Piling rigs and drilling machinery from China

0% duty

Read from the UK Trade Tariff on 27 September 2026, other moving, grading, excavating, tamping, compacting, extracting or boring machinery for earth, minerals or ores, pile-drivers and pile-extractors, and snowploughs and snowblowers, heading 8430, carried 0% on goods from China on all nine lines, with no anti-dumping measure.

Excavators and other self-propelled machines of heading 8429 are covered in our excavators guide, and drill bits and rods may be classified separately as tools. Confirm the commodity code from whether the machine is self-propelled.

Machinery rules

Each machine placed on the UK market must meet the essential health and safety requirements of the Supply of Machinery (Safety) Regulations 2008, with a declaration of conformity, marking and instructions in English. The BS EN 16228 series covers drilling and foundation equipment, including stability, mast and rotary head guarding and controls, and compaction machines are covered by BS EN 500-4.

Rigs lifting tools and casings are also lifting equipment in use, so the user must have them thoroughly examined under the lifting equipment rules before first use.

Specifying a rig

Specify maximum drilling diameter and depth, rotary head torque and speed, crowd force, mast height and main winch line pull, base machine and engine emissions stage, operating weight and ground bearing pressure, transport dimensions, controls and depth monitoring, and the tools, kelly bars and spares package.

Worked duty example

Suppose, purely for illustration, you import one self-propelled rotary piling rig under 8430 41 00 00. At £260,000 free on board and £18,000 to ship and insure, the customs value is £278,000. With 0% duty on piling rigs, the only charge is import VAT: 20% of £278,000, or £55,600. VAT-registered businesses usually recover that in their next return. The method is set out in how UK import duty and VAT work.

Inspection checklist

Structure and stability: check mast, rotary head and undercarriage welds by the non-destructive tests named in the drawings, and check the stability calculation and load chart for the configurations you will use.

Function and safety: run the rig at the factory, check torque, crowd and winch performance, test limit switches and emergency stops, and check rotating parts are guarded as BS EN 16228 requires.

Engine and documents: check the engine emission stage label and certificate, and check the declaration of conformity, English manuals, load charts and spares list before shipping.

What goes wrong

Piling and drilling rigs fail on engines, structure and support. Engines lack the emissions stage required for UK sites, mast welds crack under full torque, safety devices differ from the tested build, and parts and service engineers are hard to find in the UK.

Confirm engine emissions and certification before ordering, inspect structural welds, and agree spares and service support. See our quality inspection guide.

Cambridge China Bridge sources piling rigs, drilling rigs and compactors for UK contractors and hire firms, checking the builder's references and test facilities before an order. See factory verification.