out a full lane and the job is measured in square metres per shift, not per pit.
Picks are a consumable, and they are usually charged on top. The teeth wear against the material, not the clock: fresh asphalt is kind, while old oxidised mixes with hard aggregate, any concrete, and dry cutting all chew them. Ask how picks are charged before you price a milling item — on an abrasive job it is a real number, and it is the line most often forgotten.
Fuel is the other one. Milling is continuous full-load work, so a profiler burns hard for every hour it is cutting — the 1.5 m machine uses about 56.7 L/hr against 33 L/hr for the 1.2 m, roughly 70% more diesel for 25% more cut width. At $2.00/L that is about $113 an hour in fuel alone before anyone is paid, which is why a profiler standing idle waiting on trucks is far more expensive than it looks.
The truck sets the pace. Millings go straight off the conveyor into a truck, so the machine stops when the truck is away. On a continuous road mill the truck rotation, not the profiler, decides how many square metres you get in a shift. Water for dust suppression and drum cooling has to be on site too.
Depth and passes. Quoted rates assume a normal single-pass depth. Deep removal in layers means the same area twice or three times, so price passes, not just area — and check the spec for whether the profile has to be left to a tolerance for an overlay or just broken out.
Frequently asked questions
How much does an asphalt profiler cost to hire per hour?
Indicatively, a 0.5 m cold planer runs about $220–$240/hr wet hire, a 1.2 m machine $340–$360/hr, and a 1.5 m road profiler $550–$580/hr — roughly $1,760 to $4,630 for an 8 hour day, machine and operator. Milling picks and trucks are normally extra.
Are the milling picks included in the hire rate?
Usually not. Picks wear against the material rather than the hours, so most suppliers charge them separately or on a consumption basis. On abrasive material, old mixes with hard aggregate, any concrete, or a dry cut, it is a cost worth asking about before you price the item.
What cut width do I need?
Match the drum to the smallest thing you have to work around, not the biggest area. Trench reinstatement, pits, kerb tie-ins and car parks want 0.5 m; lane patching suits 1.2 m; full-lane road milling wants 1.5 m. A wide machine that cannot reach the detail still leaves you hiring a second one.
Why is the 1.5 m machine so much dearer per hour than the 1.2 m?
Two things compound. The machine itself costs about $322/hr against $168/hr dry, nearly double, and its fuel burn goes from 33 to 56.7 L/hr. Together that is roughly a 60 percent higher wet rate for a 25 percent gain in cut width — so the big machine only pays on continuous road-width work where you can actually keep it cutting.
More rate guides: excavators, tipper trucks, dump trucks, water carts, rollers, loaders, graders, dozers, scrapers, asphalt pavers, backhoes & skid steers. Or price any of 93 machines in the machine hire rate calculator.
Pricing the whole job?
Machine rates are one line in a real estimate. For water, sewer or stormwater work priced end to end, send the drawings. Acknowledged within two hours during AEST business.