Small scale timber extraction

[John Hughes]

That little Zetor again!

 

Far too slow to be economic but at least it kept the logs clean.

I must get those brakes sorted out:001_rolleyes:

[Iain H]

I have a vimek minimaster, it is very similar to the alstor. I would say on a average site with average timber you could haul 25t per day. To do 50 you would need a short cart with large diameter timber. They are great for first thinning operations, you don't need to take out racks for access. They will cope with bigger forwarding jobs, but compared to a tractor and medium sized timber trailer they are quite slow. The most i have done on a single job is 100 tons shown in attached video.

http://www.youtube.com/user/woodlandgroundcare?feature=mhee#p/u/7/TlCQEsce0-U[/url]

[john k]

Quad & small timber trailer with hydraulic crane. If the timbers to big for the crane, we skid it out on a log arch. Quick, cheap, easy to maintain, easy to transport behind the Landy & very light footprint on woodland floor, important as many of our sites are sensitive areas.

Interesting, thanks. Looks like most people have gone bigger than that, but small can obviously be good.

 

Any idea how much you can extract in a day with the quad and trailer? What's it like on slopes (particularly downhill with a load on!)?

 

What sort of trailer do you transport it on? Presumably you get the quad and timber trailer onto one road trailer?

 

If money was no object would you have something a bit bigger? Compact tractor? Alpine?

 

Sorry for the barrage of questions!

[Xerxses]

http://arbtalk.co.uk/forum/general-chat/35493-iron-horse-ebay.html

[treedave]

 

If money was no object would you have something a bit bigger? Compact tractor? Alpine?

 

Post lottery win spending would include one of these,

http://www.loglander.se/pdf/LLeng070604.pdf

Would complement the oxtrac for extraction from the longer runs/drier sites.

[treedweller]

We have a kawasaki mule that we use for the really tight stuff but it can be more of a pain the arse sometimes as ground clearance is not great and it tends to get hanked up on stumps. Failing that its the little deutz 4506 with forestry cage on it. But it is getting a bit tired now. I have been toying with the idea of a compact tractor with a powered forestry trailer I have seen a video of a little 18hp yanmar go up a banking with about 2ton of wood on a powered trailer and it would show most valmets up lol

[Crazy Cutter]

We have a kawasaki mule that we use for the really tight stuff but it can be more of a pain the arse sometimes as ground clearance is not great and it tends to get hanked up on stumps. Failing that its the little deutz 4506 with forestry cage on it. But it is getting a bit tired now. I have been toying with the idea of a compact tractor with a powered forestry trailer I have seen a video of a little 18hp yanmar go up a banking with about 2ton of wood on a powered trailer and it would show most valmets up lol

 

Stumps are a real pain for me usually after a harvester has been through, spend too much time lowering other peoples stumps. I use an old ford 4610 with riko three point linkage crane its small to access tight sites but still has guts. I suppose it depends whether you are selling the wood on or cutting for your own business, how much you need to shift in a day?

[Matthew Storrs]

how about 2.5t digger with grab/rotator, will lift most stuff up to 750kg any bigger and u could just choker it and pull it out, the plus side is you can fit loads of other attachments to it as another way to bring in the dollar, buckets, earth augers, flail, post driver etc and itl tow behind 4x4.

[Matthew Storrs]

Oh yes and theres always the option to tow a trailer with it using hitch on the grading blade and load it with the grab

[doobin]

Oh yes and theres always the option to tow a trailer with it using hitch on the grading blade and load it with the grab

 

Just had a play with this idea today- great in theory but in practice the tail wags the dog so to speak. Digger kept sliding sideways when trying to straighten the trailer out of a turn. Hopeless on hills. And trying to 'reverse' (ie. push the trailer) is impossible in anything less than perfect ground conditions- the digger just slid sideways.

 

Any ideas? Trailer was 'balanced' so admittedly some nose weight would help. How much nose weight I'm not sure as track motors are very expensive to replace.