Farqhar

The vitli krpan winches are very good and I don't understand why they're so cheap - I have a mate who has one of the 3 ton winches with 70m cable (think he got his from Alan Marshall - Agric). I know he shopped around for a year getting prices and comparing build qual etc etc, and he reckons for the money they can't be beaten. My brother-in-law helped him on a job and he was impressed with what the winch could do with just a 25hp tractor running at just 1500rpm, and a 55m pull for the winch over woodland floor bringing out mixed hardwoods at around 4.8m twisty cr*p for firewood.

Selling firewood as logs to customers is a pain when u r asked about cube-v-weight. But I find it an even bigger problem when thinning/singling and general clear out in compartments, getting a fair price from commercial firewood merchants. From my point of view cube is fairer - but they don't want to know they seem to 'guesstimate' weight and that's that - take it or leave it. IS there a rule of thumb to equate cube to weight when it's all 8 to 16 ft lengths with some twisty stuff in it ? E G - is a rough rule of thumb 1.5 or 1.8 cubic metres a fair equation for 1 tonne? It's mixed birch, sycamore, oak, ash, chestnut, with odd holly & rowan log, 4" - 12" approx dia sizes.

Thanks All I guess I will have to get it stacked and work out approx volume, take an average weight of the several species I'm stacking and equate volume to weight - approx. Client and I can argue about it a bit so I'd better go on the high side! Cheers - Farq'

I've taken on a job where the client now wants me to give him a seperate invoice for "firewood", that is to say, in the process of clearing the area anything not suited as saleable timber, should be moved/stacked for firewood, which he will sell by the truck-load. It'll be a mix of birch/oak/ sycamore/ash/anything! . . . it has to be cut to 8 and 16ft lengths. Trouble is, most of it is twisted/bent and otherwise rubbish! What's the best method of "guesstimating" a ton for this stuff, as if I'm to invoice it by the ton I need to be sure not to leave myself open to criticism. Any help will be appreciated.

NFU are toooo costly for any insurance I have asked them about. I went with the CLA Insurers RKHarrison who insured me thru Allianz.