Educate me about chipper history?

[john k]

I'm looking into the potential of using a chipper in various woodland management scenarios and would like to find out a bit more about the history of chippers in the arb world as a comparison. I know that it's not directly comparable because the circumstances are different, but what I'm most interested in is people's attitudes.

 

Presumably there was a time when no one had chippers, then a few started to come onto the scene. How long ago was that? Was there general enthusiasm, or did it seem like an unnecessary and expensive gadget at first?

 

How long has it been a standard bit of kit for anyone who's serious about arb work?

 

Thanks

[jomoco]

The first wood chipper was invented in Germany in the late 19th century according to my research on them.

 

They were not used a lot commercially until the 1950's when the first chuck n duck high speed drum chippers hit the markets. The production efficiencies gained by being able to shred brush and relatively small diameter wood up to ten inches into small chips blown into the back of a truck was a game changer, and their use really took off commercially.

 

The sheer speed at which these drum chippers could grab and shred a branch was truly frightening and intimidating for the workers feeding them. If the operator didn't quickly move to the side and past the feed table after feeding a branch? The consequences were dire. Hence the nick name chuck n duck, or be whipped, slammed against the feed table, or be peppered by wood chips propelled backwards at the operator at extremely high speeds. Unwary operators of these high speed drum chippers lost fingers, hands, arms, teeth etc. but rarely their lives.

 

However in the late 80's when the first hydraulically fed disc and drum chippers hit the markets that were capable of shredding large diameter brush and logs up to 18 inches plus at a much slower feed rate? Shortly thereafter the first woodchipper operator fatalities were reported and documented when operators became entangled in the branches being fed and dragged into the hydraulic feed wheels and dismembered. The vast majority of these woodchipper fatalities occurred when the operator was feeding the chipper alone with no one about to activate the safety feed control bar which stops or reverses the feed wheel mechanism.

 

As these hydraulically fed woodchippers able to chip large diameter branches and logs became more numerous and widely used in this industry, operator fatalities on the job rose.

This led to OSHA releasing the following bulletin in an attempt to reduce the rising number of on the job woodchipper fatalities in the US.

 

https://www.osha.gov/dts/shib/shib041608.html

 

Note the number one recommendation. To always have two operators working in close proximity to the chipper, with one of them acting as the designated observer with their hand on the feed control bar in case the other operator gets into trouble.

 

The now dated OSHA woodchipper safety bulletin does not reflect the fact that over 55 woodchipper fatalities have occurred on the job.

 

IMO any hydraulically fed woodchipper over a ten inch capacity should never be fed by a solo operator, period.

 

I hope you bear these grisly realities of this dangerous industry in mind when purchasing a woodchipper John.

 

Work safe mate.

 

Jomoco

[Breezeblock]

does anybody have any history on something cheerier

[Stubby]

does anybody have any history on something cheerier

 

You could look up stuff about " The Black Death " ( plague ) Might be a bit more cheery !

[Goaty]

When I first looked into buying a chipper circa 2001. If you typed in woodchipper in the web search engine......

 

All you got was American violence and Mayhem, either Man put girlfriend through chipper news articles or fantasy stories of the same. Also online gaming nerds used it as an alias gaming name frequently e.g Annihalator vs Woodchipper.

 

I was frustrated in my searching. Much better these days.

The Americans seemed to go more mainstream with them before we did I reckon.

 

All the best in your research, but I think at present do to firewood values chippers are not getting the throughput they were 7 years ago.

[Graham]

My first introduction into chipping was early/mid eighties when we used to hire an Exenco drum chipper. Good machine but step aside quick:001_smile: I bought my first chipper (Vermeer) in '87 and as I remember it was the only machine in a 20 mile radius! Now that radius is reduced to 20 metres:001_smile:

[PeteB]

I was looking at buying my first in the late 80's after years of carrying brash about the East Midlands and huge bonfires in the yard or on site. The cost in those days was a very big issue for a struggling company so it was early 90's before I took the plunge with my first. Back then, Vermeer, The Mighty Rivett Chipper (Bandit), Turner 90 (Gandini), QuickChip (TS), Premier (Schiesling) and Arboreater were the machines that were freely available and mainstream. Other makes also included Dosko, Morbark, Jensen, Exenco and I even got an Asplundh brochure but don't recall seeing the machine.

 

GreenMech started in 93 although they had been going for 30 years previously under the Turner name and rebadging Gandini. Timberwolf were starting up as well and the machines were becoming generally more available and commonplace. Some makes have stopped being imported as changes to the HSE spec make conversion expensive and, to be honest, the market place didn't really like them so things became financially unviable.

 

A 6" QuickChip took my eye but was close on £7k more than a budget Arboreater. Michael Dalrymple delivered it at a cost of £12k, complete with spare blades and a quick talk on how to change the blades!

[Graham]

I was looking at buying my first in the late 80's after years of carrying brash about the East Midlands and huge bonfires in the yard or on site. The cost in those days was a very big issue for a struggling company so it was early 90's before I took the plunge with my first. Back then, Vermeer, The Mighty Rivett Chipper (Bandit), Turner 90 (Gandini), QuickChip (TS), Premier (Schiesling) and Arboreater were the machines that were freely available and mainstream. Other makes also included Dosko, Morbark, Jensen, Exenco and I even got an Asplundh brochure but don't recall seeing the machine.

 

GreenMech started in 93 although they had been going for 30 years previously under the Turner name and rebadging Gandini. Timberwolf were starting up as well and the machines were becoming generally more available and commonplace. Some makes have stopped being imported as changes to the HSE spec make conversion expensive and, to be honest, the market place didn't really like them so things became financially unviable.

 

A 6" QuickChip took my eye but was close on £7k more than a budget Arboreater. Michael Dalrymple delivered it at a cost of £12k, complete with spare blades and a quick talk on how to change the blades!

 

 

Before I bought a Vermeer I had a demo of the Quickchip. I think it was nearly 6k more than the Vermeer so probably twice the price! I also considered the Arboreater but somehow it just didn't look quite right:001_smile: Used a Turner badged Gandini for a while in Surrey after that storm. Pto version which coped well with the shear pin giving up an hour before the low-loader arrived to take everything home.

[openspaceman]

I even got an Asplundh brochure but don't recall seeing the machine.

 

The early Asplundh looked similar to the Gibbs Woodchuck, this was an american import and the first chipper I used in 1976, Gibbs took the large petrol engine out and fitted a diesel. This was always an arb disposal machine. During this period the FC were investigating wood chip firing from lop and top, in East Anglia there were some self propelled drum machines and also some large angled disc chippers. In Surrey/Hampshire we were smaller scale so the FC arranged a demo of a small tractor mounted Jensen, It was less than 6" and the demonstrator had lost an arm in a sawmill accident, what fascinated me was the feed was no longer inclined to the disc and it still chipped and loaded whereas I knew the angled feed gave big problems as the blades blunted.

 

Most chippers were horribly expensive and just as Amstrad introduced an affordable soho computer Jim Wilkie at Exenco introduced his chuck and duck, just like the computer analogy whilst cheap it was a fork that died out in favour of towed disc chippers.

 

 

 

A 6" QuickChip took my eye but was close on £7k more than a budget Arboreater. Michael Dalrymple delivered it at a cost of £12k, complete with spare blades and a quick talk on how to change the blades!

 

Michael had them manufactured near Dorking before he sourced them abroad, I remember watching Derek turning the flywheels on his lathe in an old cowshed.

[aspenarb]

We had one of Arboreaters ( Michael Dalrymple`s ) first chucknduck chippers back in the very early eighties on a 406 mog. That would instantly devour a stick as big as you could lob off your shoulder , lethal . I think its still buried in the corner of the yard so I will take a snap of it. I know on one occasion it ate an av topper that a climber left in the hopper, the driver never checked before engaging the PTO.

 

Bob