Big J

I'm on a manual. Jon - my first two or three tanks were pretty poor. I remember the first one being only about 27mpg. That said, I'd just stepped out of my old Audi 100 Quattro in the Navara, so it took a while to beat the Quattro driver into submission! I think the biggest thing is that I very rarely brake. If coming to a roundabout, I come off the accelerator a long way before needing to come to a stop. Similarly for sliproads, junctions etc. Keeping on the gas and then braking late makes next to no difference to journey time but huge difference to mpg. Similarly for corners - I usually try to maintain a reasonable amount of speed going through rather than braking and then having to accelerate again. If I just stuck to 56mph behind a lorry, I would get 40mpg. I would also get a clip around the ear from my very bored wife!

Went to Ipswich and back the other weekend and did mega-eco mode driving for the first tank and got 37.7mpg (39mpg showing on computer) and 620 miles to the tank. Not going much faster than the lorries at that though. Goes to show that fuel economy isn't so much down to the vehicle but the way that that vehicle is driven. Jonathan

I didn't say that it was overly good, but I don't think it's bad either. Through my little MS260, that equates to about 2.5 litres of fuel and 1 litre of chain oil, which is about £6.00. Insurance is provided too.

I don't mind doing a bit of marking to help folk get into the rhythm (I don't even charge for it! ) but I'm always suspicious of marked stands as I constantly change my mind about what I'm going to fell anyway! I had a chat with my colleague about this and could I please ask all those who have replied or messaged me to send me a brief CV with a bit of detail regarding the forestry work. It need only be a few lines, but it just makes our life a bit easier! Regarding the Alstor, it's a very impressive little machine. I would say that the largest product in the stand is around the 550-600kg mark but the majority are in the 50-150kg region (working to 15 3.5m products to the tonne). In that kind of stand, a good operator should manage 4 tonnes an hour. What lets the Alstor down is a long extraction route due to it's relatively small load capacity (2.5 tonne ish). It's nevertheless the best machine for this job. Brushcutter, I think an MB trac would be too large for this stand - we are working on 2-4 metre spacing (or thereabouts) and some areas are quite tight. Jonathan

Dave - apologies if I was implying you were inexperienced in any way! We've not had any shortage of folk with a whole lot more experience than myself, for instance. It's just getting guys with self select experience that I'm happy to leave more or less unsupervised whilst I do my own cutting! Thanks for the references by the way. Had lots of interest in this so far, so for the time being I'll need to sort through everyone's details and make a few decisions.

The forestry management company managing the estate are pretty keen to have quite experienced folk on the ground as it's all self select thinning we do. It's one of those daft situations where we need experienced cutters, but how the hell are you meant to get experience without someone taking you on!?

Yep, though much of it is too big to be realistically expected to stack. You are talking about 40 odd trees a day (in this stand). What kind of forestry experience do you have Dave?

Hi Stu - rates at £11.50 a tonne. You can pretty comfortably average 10 tonne a day, with 8 tonne in the tougher branchy beech, and 12-13 tonne in the sycamore. I did put that fuel is provided, but I was mistaken as it's not! Hi Brushcutter - I saw that you are heading over there for forwarder training in another thread - it's certainly exciting stuff! We are looking into options for sorting our own extraction, but have reasonable access to an Alstor at present. Anything much bigger would be unsuitable for the stands. Jonathan

Regrettably, I didn't take any pictures of the Oak or Beech!

My kiln has just reopened, and there are various timbers available for sale. Delivery is really quite cheap - either by pallet for larger quantities (around £63 per pallet) or individually at about £11 a board. Anyway, there is a large amount of cherry that was supposed to be presold, but due to unforeseen circumstances, it's available again. It's lovely, clean stuff, with the occasional heart shake, but otherwise just about as good as any cherry you will ever find. 10-17 inch width of board, 9ft long and 1.5 and 2 inch thickness. Price is £34 a cubic foot, with 40 cubic foot available. If anyone wants the lot, the delivery will be chucked in for free. Beech - clean and pleasant stuff. Not enormous amounts, but around 25 cubic foot if memory serves. 1.5 and 2 inches (2 inch needs another week in kiln). 9ft lengths, 12-18 inch width. £28 a cubic foot. Again, should anyone with to take the lot, I'll pay the delviery. Ash - around 60 cubic foot of very clear ash. Much of it has a split up the heart, but excellent figure and no other checking. 1.5 and 2 inch thickness (2 inch needs another week in kiln) 12-22 inch board width and 9ft length. As before, free delivery if buying the lot. £26 a cubic foot. Oak - just 1 inch boards available at the moment. Medium grade stuff, with heart split, but good clean boards either side. Quite light in colour. 12-18 inch board width, 9ft long. Around 15 cubic foot available at £31 a cubic foot. Other Oak will follow, but it's not ready yet. Please feel free to contact me via message or on 07832 106156 if any of it interests you. Jonathan

If you have a lot of timber, hire in a mill and operator to clear it. Make sure to bring in someone reputable as there are some very good and very poor bandmillers around! If you have the timber at your yard, I would always bring in a woodmizer type saw if it's smaller. If it's over 36 inches, a woodmizer won't easily handle it, so chainsaw mill it. Bear in mind though that you lose around 8mm on every cut with a chainsaw compared to a bandsaw, which adds up hugely. However, if you have knotty or spiral grained timber, crack out the chainsaw, as a bandsaw band will struggle to cut straight through it. Jonathan

We are looking for a self employed cutter for ongoing hardwood thinnings with the estate that we do the bulk of our forestry work on. There will be in the region of 2-4 days work a week ongoing for the indefinite future. Presently we are in a nice stand of 40 year old beech and sycamore. Each tree is typically about a quarter to a third of a tonne, at about 60ft height. Rates are on tonnage, and experience of commercial forestry is an absolute must. Own kit is required but insurance and fuel is supplied. Drop me a message if you are interested! Jonathan

Didn't get on with skip link at all (through hardwoods). Slow and a very poor quality finish.

Haha! She wouldn't though, that's the problem - too bloody nice!

Nor me. Been tossing and turning for the past half hour and decided it's unfair on my wife, so now up and attempting to knock myself out with some Sloe gin!

I'm a huge fan of outdoor swimming! Go whenever I can - the highlands are a dream for it. Went most recently a few weeks ago in the Tweed near Peebles one hot Friday afternoon. Wonderful long deep pool urn Neidpath Castle and the water was 19 degrees.

Great photos there Yvonne - really wish that we had been able to make it down! Jonathan

In bloody good condition given it's age! I was at the Highland show this evening, and saw a whole load of very old saws, including a 60kg Villiers two man chainsaw!

Whoops! I might have been a touch further than 12 miles/50km away! If you do have a tacho, what are the implications of it? What needs to be submitted and what are the costs? Apologies again for the derail, but I'm a bit concerned that should I be making longer timber deliveries that I'm not going to be legal. It's a massive PITA really, as I've already had to put myself through the B+E test at a cost as well.

Slight derail, but curious what the circumstances would be for me to need a tachograph for trailer towing? For instance, would towing 2.6 tonnes of trailer and timber with a total train weight of in excess of 5t require it?

I think that you might struggle with it a little bit Steve. My experience with saws up to this point is that you don't need that many more cc's for a saw to feel like a completely different animal. My 088 is a good milling saw, and happy in anything up to about 32 inches. More than that and it gets to be a be a little slow. Also, I mentioned to Mark about you maybe being interested in his M7 - he said he has one piece of Walnut he wants to run through it and then it's available if you want it (though I don't know how much he wants for it). Jonathan

A tragic accident indeed - condolences to the family. I would argue that it was just a freak accident, and compensation probably shouldn't be paid out. However, chatting to a National Trust for Scotland chap the other day, he said they have no active tree management (ie woodland management) programme. He said that amongst other reasons, the trustees don't like to cut trees down. Perhaps these large charities need to take a more proactive approach. Even on the estate where we live, they are pretty rigorous when it comes to assessing and managing problem trees in areas with heavier public activity. Jonathan

It's a wonder he's made it to the age he has!

Oh loads and loads. It costs me about £10-20 per kiln fill, which is the best part of 300 cubic foot. You can have all the airflow you like, but certain timbers will always have a certain degree of mould. Anti fungal treatments are superb in eliminating this, and massively improve presentation to customers. Jonathan

Wykabor Powder / Wykabor Range / Timber Treatments / Services / Wykamol Group / Specialist products for the building and preservation industries. Superb stuff - no issues will mould growth at all with this. Cannot recommend it enough.