monkeybusiness

To be fair I didn’t consider the 7.5 tonner. If I was going down that route I’d personally go for a bigger (as in heavier, not necessarily much physically bigger) truck, as they are more capable all round for much the same operating costs.

But why not go a couple of sizes up? If you can get that 3 tonner to it the chances are you can get an even bigger machine in. IME a micro serves a purpose (much better than a spade!), a 1.5 tonner is a really useful tool for restricted access, sub 3 tonners are really only there to offer as much bang for your buck as you can easily get to site (avoiding o-licence etc as much as anything). After that you might as well go 5 tonne upwards in this country, as you can shift those as easily as a 3 tonner but they can do a lot more work.

I can’t get my head around the point of that particular weight category though. Difficult to transport and not enough advantage over something that can be easily towed to site. It looks a great spec, but is at least 2 tonnes too light/small imo.

That is nice, wish I had the money available as that would do me nicely, bet in 6 - 8 months when I hopefully have some funds again these spec machines will be like rocking horse poop again. Get a new Tak 225 as mentioned above when you’re ready to buy - these two machines Eddie has linked to are both really nice but neither will be legally under 3.5 tonnes when on a trailer which really limits their usefulness imo. I think they make a brand new setup at £30k look like a bargain too!

Just order a couple of meters of a few different sizes if you really don’t have the time to get the screwdriver out. It’s only a couple of quid.

Looks ace - keeps you away from the snakes too!!

That £30k ballpark is a cabbed machine and includes the tiltrotator with hydraulic quick hitch and buckets - you could easily spend more than £10k getting a similarly operating set-up onto another machine. The basic machine with manual hitch and 3 buckets straight from Takeuchi is anywhere from £21k upwards if you just want a canopy and single hammer line. These look very competitively priced and as Eddie said, getting hold of one is likely to be the biggest problem!

Apparently the TB225 will be available over here from April, but the first machines will only have a single double acting spool. There are more machines due in August with two double acting proportional spools, and it is possible to order from the factory with the 4 spools but you need to order now if you want one in August. Rough figures are +£1k for the second proportional spool, and + another £1600 for the 3rd and 4th spools. You should be able to get one tilty’d up with a bottom hydraulic quick hitch and a few buckets, and the all important ability to operate a grab for around £30k plus the vat. The Takeuchi spools will not allow tilt and grab at the same time - the second and fourth service latch through the same proportional switch on the right hand joystick. Pretty good value if you ask me - obviously a decent timber grab would be a couple of grand on top of that, and the same again for a trailer to drag it around on but it looks to be a really handy size/weight for easy and legal operation.

Is there anything wrong with the tree? Why is it going to fall down? Did you buy the house with the intention of felling the tree from the outset?

It’s listed on the Takeuchi uk website so I’d assume it is available over here now.

Have you seen this post @Northern Arb Supplies? Have you had any bad batches of chain reported by any chance?

I’m pretty sure it is the chain at fault here. Following my earlier post I took a husky 560 which has a new rototech bar and chain on it to our log pile and it is unusable - pulls hard to the left so much that it binds in the cut. I flipped the bar and it still pulls left. I haven’t bothered sharpening it (it is still as new) and the cutters appear even. We have had other rototech chain in the past and not had these issues so it could be a bad batch to be fair, (it will be the same chain as the OP’s I would have thought) but it is unusable to be honest.

MS360 - brand spanking new from George Carr’s. I was like a dog with two ... It did a lot of work and helped me get my business started but eventually got nicked by some pikey out of my van one night. Replaced with a 361 (which I still have and is still my favourite saw/the best saw ever made by anyone ever!).

I’m not sniping - genuinely interested. Is there anything taught on the ROLO course that an NPTC qualified arb who has passed the CIS health and safety test wouldn’t know before attending, or is it largely a box-ticking exercise?

I cut/undo the hessian once everything is in place and leave in the hole under the tree - if you remove it you will lose more of what soil there is left around the roots. Leave the wire to rust away. I have seen a 20 year old pine fail where the ‘hessian’ (although it obviously wasn’t biodegradable) had been left tied around the root - it ended up strangling/constricting the tree at ground level where it eventually snapped in a storm.

We put a couple of new rotatech bars and chains on a couple of saws I was going to chuck on eBay (but have ended up carrying on using for the time being). They pull all over the place - it is weird to be honest, as they ‘look’ straight but are obviously just dog toffee...

Trailertek used to supply axles to your own spec for reasonable money - not sure if they still do but worth investigating. Spec it heavier than the chipper...

660/661 etc with a 36’’ bar will do just about anything you’ll need in the UK. 880 and equivalent are only necessary for trees big enough to warrant their purchase (you won’t get many of them in this country).

She was very very stupid, never mind lucky!!

Not true - my sister wrote her car off when drunk (arrested at the scene and prosecuted). The insurers paid her out for her car. There were no third parties involved fortunately. It seems bonkers, but that’s what happens. She had valid insurance therefore she was covered. I think it’s been challenging/expensive to find car insurance since she got her licence back to be fair....

I’m pretty sure that an insurance company will pay out for a 3rd party (ie public liability) or an employee claim whether the company/individual are qualified/operating to best practice or not. The fact that the insurance is in place and paid for means that the insurance company are obliged to protect the affected parties. It may be that the insurers subsequently seek to reclaim damages from the insured if they haven’t met their obligations (ie weren’t actually qualified etc) but how likely is it that the cowboy in question will have anything worth chasing?

I’d like to see their lift plan...

I’ve got a cracking 2015 Quadchip for sale at the moment if you’re interested? We run the bigger Greenmech 1928 machines (which I rate very highly), and was offered this Quadchip along with a second hand 1928 as part of a package. I have no prior experience of operating Quadchips but what a revelation it is - fantastic machine that I might end up keeping to be honest! The turntable is brilliant (it allows you to set jobs up more efficiently, which is something you don’t even tend to consider with a normal tow-behind) and the whole design is very well thought out. Give me a shout any time if you fancy coming to kick some tyres/chuck some brash through it. I’m up in Cheshire, near Nantwich - 07970188050. Cheers, Dan

Aren’t all the old Fords really really slow on the road? Nothing like 40k.

Just hit it really really hard with a punch/chisel - don’t be shy, commit to it!!!