Forst ST6P common issues?

[Rich Rule]

No worries.  I had gathered that.  Plus you mention Jerome had told you.

[Ty Korrigan]

8 minutes ago, Rich Rule said:

No worries.  I had gathered that.  Plus you mention Jerome had told you.

I sent occasional videos by a mate with an ST6P 

It is impressive and with 360 hours has had no serious issues.

Forst even recalled it for modifications and sent him a bottle of Jack Daniels at Christmas.

  Stuart

 

 

 

 

[Mike Hill]

The blade angle on a Forst is steep to help the feed rollers pull stuff in. Thats fine up to a point but the angle forst chose is in my opinion to steep. This is why they have a habit of shearing the blade bolts and putting the blade through the hydraulic tank.

 

They began by using cheaper cast bearings untill a spate of spontaneous self disassembies and they went to machined SNR bearings like Jensen uses.

 

The chip chamber/feed aperture is a direct copy of a Jensen,just with thinner steel and generally poor weld quaility.

 

Instead of using an expensive gearbox to drive the infeed rollers they chose two £50 hydraulic motors but didnt design the mounting method correctly.So because they are getting battered they come loose and the shafts get slogged out.

 

Every chipper needs maintenance and every chipper I have had ( 8) needed a crack welded up now and then. But none literally fell apart from bad design/manufacture like the two forsts did that I used to work on.

 

 

[Mick Dempsey]

The roller motors/shaft/collars/mountings are a constant problem

[Mike Hill]

1 hour ago, Mick Dempsey said:

The roller motors/shaft/collars/mountings are a constant problem

I think its just that the mounting flange on any smaller motor is two bolts short of being stable enough to take the constant battering. The hydraulic motors on my Farmi 12" are 3 times the size of a 6" but even then the top motor can loosen because so much weight is hanging so far out from the attachment point and the whole thing is vibrating,getting torqued to fuc and slamming up and down.Really expensive shorter motors could solve that but Forst builds them cheap.

 

Independent hydraulic motors work well on big machines with vertical rollers .

[Ty Korrigan]

Talking of 'cheap' hydraulic motors there, is it possible to buy different build quality motors then?

On my own machines (not Forst) I've had several seals fail causing leaks or temporary pressure losses which jam the rollers.

Seal kits plus labour cost not far off a new motor and I have been advised not always reliable as a repair.

 Stuart

 

[treevolution]

28 minutes ago, Ty Korrigan said:

Talking of 'cheap' hydraulic motors there, is it possible to buy different build quality motors then?

On my own machines (not Forst) I've had several seals fail causing leaks or temporary pressure losses which jam the rollers.

Seal kits plus labour cost not far off a new motor and I have been advised not always reliable as a repair.

 Stuart

 

Are you running a gm with vertical or horizontal rollers. 

[Mike Hill]

If I am looking for hydraulic motors,I use this place.

 

https://www.hydraulik24-fluidtechnik.de/de/

[Paddy1000111]

Does anyone know the origional purchase price of an st6p? 

 

It will be an interesting test to see how much I spend in the next two years on repairs on my chipper and comparing the lost money on parts to the devaluation of a new chipper. 

 

It's a lottery but we will see. 

[Ty Korrigan]

4 hours ago, treevolution said:

Are you running a gm with vertical or horizontal rollers. 

Vertical.

We've decided not to feed it up to capacity when we get it back to see if it suffers significantly less stress and fewer problems.

I'm trading it in but the waiting list is 6 months.

  Stuart

Edited May 9, 2021 by Ty Korrigan