chippers

OutofMytree

"Cracks knuckles...."

Right then, where do I start...

14" feed but with a grapple? Over here if the logs are under 14" my wife feeds 'em one handed! If you want to look at this seriously though, thats a lot of hydro for a small feed chute. Grapple on an 18" or above maybe....less is a waste imho.

Ditto to treevets point about feed tray. This baby is a 1 trick pony. You would never get a conifer or any "crotchy" trees branches through that feed system. If you are feeding 14" logs through np, but how many clean 14" logs did any here put through their chipper in the last month? And how many snarly, crotchy, twisted mongrel branches with LEAVES on them did you put through in the same period of time?

How on earth did this thing become legal with the distance between the feed rollers and the edge of the feed tray? It would not pass muster in Australia under any circumstances without serious mods to that feed tray. Redroo is in a better postion than I to quote chapter and verse but that is just unsafe. The only thing I can think is that it has a deadman switch on the grapple controls and as such is then only legal to be fed by the grapple. Can you imagine not being able to safely or legally hand feed even a 1" branch into a chipper?

Lastly, in the 2nd and 3rd photo's I detect a slight lack of PPE. As in, zero,zilch,nada,nothing. Where are the PPE police when you need em.

Gary this may be the best chipper YOU have ever used but it lags a long way behind many machines I have used. The best small chipper ever built??

treevet

Let's forget for just one minute about rating chippers and say....hey, that is one hell of a wife OMT!

Seems like this would be an opportune time to apologize for demeaning comments made in an earlier post. Obviously made an error on that one!

OutofMytree

garyfitz

Hello Treevet and OutofMytree,

Guys, the picture is a prototype/test machine not the ones sold. Changes made > added
feedtray, changed the funnel/opening plus a curtian, the freedroll system set back more,
added deadman switch bar around opening and much more.

OutofMytree it was about 46 trick pony. Better business building large industrial pulp
and paper chippers, and here have OSHA for safety and lucky they were not around for
the photo's.

Morbark, Bandit, Dynamic, Woodsmans and others are within few miles of my home, we
all say we have the best chipper ever built. And the more beers we drink together
at the pub/bar the more fired up we get in a fun joking way.

Chill out drink a beer, you both act like I just shot your mama. Damm I apologize dud's.

Treevit, you will not find anything on the internet about SMC, the company sold in
1999. Also do you have photo/drawing of what you say "being chipped and going out the front
mostly unimpeded like most chippers do." I know drum chippers do. This sketch maybe can
show you how the slant design SMC-14 chips and don't pick on me for the poor quality drawing.

And last here is a photo of a company in Australia using just the core of a SMC-23 and built
this excellent whole tree chipper. OutofMytee look at the cab, now that is good PPE.

Gone for a few weeks if you need to talk back send email to PickardBrinton at gmail dot com

Later,
Fitz

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treevet

Maybe we were out knockin down a few too many brews with the boys, Garyfiz and forgot to indicate that it was a prototype instead of "the best chipper in history/all the others are junk". Take a chill pill.

OutofMytree

Hi Gf. The lesson here is be careful of making statements like "the best ....... ever" in a forum full of experienced operators and owners of machines. I hold no personal grudge toward yourself or indeed anyone who posts here.

I stand by my statement that the machine you are promoting is a 1 trick pony. Let me explain that more completely. A side feed machine needs to be fed from the side so it cannot work in service laneways in over 30 suburbs in my city alone. A 14" machine is the MINIMUM size I would use in suburban work and would still too small for chipping cocos and cotton palm trunks. Any chipper without a winch is a machine for Mum and Dad not arborists. Fitting a winch to a side loading machine is asking for a rollover and/or suspension and hitch damage. A side load machine must point to the kerb so I must always approach the job from the correct direction or U-turn somewhere past the job. This also means that whereas most smart operators park the chipper downhill from the job, with a sideloader it is always feed tray to job regardless of slope. If I am justified using a grapple then the logs are heavy. How do I get them to the machine? I must now buy a loader with a seperate grapple.

I can go on but I think my point is pretty clear by now. This machine may well be a great PURPOSE BUILT machine, but it is only good for that purpose.

Enjoy your time away mate.

Urban Treecare NZ

Again this is just an opinion Outofmytree. I dont have a winch on my 90xp because of size, access and lack of machine use. There are very few propertys in Auckland to use a machine to feed a chipper and utalise a winch. Situations and locations are very different depending on your location. Most companies I know have bc1000's and winches are not required. It all depends on your location. As for 14" chippers. good luck with access in most locations in surburbia unless you chip on the road and use a mini skid, is this overkill for a pruning job?? Also big chipper = big truck for towing.

OutofMytree

Ok, I admit that was probably an overstatement.

As to size in general, I drive a Hino Dutro 8500. Dunno motor size but it will be on line. It handles my Bandit 1590xp (3700kg) pretty well but I wouldnt want any heavier. As to small access, as I posted earlier, we service over 30 suburbs that have the old "dunnyman lanes". These are frequently as narrow as 3 metres and we still get through just fine. Gotta watch the corners though!

I have just progressed from a 12" morbark to a 17" bandit with double the motor size and I'm still in the honeymoon period! I stand by earlier statements of what will do the job and particularly what will do it well. I will give you an idea of what I mean. With the old chipper I would charge $200 for a cocos palm that could be scarfed in the front and $250 for one in the back with barrow access. With the new machine I can fell, winch and chip an entire palm in the front yard with only 1 cut! That is nearly half the time. So now I charge $150 and $200 respectively and am winning this work left right and centre. The client wins and the arborist definately wins. Same with big takedowns. I am putting double the log size through because the old 12" choked on 9" eucs like lemon-scented and tuart where my new toy takes logs so big it will actually tear off the bark with the feed rollers as it sucks em down!

One mitigating factor in choosing chipper size I may not have mentioned is whether the market in a given area is for firewood or mulch. In WA metro it is all about mulch. I cannot GIVE firewood away unless I cut it to length. On the other hand I get $220 per truckload (15m3) of mulch so a bigger chipper for me means more income. Dunno how the firewood guys go but we took $2400 in about 10 weeks for mulch sales and had I had the work that figure would have been 20% higher again.

As you can see I am rather pleased with "My Precious".

treevet

It's funny since we just bought a 20" chipper and had a 12 " chipper the big boy goes out all the time. Kept the old one for a second crew in the spring if it works out.

But the intention was to just chip the big "garbage" wood and save the firewood quality wood as I sell a lot of wood at a decent price. Well quite often we have all the logs dingo'd up near the big chipper and look at each other if it is good wood and then I find myself saying "just run it". It is like being on a diet and somebody drops a big slice of chocolate cake in front of you and you know you shouldn't eat it......but you just scarf it down and look around thinking in your head "did that just happen?"

OutofMytree

Did a cheap Pine removal today that I quoted 12 months ago in the dark and clearly was drunk at the time too. The price was for $500 less than my usual day rate for a 4 man crew but there was no chance of doing it quicker. We chipped everything except the last 5 blocks which will go thru tomorrow when I have quartered em. The mulch was delivered to 2 homes and added another $370 to the days take. Man I love my chipper!

treevet

You can't get $hit for woodchipper chips around here. They used to sell but now only tubground material brings bucks.

Steve Tipton

We very rarely sell mulch here now as well. Often it's a battle to give it away. In 1982 we would get $10 per cubic yard, (about $12.50 per CM)

There's more chippers than bobcats aroud here now, but the landscape suppliers still charge $30+, but won't even pay $5! And they're fussy about quality as well. Too much wood, not enough wood???????????

We have to pay to dump palm mulch.

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newguy18

I've heard of palm mulch actually regrowing at the local landfill,one of the employees told me about it,but i didn't get to see it.Would have been kinda cool[but eerie]if it were true.

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old schooler

OutofMytree

Palms regrowing from mulch would be interesting to see. In WA only "dwarf dates" grow from seed with any regularity. I suspect there is some missing link in the pollination process. Any idea what that could be?

Back on topic, I have to saddle up now and go mulch some palm junk we cut down during the week. As I sell the hardwood mulch, we often leave the junk at the clients home until the weekend then do a "junk" run ending up at the local greenwaste site. Its only $30 to get 5 tonne dropped there comapred to $350 at the local tip.

newguy18

I'm in the middle of nowhere,i just burn what i have to haul off,or just take it to the landfill,they'll take anything for free.I've taken lots of heavy logs,some over 8' in diameter there,no charge just dump it.

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OutofMytree

Man thats all kinds of wrong. Green timber in landfill produces methane as it decomposes. One thing I highly approve of is the greens recycling done about 10km's from my home. You pay a nominal fee to dump ONLY green waste ($30 for my 5 tonne load) and the pile it up. They pour it all into a monster tub grinder and turn it into mulch. The mulch is mixed with peat and then stockpiled and sold off to home owners at $15 per 8x5 trailer load. It's great to see a city council actively engaged in turning waste into something useful. I only wish the site was open to dump on weekdays instead of just weekends....

Steve Tipton

[QUOTE=OutofMytree;48503]Man thats all kinds of wrong. Green timber in landfill produces methane as it decomposes. One thing I highly approve of is the greens recycling done about 10km's from my home. You pay a nominal fee to dump ONLY green waste ($30 for my 5 tonne load) and the pile it up. They pour it all into a monster tub grinder and turn it into mulch. The mulch is mixed with peat and then stockpiled and sold off to home owners at $15 per 8x5 trailer load. It's great to see a city council actively engaged in turning waste into something useful. I only wish the site was open to dump on weekdays instead of just weekends....[/QUOTE
This process will still produce methane as it decomposes, methinks.

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ArborealTerror

Methane (CH4) is produced as a result of anaerobic oxidation (no oxygen available during the decomposition process). As a greenhouse gas methane is far stronger than carbon dioxide (I recall the figure 25x). Mulch on the surface of soil will have oxygen more readily available than when buried in landfill. Also in landfill decomposition is accelerated by the greater availability of heat, moisture, and anaerobic detritophiles (bugs wot eat garbage). Mulch on the surface decomposes very slowly.

OutofMytree

[QUOTE=Quintrex;48513]You are correct in that assumption q, as arb t said it is not whether methane is produced but the quantity in which landfill produces it which burns me.

Done it

Yeah, same here. Since our big storm here in 2003 everyones got a chipper, there's woodchip piles everywhere. I was getting $8.50, they sold it $34, now $0 even for top chips. All the schools are full, really getting hard to get rid of, just a call now & then for some.

kimtree

Thinking about getting an 1800xl,what engine size would be better 140 or 170 hp mostly we do removals nearly all African Mahogany [a semi hardwood] getting a lot more demand for chip aswell and tip fees are going up every quarter[or so it seems]
Also thinking about getting one with a winch but have concerns that it will get in the way of feeding it with the BMG.has anyone modified one so it can be slid out of the way?If so could you post some photos

kimtree

Not quite relevent to this quote but what sort of running time on average do you get from a tank?,i'm assuming your running cummins 170hp