Handheld petrol powered winch

[swinny]

I saw the demo at the arb show of the eder 1200 and thought it was ace. Bought one straight away after that as had plenty of work lines up for it. Great purchase!

[Canal Navvy]

I got to use an Eder 1800 recently and I can see why they are so popular. 

They make dragging things around in the back of beyond an absolute doddle 🙂

[Stihllymok]

It really is one of the things you buy that surpasses your expectations.

Was dragging these for fun that's 28" for scale.

I've got videos but might get done for child labour on the winch op 😆

[Vedhoggar]

We have been using the Docma VF 105 capstan winch for 5 yrs. for taking down hung-up trees, directional felling as well as extraction of some firewood. The machine has been run on ethanol free fuel from the start and have not experienced any problem with starting or running. We have 100m of rope and use the first 50m mostly but do need 100m at times. As not just the pulling power to consider but also friction between ground surface and the load therefore skidding cone we find is very useful and use it when we can (will take up to a 50cm dia log or a bundle of stems). The machine has a 1 tonne straight pull but increase this to 2 tonne with use of snatch block.  The only problem is rope getting tangle up if tension on rope during winching suddenly slackens, which is a pain but otherwise machine works well. The 1800 Eder winch is obviously more powerful but more expensive (£800 plus vat more expensive). Pulling speeds Docma VF105 24m/min (at 1000kg pull), Eder 1800 20m/min (at 900kg pull) and Portable Winch Co. PCW5000 12-18m/min (at 1000kg pull) depending on drum size. The PCW5000 is 4-stoke and the other two 2-stoke engines which is useful as you do not need to carry two lots of fuel.  Treadlight Forestry is the firm to deal with.

[monkeybusiness]

I’ve bitten the bullet and ordered the Eder based on the very helpful advice on this post - have a ‘guerilla-felling’ job for it this weekend so hope it turns up in time! 
Thank you everyone for your input, much appreciated.

[Stihllymok]

38 minutes ago, monkeybusiness said:

I’ve bitten the bullet and ordered the Eder based on the very helpful advice on this post - have a ‘guerilla-felling’ job for it this weekend so hope it turns up in time! 
Thank you everyone for your input, much appreciated.

Enjoy.😎

Now for the negative bits.😂

Follow the starting procedure exactly you'll be fine ..I thought I knew better and battled for a bit.

Watch out for tension releasing and sudden slack causing tangles...

Skidding cone handy but tbf with one op on winch and one guiding/rocking with cant hook you can shift some surprising stuff.

 

[openspaceman]

1 hour ago, monkeybusiness said:

I’ve bitten the bullet and ordered the Eder based on the very helpful advice on this post - have a ‘guerilla-felling’ job for it this weekend so hope it turns up in time! 
Thank you everyone for your input, much appreciated.

Don't stint on the number of coils on the drum, it is aluminium and slippage causes wear.

 

Also consider that if you are pulling something 50m away; you wrap 5 turns around the capstan which means the rope by the rope bag has 5 twists in it. Now winch the load in 50m and release the end of the rope and remove the wraps off the capstan, 5 twists come off the end of the rope but 5 opposite twists are now in the rope 50 m away. it is a rope management problem I did not appreciate until I got the Eder.

[Mick Dempsey]

I’ll echo the comment about the starting procedure on the Eder. 

[Haironyourchest]

The Eder powerwinch differes in one respect from all the others. It uses a planetary gear like the ones on an off-road vehicle winch. The others have a regular oil filled gearbox. The oil filled type gearbox is much bigger. I'm curious about how the Eder planetary gears hold up over time, since they don't appear to be oil cooled, just greased.

[swinny]

3 hours ago, Mick Dempsey said:

I’ll echo the comment about the starting procedure on the Eder. 

What's this Mick?