Chris Sheppard
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Everything posted by Chris Sheppard
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Looks like you all had fun. 560 looked like it gave everything else a pretty good show
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Same here - first tree I ever felled was with a 242.
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I thought this was cool when I first saw it eBay - The UK's Online Marketplace
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A used, but fairly new, Jonsered 2163 that I somehow blagged for £150. kept it for about 5 years and stuck it on ebay and got a fair bit more than I paid for it Was a good solid saw.
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That sounds a PITA. Absolutely
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Won't most artics take 3 bays of 3.75m?
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A far as I can remember, I've always used the Oregon 2 stroke and never had any problems.
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I knew what you meant though It varies a bit round us, we do still get some blocks to do in return for the timber but quite often it can take a fairly high bid to get into a block of nice stuff to work. Only 5 or 6 years ago processor grade hardwood was a whopping £17/T roadside if you knew where to send it
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It's crazy to think that firewood is costing similar money standing as it was at roadside not that mant years ago.
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I have a 353 that's 8 years old now and up until recently was my main small saw for thinning etc and it's been great. I prefer the way it delivers the power to a 346 but the only thing I could really fault was that it used to eat clutch springs, and I know of at least two other people who had said similar. I retired it a few weeks ago with a 550 and that's so far been awesome. If you find your 357 is overkill, then a 550 will be too.
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That's pretty much what I was trying to say but you said it so much more clearly It wasn't that long ago though that Newton Rigg was the National School of Forestry, with a whole load of machinery getting used regularly. On our CS31, we were felling and presenting timber ready to be forwarded out and sold (a novel concept ) Around us there has been colleges going into privately owned woodlands and "managing" them for the owners. In reality it usually means a minefield of high stumps and little eco piles of brash and short lengths of timber, making it twice as much hard work when it comes round to further work needed doing. Sorry, gone off on one a bit
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Great fun aren't they Have you tried it on an 8 tooth sprocket with the 15" yet?
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IMO, Forestry is in need of new blood, but very few want the hard work and comparitively low wage that goes with it and it's not as glamorous as climbing trees with shiny gear What gets me is the number of colleges doing courses that are supposedly covering Forestry as well as Arb, but don't actually go into the workings of commercial forestry.
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I'd agree with that. If you'd have asked me a few weeks ago though I'd have said 372 all day long, but then tried a 560 and bought a 550 and both a leagues ahead of their predecessors in theway they deliver the power so I'd guess the 576 is going to be pretty awesome. Still think the 372 is a beast of a saw for big softwood thinnings though
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That looks ace. What it needs though, is a log cabing building on the back and it'd make a proper camper
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We're probably a lot too far away but might just be felling one suitable tomorrow or Wednesday.
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By the time you'd felled the first one, it wouldn't be cutting as well on the second, whether you ccould actually notice it or not depends on just how muddy/gritty it is and what you consider to be blunt. We've been on some birch round a lake recently where it was dulling off and stretching chains enough to need to fettle it before you had ran a full tank through.
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What did you do on your 1st day out there on your own?
Chris Sheppard replied to button1803's topic in General chat
Line thinning some really hairy sitka on a steep valley side on one of the local estates. Had line the work up few weeks earlier while I was still employed. Finished the old job on the friday and was on my own job on Monday. -
What vehicle and gear did you start off with?
Chris Sheppard replied to button1803's topic in General chat
Ford Sierra Sapphire and a second hand Jonsered 2163. When i went back in the woods after college it was an old Toyota landcruiser, an old wooden bodied 7x4 trailer with moggy minor wheels. The same old 2163, a husky 372 and a jonsered 2141. -
I'm still riding my Malt 1 ltd that I built up nearly 15 years ago complete with a whopping 1.5" of fork travel. Old skool cool
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Took the spark arrester out of my 550 yesterday - made it even better. Seems a bit more crisper sounds less gargly. Know what some of you mean regarding the 346 - but until you try a 550 you'll just not understand Way I look at it, if mine starts to become a problem once it's out of warranty, it'll go on ebay and I'll buy another new one. Admittedly, I was anti next generation saw initially and then I tried one and all was forgiven According to the dealr, the only thing the computer is doing is the tuning - every thing else is just as it is on normal saws.
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Hoping to get to woodfest, justins, APF and bentley this year as didn't manage any last year. Glad the APF is gong back to Ragley as it always seemed a better show when there.
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Beauty of retort was that it's pretty foolproof - as long as there's enough heat it keeps on working. When I used to burn in the garden on a night, I'd get it going and pop back out about every 30 -45min or so to shove a bit more wood in. Worst case, if you ignore it too long is it'll go out and have loads of brown ends - rather than it burning itself away. Time wise, it didn't take long to get it burning the gas - been a while but think it was usually less than a couple of hours on green birch. http://arbtalk.co.uk/forum/forestry-woodland-management/21912-my-first-charcoal-burn.html http://arbtalk.co.uk/forum/forestry-woodland-management/31057-mini-charcoal-retort-mk2.html Going to have to try and make some time to get to do more making stuff and less "crash bash" forestry
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Hadn't thought of it like that - good point Am liking the idea of a retort as none of the wood in the kiln is burnt, only scrap wood for firing it. The few times I've burnt it's been green it didn't seem to take much firing to get it running on it's own gases. When I get time, I want to try and build a bigger retort but still be really portable - ideally want to be able to load it up first thing, get it running and look after itself (other than a bit of stoking) and then b ready for opening the next morning - meaning we can still be felling etc the rest of the day. Sorry for the hijack
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Ran a couple of tanks through this afternoon on some hairy lodgepole and so far it seems OK - have been fairly steady with it so far but got some more pines to go at next week so be interesting to see how it fairs compared to the 372 once it's ran in a bit, given that it's 27 years old
