Forst warranty and service top notch.

[simonm]

get a tw230 on hire for a wk se how it fairs

 

We are shafted with this johny as money tied up in it and resale value is nothing for a 2 year old machine with no hours!

 

Stuck between a rock @ a hard place springs to mind.

[simonm]

Sounds like our Timberwolf... at least you got a loan chipper we were without ours on many occasions until they finally sorted this out and provided loan machines.

 

Our Forst has been trouble free and is 3 years old with 750 hours only issue is kubota engine fuel pump went. And the hood hinges kept breaking until we welded them.

 

What tw is it? Problems???

[Johny Walker]

Useful contributions Johny.

 

i do try & keep up with you old boy

[Marc]

What tw is it? Problems???

 

It's a TW230 and makes your Forst look reliable

 

But, personally I forgive it and especially now TW have got involved with our dealer and are bending over backwards to make it right. It's still cost us around £5k in downtime due to its unreliability but it happens and we can soak it up.

 

Although we are lucky to be able to absorb the downtime dealers/manafacturers need to understand that for some this is their main income and the costs as a percentage can be huge.

 

There are some real heros out there providing above and beyond service, but I also look at this through myself and the service I provide, some customers I nail it and I love it when I meet there expectations, some customers will never be happy, and sometimes I just fail and it hurts. So sometimes you need to cut the dealer some slack they might be failing as it's very difficult to please everybody all the time.

[Johny Walker]

It's a TW230 and makes your Forst look reliable

 

But, personally I forgive it and especially now TW have got involved with our dealer and are bending over backwards to make it right. It's still cost us around £5k in downtime due to its unreliability but it happens and we can soak it up.

 

Although we are lucky to be able to absorb the downtime dealers/manafacturers need to understand that for some this is their main income and the costs as a percentage can be huge.

 

There are some real heros out there providing above and beyond service, but I also look at this through myself and the service I provide, some customers I nail it and I love it when I meet there expectations, some customers will never be happy, and sometimes I just fail and it hurts. So sometimes you need to cut the dealer some slack they might be failing as it's very difficult to please everybody all the time.

 

 

what probs you had wirth the 230.

[Gray git]

We are shafted with this johny as money tied up in it and resale value is nothing for a 2 year old machine with no hours!

 

Stuck between a rock @ a hard place springs to mind.

Most accurate statement about these machines, definitely negative equity machines!!

 

Sent from my D5803 using Arbtalk mobile app

[Johny Walker]

Most accurate statement about these machines, definitely negative equity machines!!

 

Sent from my D5803 using Arbtalk mobile app

 

 

Not good for balancing the books:thumbdown:

[Gray git]

Not good even to replace like for like with a brand new machine.

Fantastic productive machine but no residential value which makes it very hard to justify getting a new 1 and seriously thinking if it's lost so much in 2 years what's it going to be worth in 1 more with no warranty, who's going to buy it when I want a new 1....

I lost 4k on my quadchip in 3 years which made it as far as the books went a very good investment, lost a lot more on st8 already.

I know someone will say you have to build depreciation into your running costs but there's depreciation and then there's just plain loss.

 

Sent from my D5803 using Arbtalk mobile app

[Marc]

what probs you had wirth the 230.

 

1st month bottom roller bearing started to play up and fuel tank sucked itself in all the time, half a day to transport to dealer (even though the have a branch 5 minutes away from us who sold us the chipper only TW mechanic is at branch 25 miles away through Reading.) 3 days in workshop to repair.

 

Fuel tank still sucked itself in and bottom feedroller went again at 2 month. Told no cure for fuel tank issue, but new bearing fix issued, so back to dealer for another 2 days downtime and delivery.

 

Alternator issue giving stress control issue at month 4, back to dealer to have that replaced.

 

New fuel tank came out which we fitted ourselves to reduce downtime.

 

Month 7, feed roller again playing up told another new fix so back to dealer for that. Another 2 days downtime and plus delivery by us.

 

Two weeks after feed roller fixes blades start to strike anvil, H box was not fitted correctly so back to dealer for strip down and repair again, 3 days downtime and again delivery by us.

 

Paint began to peel badly by month 12 choose to ignore it.

 

Month 14 solonoids worked loose throwing intermittent feed fault, we stripped this down ourselves and replaced the spades which were poor quality.

 

Month 16 engine mounts went meaning we couldnt get the correct belt tension, updated part supplied and we fitted it ourselves.

 

Month 18 something I cannot recall went wrong, serious enough that it ended up going back to TW to have paint issue corrected and a going over (I was away on holiday) this time the first time we were provided with a loan machine a TW280

 

Came back 2 weeks later and throttle cable snapped.

 

Month 24 bottom roller bearing blew out completely, this time dealer collected and supplied a loan machine (although they didn't realise it was a loan at the time ) and repaired under warranty.

 

Came back with broken grease lines and sub par repair that wasn't to the latest version, I spoke to TW about it, they said they were satisfied with dealer fix.

 

A month or so later bottom feed roller blew out again.

 

Even outside of warranty they had a chipper to me that day, TW collected our machine and replaced entire H box, H box cover and blade inspection panel to the newer design which looks to me to be hopefully a permenant fix.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Still the best machine on the market in its size imo and I would buy another one. Even though the Forst has been faultless apart from hood hinge and Kubota Fuel pump issue in 3 years with first class service, we will replace it soon ish with a TW. Unless they can address the issues we have with the design that the TW doesn't,,,

 

I feel we were just unlucky as the majority of the issues were teething problems with our TW230 and apart from the downtime and delivery costs they sorted everything without quibble.

 

TW also not provide 3 year warranty.

Edited June 21, 2017 by Marc

[Marc]

Not good even to replace like for like with a brand new machine.

Fantastic productive machine but no residential value which makes it very hard to justify getting a new 1 and seriously thinking if it's lost so much in 2 years what's it going to be worth in 1 more with no warranty, who's going to buy it when I want a new 1....

I lost 4k on my quadchip in 3 years which made it as far as the books went a very good investment, lost a lot more on st8 already.

I know someone will say you have to build depreciation into your running costs but there's depreciation and then there's just plain loss.

 

Sent from my D5803 using Arbtalk mobile app

 

A lot of kit these days seem to plummet sharply, but then hold steady. It is harsh so we try to work on a 5 year basis which should be the prime of most chippers depending on hours used. If your getting more hours then 3 years is fine I worked it out as £50 a week over 3 years or £30 over 5.