Quads

[Tom D]

What you guys need is a compact tractor. I bought one last year and I Honestly don't Know how I managed without it. Its a 50Hp BCS (looks like a miniture ford county) I have an Igland winch and a log splitter for the back of it and a loader with bucket and timber grab on the front. It is small and light enough to be towed behind the landrover and can lift 500kg with the loader.

 

Having a PTO and 3 point linkage the list of quipment you can get is almost endless, Timber trailer, chipper, winch, flail, stump grinder, log spliter etc. The only problem is finding one second hand, I bought new in the end but in reality the finance on this only costs £300 per month and it more than pays for that.

 

Seriously guys its ideal for tree work,It'll do so mucg more than a quad except 50mph .I'll try and get some pics / video and upload it soon.

[MattyF]

got any pics mate?

[Tom D]

Here's one off the dealers website, I'm not at home at the mo so will try next week with one of mine.

[Andy Collins]

Nice bit of kit that Tom. Compacts are ideal for loads of jobs, but I can get the quad in places that the compact just wont go, plus the quad causes far less ground compaction, which in many of my jobs is a major issue.

[Tom D]

The equal wheeled compacts like this can really go some places, they're designed for vinyards which are often very steep. I reckon i'll get most places a quad will. You're right about ground compaction though, still I could always get some grass tyres for it. The forestry winch is the biggest advantage, I used to use a 4x4 winch but the Igland is awesome by comparison. We were clearing windblown ash trees which had falen into a river at the bottom of a 50 foot embankment on thursday. This job would have taken 2 1/2 days previously but we did it in one.

 

I'll admit quads are probably more fun though.

[Andy Collins]

I think the biggest advantage of the compact such as yours is the fact that pto accessories are by far cheaper, and maybe more powerful than quad accessories. I saw this timber trailer working in a wood nearby, and it was running off a equal wheeled compact, a Goldini I think from memory, and I was quite impressed. Cost is an issue, initial outlay for something which would not get enough usage, whereas the quad gets used daily for many tasks. The crane modification is just to enable a couple of jobs to be done more easily, at minimal outlay, oh and its fun rying to think a way around a problem!!

[Steve Bullman]

now that looks handy

[Andy Collins]

really good bit of kit, and a fast forestry grab on it, not the slow creeping ones that some use, I really liked it.

[igottacabstar]

The equal wheeled compacts like this can really go some places, they're designed for vinyards which are often very steep. I reckon i'll get most places a quad will. You're right about ground compaction though, still I could always get some grass tyres for it. The forestry winch is the biggest advantage, I used to use a 4x4 winch but the Igland is awesome by comparison. We were clearing windblown ash trees which had falen into a river at the bottom of a 50 foot embankment on thursday. This job would have taken 2 1/2 days previously but we did it in one.

 

I'll admit quads are probably more fun though.

 

Reckon I'd rather have your tractor than a quad - far more versatile.

[b101uk]

The biggest disadvantage if quads is the unbraked trailers and or overrun couplings, off road vehicles should be running powered trailer brakes witch is something compact and full-size tractors offer.

 

With vehicles with unbraked trailers regardless of size, hills will be the cause of most accident be it not having the adhesive force to slow/stop a load when travailing down hill or being dragged backwards down hill once traction is lost and in most cases its because the driver underestimates modest hills that are wetter than normal.

 

Quad’s are normally 250kg to 300kg empty and with a rider ~375kg for the bigger ones, most of the trailers talked about are 500kg to 1000kg payload with no brakes and the trailers them selves weigh 100kg to 250kg.

 

If you assume the standard coefficient of adhesion for wet grass of <30% that gives a 375kg quad with rider an adhesive force of 112.5kg.

to climb a 45deg bank it would need 50% adhesion or 187.5kg of adhesive force just as a solo quad.

to climb a 22.5deg bank it would 25% adhesion or 93.75kg of adhesive force just as a solo quad.

for a 11.25deg bank it would 12.5% adhesion or 46.875kg of adhesive force just as a solo quad.

 

if you take a 600kg balanced trailer and add the unbraked hill factor caused by gravity vs. angle that would be acting on the same quad above caused by a trailer you would get the following.

 

a 45deg bank it would generate 300kg of trailer force + the KE factor from speed.

a 22.5deg bank it would generate150kg of trailer force + the KE factor from speed.

a 11.25deg bank it would generate 75kg of trailer force + the KE factor from speed.

 

Or 375kg quad + 600kg gross trailer = 975kg = 121.875kg total adhesive force + the KE factor from speed required on an 11.25deg bank witch if that modest bank is wet grass with a coefficient of adhesion of <30% then you will be pushed/pulled down hill by lack of adhesive force generated by the quad (112.5kg) because of the much more important missing 180kg (<30%) of adhesive force that you would have got from a braked trailer.