Chris Sheppard

I'm not defending drinking though - never understood the whole drinking to excess thing. Managed to get that out the system by the time I hit 20. Can't bide people smoking near me either. THUD: I've just realised - I'm a narrow minded grumpy old man 30 years early

We do a bt of a mixture of work through the year but from Feb to August usually we are out in the woods more than not. On the whole we get the sites that harvesters either couldn't work or wouldn't be worth bringing in due to the volumes. We get a good variety of stuff from first thin small diameter firewood to oversize stag topped pines and everything in between. Price wise, I think the best way is to cut out as many middlemen as possible, everyone taking a cut is meaning the guys actually doing the work are getting less and less. The demand for firewood and biomass has helped a lot the last couple of years, though it's also pushed standing prices up a bit too. We always emphasise that the cheaper someone wants the job doing for, the more mess there will be left behind. I think there's an awful lot of younger arb guys who think that felling in the woods is easy - they are wrong. Simples Yes, Forestry and Arb both involve chainsaws and trees, but on the whole that's about it for similarities. Yes, getting the trees on the floor may be fairly straight forward, but doing it quickly and efficiently and presenting it tidily, and on more valuable stems, getting them down without smashing/tearing them, are things some people will never get there head round. More often that not, they'll start to tire and start taking shortcuts - leaving the undersides with branches on, guessing lenghts, leaving toes on, stumps getting higher, timber thrown onto stacks, etc - it can't work like that. I know I'm never going to make arb money in the woods, but I'm happy doing what I do, earn enough to keep moving forward and get to have an odd rest day doing arb jobs

I think I know what you mean; does it almost look like the plastic has split along the join and the short bit just in front that the AV spring is attached to, is moving? If so, every 357 I've used/owned/seen does it after a while. It doesn't seem to get any worse and I've never known one snap. I've looked about at different huskies with a similar looking tank/handle and they are all slightly different and don't seem to suffer the same.

Phew, someone else see's it the same way What worries me the most is the number of people who seem to feel the need to defend drug use

Motoring convictions aren't criminal convictions though are they?

£229's best I've seen so far so not much in it That was the Titan Pro website. Will get those measurements sorted for the Yew sorted shortly - am a bit further behind than where I hoped to be by now so couldn't measure it all in situ

On the whole, my experiences of ebay have been pretty good too. Do like the look of that Holder too

Cheers guys Am fancying one for those really light jobs where a normal small saw is a bit overkill. The 550's great but almost a bit too lively for some jobs, and a bit thirsty. We've been doing a bit of formative pruning/cleaning the last few weeks and been using 242's and 42's and they're great too but can't elp bt feel a tiny saw could just fill a bit of a gap from time to time.

Absolutely. I might not agree with bits of it but it's still about things I find interesting so no doubt I'll watch it again Bet that old guy could still give plenty of us a run for our money - he might not move as fast but he'll make every movement count

Any update on how the little echo is performing, Charlie? Really quite fancy one

I'd take softwood over certain hardwoods without thinking about it, but ultimately owt will burn if it's dry.

Know you're a stihl fan, but I really rate the big husky one HUSQVARNA 325HD75x - Hedge trimmers Don't know what the real price is but I'd have thought most dealers will be around £400 if they know you. Hedgecutting isn't my favourite job but that just eats it up. Will take fairly thick stuff too.

Sorry, yes - meant transfer ports. Was thinking more along the lines of some of the better semi pro saws where they are pretty much just open ported pro saws (353/359/2159/42) I still have a 357 and a 372 barrel sat on the shelf which both need the ali transfer cleaning off and if they aren't fubared, hopefully one day will get as far as sending for some spudding

Wonder if he thought it was an autolube tank for the 2 stroke? I've heard that one before

Can see what you mean, but if we think some landowners are hard to deal with already, imagine what it'd be like dealing with those with tiny woodlands full of rubbish that they think they will make a mint out of. Can hear it now - "I know what I'm talking about, I've seen it on the telly"

Jut watched this on iplayer and thought it was OK to a point. Think the main thing we're forgetting is that most of us on here only make up a tiny tiny proportion of the people who watched it and that we were always going to pick fault. Thought the old guy who went felling with him was ace - tell he was a proper woodboss as it looked like his mitts and helmet had been dug out of the back of the shed specially for the cameras My worry is that, a bit like with the Kevin Mcloud thing, there's suddenly going to be a run of more wealthy people fancy a go and start pushing the price of woodland up further than it aready is and also start to see bigger blocks broke down into much smaller bits for peoples weekend woodland garden getaways. Some might think that's no bad thing but I'm not convinced.

Can open ported saws be ported or would the effort outweigh the benefits? At the other end of the scale, I'd really like to find myself in a position where I could send you a 242 for porting - it'd be interesting to see how much more revvy it could be made

Think he was meaning the bar rather than the saw But yes, so far it's the best all round 50cc saw I've ever used.

I wouldn't put a 20" bar on any 50cc saw - the 550's fairly torquey but I think 20" is asking too much of it. It might pull it for a while but it's going to put some pain on the clutch. Mine lives with a 13" mainly but did put a 15" on it in some sycamore and it was fairly convincing.

I like the idea of it, much like I like the idea of the tiny echo backhandle. Think it could be good for underbrashing/formative pruning/cleaning in young stands but can't help but feel they'd be a bit disapointing to use with tiny engines. We've been using 242's a fair bit recently for that sort of work and think they'd take some beating. 550's good for heavier branched stuff and cleaning but it's a bit overkill for formative pruning.

I really like the idea of that. It's the sort of thing that could work really well out in the woods for processing it at stump and cutting down on handling operations. Had a site recently that that would have been ace for. Bet it's dear though, despite it's simplicity.

Surely you and Dan can make up some shiny pipework to put the exhaust on the right side though

I've a 1985 181se that I rebuilt and that got used most days for a few weeks earlier in the year for felling some hairy lodgepole and crosscutting in front of the forwarder. Get to use some mid/late 90's 242's and 42 specials a fair bit (though one did suffer from crank bearing failing last week while I was using it ) Got a couple of mid 2000 357's a 2001 372 and a 2001 2159 that all work for a living too. The 550 was the first shiny new saw I'd bought since 2005 I think.

Because the 346 was a lardy, bendy, squishy lump that was only any good as a chipper saw Us woodmen needed a proper small thinning saw so they gave us the 550 In all seriousness though, when the new gen saws came out I was dead set against them, until I used one and was convinced from a power and handling point of view. So far I've been lucky though and had no probs with my 550, and chances are I'll be getting a 560 early next year once felling kicks off again properly.