Rob D

What a ridiculous hassal.... This sort of thing gets to me.... If you have to do things like this it means you will spend less time actually checking the gear for safety and more time ticking boxes.... Does a lot of the stuff we do for Health and Safety actually mean you work in a safer working environment? Does it alter how you do a job? Does it reduce risk? I know it's supposed to do all the above but does it? I am all for making the work we do as safe/minimal risk... but Health and Safety exercises in tree work I would say could even have the opposite effect. We should be trained and competent to do what we do. We should use well maintained equipment and the right people/equipment for the appropriate job. If you're not doing this you shouldn't be doing the job. We should not have to tick boxes on the chance of a court case arising.... that's not improving our health and safety - it's just covering our arses! Had written a lot more but have deleted it!

Yeh but the tea would be cold by the time they'd walked the quarter mile out to you

I know that gravel Stevie and I know after I have done a hedge and finished blowing there is 10% gravel less on the drive than when I got there!! It's when you have the plum slate that you really need to worry - not a needle of conifer, not a leaf, not a grain of sawdust must be left to mar that lovely surface!

Never pay RRP on a chainsaw - you should always get 25% off. If you have a small wood what you need is a chainsaw mill.... Never mind the firewood think of the beautiful planks you could turn out! Go for a 60cc saw in my opinion - light but powerful.

That's a great job done! I used to get pleasure and job satisfaction from doing hedges... I don't anymore...!

Must say the site seems to be running much smoother and faster... well done!

Sounds an interesting job there.... Looking forward to the pics of the job. Now let me think... Land on fairway where grass is clipped short and smooth and avoid any large trees that may be planted there... Or go for that beech tree over there because Biggles did it and survived to tell the tale... Cause of course that's going to be far less risky! I don't know about you lads but I would definately have done what Biggles did every time.... It's not as if he was a fictional character made up for 10 year olds to read about is it!

I hate it when people cut the ivy at the base then get you back a year later to pull it off... you're pretty screwed then...! Just to get back to thread I reckon that chipper sounds just the job Mark - at least you can move it on your own and so what if chipping takes a bit longer...

I've had jobs where the drag would be almost a quarter of a mile....! Just would not be practical to drag it. And I've had other jobs where the chip piles combined must have weighed 30 to 40 tonnes.... your groundies back would just buckle

That looks bloody good. The trouble is though no matter what system you get you'd have to do it yourself as the chipper manufacturers want to sell expensive tracked chippers not chippers with bolt ons...

Yeh let's go to war on the thieving scummers!!!!

Yes ditto the above in full Stevie.... but I still found all the NPTC courses really good and it started me off nicely.... this was in the day it was £795-00 to do from cross cut and maintenance through to climbing with a saw. My nickname was 'Nervous Nerris' courtesy of Tony Darbyshire (instructor) because I had the tendency of sh*ting my pants whenever I had to go near a tree !! Of course I'm a big tough tree surgen now so don't like to talk too much about it!!

If you feel in the mood you can have some fun and hide and get the kids guessing what's going on but they soon twig! I think this system will move 1500kg... But in the mud and wet it can start sliping and so then you have to help it along. But what would be really good would be direct hydraulic drive where you just take a feed off the pump.... you'd be able to go all over the place.

Ok here it is... hot from the camera. I don't think this is the perfect solution but it is the way to be thinking. The trouble with all the other self propelled stuff is you need a trailer for it to go on which is another expense, more weight, more fuel etc. You need to be able to tow the chipper normally. What you need is a faster version of this running off the hydraulics I reckon.... Have a look: [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7koG6KzV8mQ]YouTube - Chipper mover 004[/ame]

I know what you mean Stevie but I'm not sure anything exists... you could make something up but would take time and energy me thinks. The good thing with the caravan mover system is that is bolts on, takes 20 seconds to do, doesn't add that much weight and you can still tow the chipper normally. The disadvantage is it's not as good as it could be. Am getting the chipper out in a min so will post the vid!

What gets me is Stihl knew they had a problem, they told their dealers they had a problem but they didn't tell us the people that use the saws.... and when you're getting frustrated up a tree because the thing won't idle... and you had to send the carb in, wait a couple of weeks before a replacement.... just not impressed really...

Have you got some contact details for Chris Day there? Have googled but can't seem to find him. Cheers

It looks great selling bags of net bagged logs when you see them retailing at £5 a bag but that's not what you'll sell them for unfortunetly..... Wholesale to a petrol station etc. you'll get £1-80 or so. So if you're selling the builders bags for £60-00 hardwood how many net bags do you have to sell to get this = 34 bags.... Much easier to sell your builders bags... you need a friend with an outlet for the net bags who will give you a better price and unless you have a little machine for loading them it is a pain getting the logs into the bags - a real real pain. And as said above in direct sunlight they fall to bits. I bought a load, net bagged them, tried to sell for £2-50 each, sold all my other logs in builders bags over 6 weeks, most of the net bag logs didn't sell, bags fell apart, so had to rebag in builders bags where they sold!! I spend a lot of my life doing things like the above and wasting my time!

I've got a weighing thing that you hook onto bag and it will tell you exactly how much the crane is lifting. Next time I load a bag of wood I'll let you know. Wet wood weighed in at 380kg a bag of 0.75m3.... so a cubic meter of wet split oak around 500kg. Ash will be much lighter.... But will post when I next load a bag of dry wood. I think it wil be around the 250kg mark (or 330kg meter cubed)

It's great for woodturners and spaulted beech is lovely looking timber but it's not popular for a lot of people as beech has poor decay characteristics and so you're more limited in it's use. And as above wood turners spend 8 hours making something they may sell for £25-00 and so they do not have any money to spend... No offence to any woodturners here but I have had so many call interested in timber and of that 10% will actually come and buy some!! But all that said I'm also in Hants so how much do you want for it? We could do a deal i.e. I'll come up with the Peterson mill and chew through the logs and all the off cuts could be turned to firewood (about 40%) + I give you some cash/and or milled timber. PM me or call 07811611457 and let me know how you're thinking!

Yes I fitted a caravan mover to my chipper and it's still going strong! For what it is it's pretty expensive but the company has fitters nationwide and costs a £1,000-00 in total. I still use mine all the time and although slow it's a ruddy boon getting it into peoples back yards. Remote control as well. The concept was a good one but never took off because - the chipper manufacturers were happy it added to the machine but didn't want to promote it as it then meant they wouldn't sell a tracked chipper - it was too expensive for what it was - could be a bit faster - solid construction but a few things that could have been made better. What we need is a clever arbtalk member to somehow get a hydraulic drive off the pump and then you'd have more torque for a faster speed! Tell you what I'll get a video on the go so you can have a butchers!

I file my VAT return online each month. Really easy and any vat due back to me goes into my account 2 weeks after I send the return in...

I'd read all the forums and debated with other members the pros and cons but still I had to try some myself! Spent around £400-00 on rapco tungsten tipped chains for both milling and cross cutting. Got them in a range of different hardnesses so I could put an end to the debate in my head 'is there any place for carbide on a chainsaw'. The answer was an emphatic no! If you hit a stone or a nail you have pretty much written off the chain. They still wear (but perhaps slower than normal chain), you can sharpen with a dremel style tool and diamond file, but it is a physical impossibility to get it as sharp as a steel chain. They cost 5 times as much as a normal chain. I'd even question using them for stump work and gritty wood as you would still have a chance of hitting a larger stone and writing the whole thing off and/or I found they still needed regular sharpening. Better options are Oregon multicut chain (used this a lot but very hard to tell if it lasts longer than normal steel chain... still needs regular sharpening) which has thicker industrial chrome top plate and also Baileys diamonised chain (which I'll be trying next week and selling if the results are good) which is impregnated with tungsten carbide chips. Don't waste your money buying (or your time thinking) about dedicated carbide chains IMO there is no place for them for 99.99% everyday hand held treework!

Not that cheap as most places sell saws at 20 to 25% off the retail... Not to worry!