Brushcutter

Did some coppice last weekend. The hazel was fine but the Ash and Sycamore were starting to come into bud. Cut low to the ground and don't cut into old wood on the stool.

Not seen Jons Igland but yea most of them fit on the 3pl. At a guess 5.5 tonne pull winch should be just under a tonne and have stepped cat 2/3 pins. Well the Fransguard does anyway. How many sliders you got on the cable Jon? 4 or 5 or more you got a chain hook on the end or another attachment? Come with any skidding chains?

Well done! How many trees were you doing a day on your 31 training and what sort of size on average. From doing 31 to the jump into the real world is quite scary. No leaving trees because they're hard or your not quite sure. No jumping to the next rack because its easier than the one your in. 31 teaches you to fell but not really any forestry techniques. If you can get the chance spend a day or so just watching as you will learn masses. Bucklebury Estate might be worth contacting they have some woodland so maybe a chance to fell there?

I have the D22 fear. That is i've gone past 80k and i need my navara but can't afford to replace it. Its still a fantastic truck and its been truely fantastic up to this point. Its due a service soon but there is an little more engine noise than normal. All adds to the fear.

I'm burning Sweet Chestnut at the moment. The dry stuff burns like a dream but the slightly wet stuff is just naff. Think it takesa lot of drying mine was in 5' lengths for about 6 months then 3 months cut and split in the wood shed. Still quite wet so might take a fair bit of seasoning. For 35 quid delivered i don't think you can go too far wrong. Thats going to be 20 quid roadside which is quite cheap for firewood. If there are anygood bits in there you could make gates and the such.

I got one for free from the local agri college that was selling the land off. 20m long double span tunnels so about 12m wide. Got the lot on i think 3 big landy trailers. Got some suitable sized metal pipe that i concred in the ground and stuck the frame on that and bolted it together. Not bad for 2 days work. Always worth phoning places like that see if they want shot of thing like that. I was so efficent at taking it down the college thought we were some kind of demolition contractors.

Nice tractor lots of space in the cab. I'd like some pics of it in action. The FC Wendover office is doing a lot of planting at the moment. some 18,000 trees might be worth a call see if they want to hire in a planter.

Been on a new year spending spree charlie?

Yea its a truely shocking amount of money. Whats worse is that you need lots of units. I only have tractor based stuff. if i want to use proper forwarders/harvesters i have to do more modules. Tend to do more woodland management now rather than full blown forestry peice work cutting. I too am working towards going to work in Norway/Sweden driving forwarders.

A short course approximately £1500 per week + £150 skills check first. Could take up to 2 weeks to get the certificate and after that there is still a lot to learn in the workplace. Not sure about funding.

Did mine two years ago. Can't remember who it was with but the HGV centre put me in touch. Some agri colleges run the training. You turn up and they have a suitable vehicle and box trailer (a chipper wont do). You then practice doing the reversing: 1. drive upto a cone and stop 2. Reverse around a cone behind you and head across a the test area diaganally. 3. Reverse into a parking bay not hitting the barier and lining the trailer so its wheels line up in the line in the box. You can have 2 shuts which one of which counts as a minor faul if memory serves. You fail if you cross the lines either side of the car which represent a kerb. After that there is an emergancy stop. Then off out on the road for a regular driving test (this is where i failed first time). Then back to the centre to unhitch the trailer and reverse onto it and conect it all up and do all the checks. Training is about a day-half to a day and the test is a couple of hours. About £500 quid per person i think. I did mine in Abingdon in Oxford but you can do it at any HGV test centre.

FCA website is always a good place to find contacts. Windblown trees can be difficult course to find/get onto. I had to go up to Yorkshire to do mine after 4 years of waiting. I needed it to work on some FC sites but managed to get CS34/35 on the same course. If your lucky you can do CS32/34 combined. I did cutting wood for chipping at £3 a tonne. It was hard crappy work. I perfer forwarding nowerdays. The harvester forward courses are very expensive makes a CS30/31 course look cheap. Try Bartony college for that.

Getting into forestry can be hard but once your in it can be fantasic or an uphill struggle. Cutting all day every day is hard work. Your back will hurt your hands will hurt. You have to fell quick limb out quick and get the stems cut really flush and cross cut with great acuracy. Stacks have to be neat for the forwarder and you can have to stack up some big bits of wood. Pay can be poor but if you get a nice clearfell money can be great. Thats the doom and gloom but it is fantastic work. Once you work your way upto doing medium/large trees its even better. Obviously the cutter isn't only rung in the forestry ladder. There's the forwarder drivers, harvesters and skidders too. Again all hard work but i do love forwarding. Ring local companies see if any work is going and don't be afraid to go anywhere in the country to have a go. You might want to consider CS32 to make you more employable on the forestry side

Its got windier as the day went on. One back weighted tree suvived the culling because of it. Although that met it end on Monday. Each tree was 40-60 feet of timber. Then some 10-15' of top. All cut to 10' lengths finding its way to a firewood forum near you soon!

Nope the Estate yard where i work.

A bit of Norway felling from last week little bit windy. 30 trees to come over 90% of which were blown. Shot on Nikon D90. [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=10BD6oLFTys]YouTube - Norway felling[/ame] Not sure how to embed it so a link will have to do. Lots of things to hit: Office, Heating oil tank, Red diesel tank, fence, two barns. a few pics as well

Normally SHB deliver. Send the guy in the 4x4 you hire with a tiny motorbike in the back that they ride back to base in.

Did you leand out your Tractor to Wilsons for the APF? It looks really familiar. The 560 is 6m reach and the 570 is 7m and you guessed it the 580 is 8m reach. I've got 5m on the trailer at the moment and when i get to use other people with 6 the difference is amazing. Great thing about the Botex is that they will lift a lot close in more than the Kelsa ones. There are lots of options for the controls for the crane. Pics are from an older Botex 5050 with a set of antiquated leaver controls which you can still get buy avoid like the plauge. The second is the next botex standard controls with two joystick like controls for boom lift slew rotor. Then the other leavers do grapple open/close and extending boom and stablisers. You can get them on fancy electro-hydraulic joysticks like in a digger but thats an expensive extra. If its going on the roof it might be worth the investment though.

Delimb them in the wood but stack up the brash. Then pick it up with the trailer & grab and extend the mat out of the wood. But your right new toys do encourage more work.

Yea came up with the idea a little while ago. If you have front linkage with spools you could do the same out front, well if you have front spools you could make it part of the weight box. Be about twice the price for a Valtra. It maybe worth buying a valtra elsewhere and sending it to Wilsons for conversion. Then you can choose your crane as they put a 560TL on eveything. I think the 560 is about 18+vat the 570 is 19 and the 580 is 21. I'm still clinging to the dream of a 8050/8100 with a 570TL roof mount. Will have to more likely get a 570 on a 10 tonne euro trailer.

If its really wet make sure you get a good brash mat down. It's probally stating the obvious to you but it really makes the difference. I did some forwarding for a member on here who clearfelled a small block of Norway. Sold all of that for sawlogs, fencing and chip wood. I felled about 15t on Norway on Saturday thats going for firewood.

Riko UK :: Mechanical controlled forestry winches See what price a new one will be. It will be a good guide for a s/h one. See if they have any as well. A grand might get you a 6.5 t winch. The EA sold off some of their fransguard a little while ago. They were a little overpriced.

Bigger is better but really you won't need more than 5 tonnes for that. Consider getting a double drum if you'll be doing a lot of winching. Igland are the Rolls Royce of winches but if you get the price list from Wilson make sure your sitting down when you open it! It was 14K for a 9tonne double drum! For cost/performance ratio i'd go for a uniforest. Have a chainsaw holder and lots of bits to hold kit, also a chainbox too. Electrohydraulic is great, power assisted rope out is great especially when you have 60m of cable to drag out.

I think you mentioned a Harvester head in another post? It would work quite nicely on this tractor.

I'm not sure but i think Stephen Blair had one of these. Not a Botex crane though think it was Kelsa. The 8750 is a big tractor best part of 200hp so not really in the woods nippy like the smaller 6400 or even the smaller 8000 to some extent. If Wilsons have put the crane on they've probally wighted it up. Although looking at the picture it doesn't look like it. I've had a go on a 8100 with a FMV roofmount. That has front weights and wheel wights. Its quite a heavy tractor. I'd put a front weight block on it, set of front and back wheel weights and water ballast tires. Maybe a bit of belly balast too. The 560 is a fantastic crane pitty with a tractor that big i'd of wanted a 570 or 580 on it. You'll always lift more on the trailer than on the roof. But roof gives you much more versatility. The 560 will lift 2.5 or 2.8 on the trailer. I think you'd get 1.8 maybe 2 on the roof. You could make some stabliers legs to go on the 3pl that run off a spool for extra stablity with the roof mount/