monkeybusiness

I has had a chipper stolen off the back of one of my vans in the whitchurch ellesmere wrexham area 1 hour ago - it isn't insured so I am extremely gutted. If anyone can give me information that leads to its return I will give them £1000 cash no questions asked. It is a 2008 greenmech 1928 road tow in good condition with a white bonnet. Any info, give me a call on 07970188050. Cheers, Dan.

Hi I've got a few lads who need to do their multiple windblow assessment and I'm trying to find a suitable site within an hour(ish) of Crewe. If anybody knows of anywhere I'd be grateful of a heads up. Cheers, Dan (07970188050).

I've bought gear off them in the past and they are a very helpful and efficient company - I'll certainly use them again in the future!

Looks a good machine - what size is the feed hole (being a Bandit I'd imagine quite a lot bigger than 7'')?

I guess we're never going to agree on this one!!!

Greenmech 1928

That's ace - thanks for posting!

Haix Protector Pros - I've had 7 or 8 pairs, get a year's continuous wear out of them (5 or 6 days a week with no maintenance/cleaning/proofing ever) and they stay waterproof all the way up to the top of the tongue. They are f****d after a year, as the soles are normally smooth by then, and the leather can start splitting behind the toe cap and behind the heal, but I feel that's acceptable. Hats off to George Carrs and/or Workwear (the importers) - I bought some off them at the APF (ie more than 12 months ago) and it turned out there was a manufacturing defect - they've just sent me new boots with no quibble at all. I can't recommend either company highly enough!

I've done mine as in these pics. I took out the back seats altogether (I don't have enough friends to need them anyway) and built this box. The only non-reversible damage to the van is where I have cut a couple of little rectangles of plastic to allow the ali c-channel to be tech-screwed to the B-pillars - otherwise everything can be removed and the seats replaced in about an hour, with no other evidence of damage. The top shelf is level with the very bottom of the windows, and I have cut it so it floats over the hole where the door lock pokes up (I have removed these and just use the central locking). This means that even if someone gains access to the front of the van, or smashes one of the rear windows, they can't unlock the rear doors and gain access to the tool box below (Obviously it is only plywood so isn't properly secure, but it will hopefully stop/slow down the opportunist). The two side steps are perfect for combi-cans, but I need to sort a way of securing these as they have a habit of falling out when you open the door. The lower shelf could also do with some sort of step on the ends to stop things sliding about during get away driving manoeuvres. The only real downside is the way I have built it needs 3 sheets of ply - you may get away with 2 if you are creative with the lower shelf and make it out of a number of offcuts, but I think it would probably lose too much strength. You also need to watch that nothing too hard/heavy/mobile is stored on the top shelf as it is then in pole position to smash any one of the rear windows (and be assured that the little slidey side windows are mega expensive...).

Nope... They've got me an 2nd hand 18 inch bar and I get to keep the 15 inch apparently. It's kind of like all my Christmases have come at once!!!! I'm willing the saw to break again to be honest, I'll have my money back next time I reckon (the only problem is what else is there out there that is available brand new and is actually any good?).

As an update - mine was one of the first into the UK and was faulty, so I sent it back. It took a month, but the dealer sent it back to Husky and when I finally got it back (about 2 weeks ago) it appears to be fixed. It has since done a fair bit of work and so far appears to work well. For some reason it came back with a 15inch bar (it had a 18 when I bought it...). I'm still not 100% convinced about it - we'll see how it continues to perform!

I can't wait to try a Quadchip - the feedback seems to be very positive! I haven't experience any particular jamming issues and I run 2x 1928 machines. Every chipper will jam on the odd occasion - it seems very unlucky for you to witness this twice. For some reason our road tow actually seems to feed slightly better than the Safetrak, but I can't really determine why this is (the top control bar on the road tow is a lot better for avoiding unwanted branch 'trips' than the lower Safetrak version, but this doesn't have any other effect on actual chipping performance). The rotor/feed roller set up is identical on both machines, and they have both done similar amounts of work so are pretty equally worn. I have the stress control set up more along the lines of the Timberwolf - you can re-program the Greenmech box to suit individual operator requirements and I find this works very well for me. In reply to tommer9, I think I have mentioned quite a few reasons as to why I think so highly of Greenmech when compared to other makes. Maybe I've been lucky and only used really good ones?! The reason for starting this thread was to thank Greenmech for their excellent support - my opinion is based on my individual experiences of dealing with them as a company. I have spoken to people in the factory who could easily have fobbed me off and pointed me in the direction of a dealer, but who take it upon themselves to offer any assistance possible over the phone. This is priceless when you need help there and then, and can save downtime along with the obvious financial implications. It is apparent that people have mixed feelings about the brand - I'm sure that some people had negative experiences with the older/earlier models and are subsequently put off the entire range. I have used 2 different models of older Greenmechs that were absolute dogs - not a patch on the competition. However, the later machines in the range are leagues apart from the earlier stuff. Even though they use the same disk blade system it appears that there has been a massive evolution in the design of the flywheels and the way timber is presented to the blades, which in turn affects the feeding and subsequent chip ejection. I think the company and the machines are brilliant, and I would recommend that anybody in the market for a chipper at least has a demo on one - if it turns out that a competitor's machine is better suited to your needs then at least you'll know for certain!

Pm me your details or call/text me on 07970188050. I'll stick em in the post, if you're happy with them you can send me a cheque by return, if you mess me about I'll hunt you down!

It wouldn't pull material into the knives - ie the feed roller(s?) were not doing their job properly.

It was a timberwolf.

I've found them - they are still packaged and come with new bolts and the torx head allen key tool thing. I bought some second hand ones off here for £25 - you can have these new ones for that (including delivery) if you want them. Cheers Dan

It sounds like you've been using a blunt machine if you've experienced all of those problems. I like the disk blades personally, and find they last longer than straight blades before they need turning/replacing. The only time we had any blockage issues was when a baffle was damaged at the bottom of the chute and oversized chip was getting out of the chipping chamber - once that was rectified the problem stopped. I love the letterbox feed - the tw190 is a good machine but you have to do a lot more snedding than with a GM. The 6 inch TW and Jensens are horrible to use after you've fed an equivalent GM - the hoppers and feed rollers are tiny in comparison. In fairness to TW, I think their stress control is the best on the market, but you can adjust it on the GM if you speak to the right people and set it up the same way. It is quite unbelievable that 'the UK's most popular chipper' has bearings that can't be greased and fail every couple of hundred hours - how this design fault got through (and continues to be produced AND people continue to buy them) is beyond me. You can grease everything that moves on the GM - if you aren't lazy with your maintenance then nothing should wear out/break. The Jensens are overpriced and have some very poor design features IMO (feed control/shute adjuster/stress control unit/cable tensioner on top feed roller are all points of weakness). Pound for pound I feel they offer poor value for money, as do the Scheislings (or however you spell it). There are some good American machines but they are MASSIVE and heavy. The only time I saw a small Bandit working was at the APF a few years ago and it couldn't even feed itself (and this was on their demo stand...). Don't even get me started on tracked machines - there really is nothing else that comes close to a Safetrak.

If you need more bods for large tree felling give me a shout - sometimes the courses need numbers in order to run and I've got a couple of lads who need medium/large trees and windblow. You should also try Terry Crick - he runs courses all over the place, isn't a million miles from you and is a top man. He's on here - I think he's called apex arb. If you Google Terry Crick Apex Arboriculture you'll find him.

Looks like a sense of humour deficiency is in evidence around here!

What would you put ahead of them then? And why?

Try a 1928 or a 1623 if you get a chance (I haven't used a quadchip yet but hear they are even better than the 1623) - I can only imagine your poor experience stems from using some of the older designed machines. I was sceptical until I demo'd one - if you compare like for like there isn't another machine in their respective classes that come close in terms of performance imo. The opposition to the brand is amazing, and probably not helped by the cross-over of products in different size categories and the similarity in appearance throughout the range - with the exception of the quadchip they all look much the same - an appearance that hasn't progressed drastically over the years. A greenmech with a letterbox feed is a totally different animal to the square feed machines in the range - we stepped down from a 9 inch machine to a 7.5 inch (reluctantly, but the price was right) and have actually been blown away by the increase in performance. Pm me your best best price on the alpha machine Pete, let's find out how far apart we are...

Where's your second anchor point?

I need to post another thank you to Greenmech - they only seem to employ great people! Peter in parts has sorted me out superfast, and Mac has taught me a little trick over the phone that made an awkward job very easy. These guys are always on hand on the rare occasion that their assistance is needed, and their knowledge of their products is unbelievable! Thank you guys, you're mega! (Now get sharpening that pencil Pete B, you're letting the side down...).

If they have been linesmen's gaffs (most have as the utility companies love them) then they will be short. If you can walk around in them and the tips are off the ground then they are short, if the tips are almost flush with the bottom of the gaffs then they are long. I personally prefer long for tree climbing, but some of my lads prefer short. I'd stick with what you're using if you're happy with them. As for price, make me an offer. (I don't know for certain if I can find them - I'll have a butchers tomorrow). I do know that they are still in their unopened packaging (shrink-wrapped onto cardboard) - the issue is whether they have gone walkies!

Do you want long or short gaffs? I may have some brand new short (ie pole climbing) gaffs knocking around if I can find them.