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Hi buzz, we've been deadling with AHS for about a year and they are spot on. The lorry's turn up when you say they will, we get paid almost on time. Our chip is not usually the best quality and we do store it outside on some compacted roadplanings (no hardstanding) so we did get a few loads rejected due to contamination from shotton when we first started but things work well now we know what we're doing. The problem for you is we are selling mosty chip to a a couple of landscape firms at the moment but I'll keep in touch.

I took some of their ideas to an ali supplier who supplies most of the hgv body builders in our area. They are making a chip box form same profile ali as overlands with 8x4 ft sides, a full height toolbox with shelving and twin roller shutter doors all clips and ali angle to bolt it to. It all comes flat packed ready to be assembnled and fitted to the steel floor on our Iveco Daily for £1450 plus vat. I'll post some before, during and after pics when its done.

My bad one was for Balfour Beatty Civil Engineering. I did speak to Martins about doing some work few years ago but I was warned about the retainer issue, so I left it well alone. My uncle is a solicitor specialising in contract law, I had to use his services to retreive just under £30k from a nationwide landscape maintenance firm who we used to sub for. It only cost me a bottle of single malt and he got it with 1 (well written) letter. The problem is some firms take insult and will refuse to work with you again if you use or threaten legal proceedings.

You can get a D&B check carried out on any Company if your not not sure of their background or stability. Basically always give a written quotation containing you terms and conditions, and always either get the client to sign an acceptance slip or get a purchase order before starting work. You will deliver your contractual obligations by carrying out the work as described in the quote / spec, their contractual obligation is then to pay on time. If not a solicitor will have no trouble in retreiving the debt as long as the client hasn't gone belly up in the meantime. My bad one from last year was from a large plc who I know arn't going anywhere and who also give us loads of very profitable work so I wasn't willing to use legal action until It was absolutley a last resort. They did however pay up without the need for legal, but I have used a solicitor in the past and they are worth their extortionate fee if the debt is large enough.

Dean, whats the out casing made from and do you know if you can you get a mouting bracket for the lens. If I get one it will probably end up under water

March, thats not too bad. We have just been paid for a rail clearance job which we did july 07. They came up with all the excuses in the book, lost the invoice, 'that one has been passed for payement I wonder why it hasn't reached you yet', didn't have our up to date insurance doc, (they had lapsed in september after the bill should have been paid. I still do work for this client but now I double the value of every quote, that way I don't mind waiting if I'm being paid twice.

COOL, are they robust? I want one for off road motorcycle enduro racing but it will need to be very impact restistant as I do spend a lot of time crashing into things.

I've been trying to get myself over for a couple of years but the logisitcs of leaving 11 lads and taking my lass and two small kids has meant it hasn't worked out as yet. She wants me to go myself for a couple of weeks and leave her and the kids, but I think a trip like that needs to be shared with the family. It'l work out out one way or the other.

My mate has been in Surfers Paradise, south of Brisbane for a few years now. Just about got his full residency. He loves it. A few other mates have gone out for a few months or year for holidays and they all loved it. He says why would I want to come back, its great weather, good pay, good conditions and loads of mature trees to work on. How long were you out there for Ed?

via link on Prochips website while looking for the Schliesling dealer

Can it make my tea and stop my kids from crying?

I bought one for a job a couple of years ago. The one job job paid for itself (easily). Since then I've used it a couple of times to find buried cables beneath stumps and once to expose some roots so the LA groundworks team could build up a footpath over some poplar roots without severing them. Its tucked away in the back of the container at the moment, maybve I should start to promote it a bit more. It is a messy job but it is also pretty good fun at the same time. I wouldn't think its too good for deep de-compacting jobs, a terra-vent will probably do a better job and it will only loosen the soil (or blow it away to the side of trench etc. To effectively dig you would also need a suction device. Hope this helps and good luck

Its not going to be doing any extreme off roading so I think duel rear wheels will be fine, they spread the load better on the road as well. I Know the front will be heavy though, our 7.5t cargo will spin on a banana skin when empty.

Sounds like a good plan. I'll keep you all up to date on the developments as they go.

The reason behind the folding crane was so that I didn't have to keep lifting the arm up when chipping into the chip box from the rear, and then lifting the arm right up in order to tip the chip off. But the fact I'd either have to keep taking the grab and rotator off to fold it or pay silly money for a Z crane is now making me think that it might not be such a bad idea to go with our conventionmal crane. 'Oh what i'd do with an unlimited budget'.

Are they 240hp

Did you also have a tipping body on the back or Bolster / flat. I want to use the truck everyday for chipping into and carry occasional loads. The reason for this is that the U1500 is our most expensive bit of kit which does the least amount of work. I.e collecting odd stems and logs from site. The timber crane is great, loads of power, fast and good visibility but it wont fold behind the cab of an 18 tonner so I think it'l have to be changed for something more suitable. A Z crane would be good but very expensive new and not many about used.

Our u1200 with 3pl chipper is pretty good but the U1500 has narrow MPT tyres and Jonsered 770 crane on the back and has to tow the 10t trailer so is pretty limited to what it can do, thats why I want to chage it for a lorry. Also since we told by the great HMRC that we cannot use red diesel in the U1500 its been pretty expensive to run as well. Would you go for a Merc or MAN, I've been told the Mercs are underpowered thats all.

We're haven't really seen work drop off too much and I've not really had to lower our rates in order to get the work. However our running costs have gone up, fuel, wages etc so I'm now looking at improving the effieciency of how we work. Anything that isn't used daily, should we be keeping it of changing it for something that can etc. A few quid saved in downtime every day all adds up the end of the month.

Cheers Ed, Do you know if they suffer from heavy corrosion on the chassis as a result of the salt? Also do you know how capable they are off road.

Can anyone suggest a good 4x4 lorry, I've jsut put one of my lads through his class 2 and want to change our U1500 and Fortuna trailer for modern lorry which we can chip into daily and carry a decent amount of timber when required. Any coments appreciated.

The little railwork I've done has been spent around 50% of the time waiting to get onto the track and the other 50% working very hard to try and get a section clearaed before you were kicked off. (all possesion work) Good experience though, stock up on gauntlets.

That looks like a nice compact truck Ed, was the body and toolbox already on or did you have it built.

I've found that 1 man can't do the work of two men, but 2 men can usually do the work of 3. Unless theres a big drag or another good reason we always work in teams of 2.

Eat a couple of thick sliced Cheddar cheese sarnies before you go out. It fills you up, puts a lining on your stomach and slows down the effects of the alcohol (I saw that on an episode of spooks). I'd agreee with sticking to one poison, Ale (John Smiths in particular), hops and water, no chemicals or other rubbish and fairly weak in strength means you can drink more for longer without feeling ill.