Show us your Arb Diggers please.

[aspenarb]

Nice work Steve. Its nice being able to reach over the fence to lift logs over and think that would have taken an half an hour to do that by hand. I think once you've had a digger and grab on jobs like that you'll never look back.

C'mon felix- where's your pictures?!

Been mud bogging in mine today- laying brash mats everywhere so I can track over it. Its that wet I pushed an 8ft strainer post into the ground with just the bucket!

 

The trouble with this stuff is the guys soon clock on to how easy a decent machine makes life and they become workshy. They forget that sometimes it takes longer to get the kit to the job than it would to go oldschool and handball.

 

Bob

[Daniël Bos]

There's a little spinney in the middle of a field of wheat in which there are a dozen or so oaks of between 40cm to 100cm dbh, to be cut to 6m lenghts.

If needed I can rip the bigger ones in half as they'll be milled anyway.

Access is through the field only so unless we get a decent frost period (it seems like we can't count on that?) I was thinking to use a three ton digger to drag them to the edge of the field 100 yards away then load them on the trailer.

[Guest]

Not so much a digger but maybe worth a look at one of Vermeer's Skid steer loaders

 

[Guest]

Not so much a digger but maybe worth a look at one of Vermeer's Skid steer loaders

 

 

 

Sorry It didn't work the first time

[doobin]

You'll not lift oaks of that size with either a 3 tonner or that skidsteer. No way.

 

If it's not desperate I'd wait till it dries up (har har!) and use a telehandler. You'll struggle otherwise.

[Stephen Blair]

As above, you'll not lift them but you could roll them out with a 3 tonner.

If your a farmer, get a big chain and drag them out, then fix the mess with the 3 tonner

[Daniël Bos]

The heaviest would be say 90cm midway.

Pi x 45 squared times 6m lenght =3.8m2 at a little less than a tonne per m2 so say 3750kg

If I half that the halves weigh 1875kg so if I can get a digger that'll lift a tonne close up I should be ok, presuming I lift one end on then coax the other end on.

 

What would one of those tracked loaders lift?

 

Waiting for dry weather is not really an option, they need to be gone by end of march at the latest (I need them for construction at home) Best hope is a good frost...

I need minimum destruction in the field as it's got winter wheat in.

[Matthew Storrs]

Sorry Rover, but a 3 tonner won't be getting lumps like that on to a trailer. The trouble with a digger is it may lift a ton close in but as soon as extend the boom to get enough height to lift it on to a trailer it won't have enough grunt. It will however be able to roll said lumps but then you must as well use a tractor anyway to lift them, even then a loader will struggle with lumps like that unless its a biggie. Seems like telehandler may be your only option.

[Daniël Bos]

How about a 6 tonne machine?

I'd have to hire them in anyway and the price difference is not huge.

[doobin]

How about a 6 tonne machine?

I'd have to hire them in anyway and the price difference is not huge.

 

 

Check out this thread and the end pic. That was 8 feet long, four feet diameter, and the 7.5t digger could barely pick the end up and lift it.

 

http://arbtalk.co.uk/forum/milling-forum/63113-oak-butt-milling-sussex-surrey-area.html

 

Telehandler is the same money to hire and will save you a shagload of hassle.

 

I know it's not what you want to hear, but hey.