John Shutler

potbellied would suggest the rest of me is skinny, whereas the reality is that i’ve got a fairly even covering of lard

i’ve got the Femac rev forestal heavy duty swinging hammer version with the hollow rotor. it’s always gone well on my jcb and the volvo before it but always thought about a fixed tooth one. do a video if you ever get a chance mate

@Stephen Blair

how does it run that fixed tooth mulcher @stephenblair

you sound bitter

the top of that timber was 020 cut size such is the efficiency of the GRCS

Ive had a GRCS for about 15 years and am actually on my second one, prior to that I had a German reproduction of a Hobbs style device that I bought off sparsholt college for about £900. Id credit getting the GRCS as the starting point of heading in a mechanised direction, simply because we removed trees in larger pieces so needed an ability to move large sections of timber more efficiently so in 2011 bought a boxer skid steer and the rest is history. when I first bought it we were doing lots of back garden/confined space removals, It allowed us to remove trees in a style not dissimilar to using a crane by lifting and then lowering. I wish I could be bothered to trawl through nearly 18 years worth of pictures on arbtalk to find more GRCS ones but have to much else to do. Over the years its been essential to my way of working and its really only since I've owned a roto that we don't use it so much anymore.

i have got 7 batteries at the yard 🤣

i’ve got the 1/2 inch and 3/8ths milwaukee ones, very good bits of kit

another mixed bag of jobs. A 2m Oak reduction for a housing association with an overkill of a chipper. Flailing some scrub around some test pits with eco supervision for a development site. Winching a windblown conifer over a footpath back into a field for a LA. Valtra with the 30cube trailer coming back for a second load. IMG_1584.MOV IMG_1494.MOV

myself and one other the other guys were talking about the glory days when every tree wagon had a massive set of triple extensions on the roof. straight to the top of the ladders then pretty much free climb upto top anchor.

We require an additional climber in the New Forest on a sub contract basis. We undertake a nice variety of works in the commercial and domestic sectors. 730am - 430pm Rates to be discussed Plenty of plant used to reduce effort required Call 07731929194 for a chat thanks John Shutler IMG_1233.MOV

bought a pickup with a loan of 3k in 2006 and started doing some bits alongside my climbing job. bought a 5k chipper in 2008 with a bank loan, my folks were pretty concerned at the time and wanted to make sure “ knew what i was doing” 16 years later i’ve got about 400k worth of kit: bought a house 11 years ago in the new forest and some land over the next couple of years which had appreciated nicely. bought a place in france a coupe of years again and just sold that for a profit and bought another. i’ve worked pretty hard and enjoyed myself along the way

different day, different opinel. out and about with a no8. white powder isnt cocaine, rather residue from plasterboarding

opinel no9 this is a slightly posher one with a walnut handle but still phenomenally good value

Its more like 10 but what's an inch between friends 🤣 ultimately my point remains the same wether we rip the bottom 6ft down and chip it or cut a 2.5m length off the bottom and swing round and pick up a trailer load of wood at the end of the job, having an increased ability to deal with arisings is never a negative thing imo.

yeah to a certain extent but I'm a firm believer in buy the kit and the work will come. No one starts off getting larger type jobs straight off the bat. A brief synopsis of my machinery journey that has led me to the point im at now with my buisness. In 2008 I started off with a 6 inch chipper doing domestic works. In 2011 I bought a boxer skid steer that allowed me to deal with timber from removals easier. I started getting more removals because I became more competitive as the timber was less of an issue for me. Over the next couple of years I had more and more timber to deal with so in 2013 I bought a tractor and trailer. In 2015 I then bought a bigger chipper for the tractor as I had an opportunity to price for a larger clearance type job. 2016 it became apparent that I needed a larger day to day chipper and more capacity so I bought a mog and 10 inch chipper. In 2017 I bought another tractor so I could move larger quantities of chip as I could see that moving chip was becoming a bit of a bottleneck for me. 2018 I bought a 6 tonne digger as it opened up some opportunities doing some heathland restoration type works. 2021 I bought a merlo and grapple saw as there wasn't anyone in the new forest running one. 2024 Im putting a grapple saw on a digger to run alongside the merlo. That isn't even an exhaustive list of everything as throughout that time there's been changes and upgrades as finances allow. Id always encourage people to push themselves or upgrade to a bigger machine if there's potential to improve a buisness and their earning opportunities. But equally there's nothing wrong with pottering on with domestic works and a simple setup if that's what you want to do

i couldn’t go back to running smaller chippers, the ability to fell a 30cm roadside tree, winch it into the hopper and chip all of it is ideal for our estate and council works. Additionally we are in an area where there is a lot of monterey pine, trying to chip that sort of brush with a 6 inch chipper is a nightmare with the 4-6 cone bunches that are common of the species. The other thing i like about larger machines (in particular Bandit) is that everything is more accessible so any maintenance or repairs are alot easier day to day we run 4x4 tippers ie hilux or isuzu which obviously don’t have great capacity so when required we take a 30sqm grain trailer to chip into

yes bigger is better

Another mixed bag of a week moving kit back from a little clearance job on a building site taking out a pretty much dead mac with the roto moving an 8m tall 5 tonne taxodium IMG_1349.MOV IMG_1352.MOV IMG_1343.MOV

🤣

careful mick he'll threaten to box your ears

well you know what they say, if there's no arsehole in your group of mates its probably you

July 2007, 17 and a bit years. Aside from all the information I've picked up over the years. which has certainly made me better at my job ive ended up with a really good group of mates as well