richy_B

You can insure anything against anything - cost and benefit are the real question. Best to speak to a broker. Tell them what you want to insure and the values. Once you have a premium you can go from there. Arborisk or trust might be a good place to start.

My mum is in west fermanagh. Hitting pretty hard from hard from the sounds of. They've closed lots of schools.

£200 to dismantle, log up and chip a 60' tree !?! Leave them to it. £400 is pretty cheap in my opinion for a two man team, rigging kit, tipper and chipper.

Does anyone know of a UK supplier of a root ball strop / carrier? Can't see to find anything via google. Want it to go over forks and be good for heavy standards upto 200kg.

Probably not a lot you can do if you are sticking with the same vehicles. Keep on top of servicing and make sure your tyres are at the right pressures is all that occurs to me. Avoud sharp acceleration and braking. Probably only a nominal difference though. Have you got a fuel card? Perhaps worth shopping around and seeing if you can get a better rate. We only run 3 vehicles but they all tow. Our diesel bill is £5k ish per year. Painful.

I have a scanmek hedge cutter on my MO. I doubt there is going to be much between the brands as they are essential the same implement. - Finish is decent, better than a flail. It isnt as clean cut as using a good handheld petrol hedge cutter though. The handheld cutter gets that steady 'up and down' motion which helps gets every bit. The finger bar can push branches a little before it cuts them so you get some bits end up slightly longer than others. Biggest problem is the finger bar is single sided so you can't go back the other way, which I think would solve the problem. Obviously will do vastly more and higher than you ever could with a handheld cutter so probably not a fair comparison. I did a 1000 metre hedge to 4 metres in less than a morning this week. It's a relatively new item to me so I am still getting good on it but I have found you can wiggle the steering slightly on thicker sections and it significantly assists the cutters. I had my go pro on so I have about 2 hours of footage. I'll try and find a few decent minutes of it.

They've been a God send this summer cutting epicormic on Limes. Clocked up over 220,000 cuts according to the monitor. Zero hand pain. The battery life is amazing too. Charging it every 3 days. People love them as well. I must had had a 100 people stop and ask about them.

No experience if the hedge cutter but the backpack is the same for my electric secateurs. The cable situation is likely to be the same - I'd definitely buy a few spares! Would be very early to cut it. From a design perspective I suppose you can't have a close fitting cable to reduce risk but also enough length for movement. Side note - the backpack is very comfy. I wear it for hours at a time without complaint.

Agreed. 30 odd ton of metal, travelling at 50 kmph with a set of pallet forks up front.

Could have been nasty. Pretty reckless of the tractor to be doing that speed on a blind corner.

As has been stated, really rare in the UK and Europe. I'd also expect the manoeuvrability to be an issue. The main market has to be the US where there is an abundance of 'compact' tractors (there compact seems to be a 50-90hp though). I spent quite a bit of time in the US and outside the main cities everyone had a few acres and a tractor of sorts.

When I was on my bike in London I'd go past a dozen vans a day and you'd smell it. Worryingly they'd be driving and it would be before 8am. I don't think its industry specifc but I did notice a lot of scaffolding lorries and painter and decorators.

There is a nice (a bit expensive) pub called the botanist nearby. Decent ales amd food. I'd suggest Hampton Court Palace would be a better place to combine it with as it's only a short drive between them

Allow an hour to find a parking space!?! You could do a 'tourist visit' in 4 hours amd briefly see it all. For a proper look around I'd take most of the day. Wet and windy in London today though, might be luckier tomorrow.

Fuel consumption isn't to be sniffed at! I have a timberwolf sx200 with the petrol engine. It has a 18 litre tank and will only run 3-4 hours before its completely empty. EX VAT that's about £17 a day. The bigger engine has got to be atleast £25 on a normal day. Compared to £10-12 per day on the diesel equivalent. £12.50 a day, £62 a week or £3k a year increased running cost compared than the diesel equivalent. Over 3-5 years of ownership that is pretty hefty. The bigger petrol engine has the same 18 litre tank as well. You don't want to be filling up halfway through the day.

Replied. I'm in West London. Try to keep within a hours drive.

Amenity value of 3 mature london planes? £20-25k a piece I'd say. Good place to start the fine.

The leveller is definitely on the list! I like the soil screen - how much was that one? I got a quote from multione for their screening bucket and nearly fell off my seat. Crazy expensive.

I like that. I have gone for 'side on' grapple as its mainly for shifting bigger stems/rings. I have a skidding grapple from an alpine that I was considering attaching via a 3pt linkage adaptor. Be good to be able to load lengthways or sideways depending on the situation. http://www.multione.com/mini-loaders-attachments/log-grapple/ I feel I might have developed a bit of an habit. I better step away from the multione website before I end up with another 5 attachments.

Thanks. Got quite few attachments to get me started. I have a log grapple on order as well as the rear bull bars and a plexiglass windscreen - want to beef up operator and machine protection. I am going to look at a thin metal grill to go over the plexiglass, will figure it out once it arrives. I want a bit more head on protection when flailing. Probably something detachable.

Out again today - flail cut the grass path edges and 4m sides (a lot of dead elm and masses of ivy) of a 2km right of way. Side shift flail was a good tool for it, floor and sides without changing attachment. Nice to be able to cut the nearest side of the ditches with it as well. Didn't quite have enough reach across to the sides beyond the ditch but the path was far too narrow to get a full size tractor flail arm. Would have taken 2 guys with long reach hedge cutters a month! Very pleased with it. Also managed to get the 7.3s on my gh94 plant trailer. No attachment but fits like a glove and feels pretty well balanced. Attachments in the back of the transit tipper or pickup. Going to try it like that for a while and see how it works out. I much prefer a small plant trailer to the big ifor flatbed.

Yes, thays me in the machine today. I have the side shift flail. So far I really like it, offers so much more usability compared to a standard in line flail. Major downside is it sticks out a lot (particularly a pain when transporting) and seems like it could unbalance you easily as full stretch if you hit a bump or dip.

Sorry, I was definitely flailing horizontally when this was taken!

Joined the mini loader club. 7.3s. Really pleased so far. Thinking about more attachments. Anyone run a relatively heavy weight flail on one? Saw this but not a lot of info on model or performance. http://www.mcconnel.com/news-and-events/_article/100/new-avant-flailhead-helps-mcconnel-advance-into-new-market/

They looks great and very expensive!