doobin

Try fleet and commercial. They are my brokers and seem pretty good.

1.3tdci Corsa or Astra or combo. 57 genuine mpg. Available for around 2.5k ex meter reading with 70,000 ish. Change the oil every year, no problems touch wood.

I make that £192 a day.

Looks like an E26. I have an E27, finance is around £450/month over 5 years. 1.7t machines are cheaper, and can still do an awful lot especially if you’re scratching about landscaping. I’d start there. Mine is £250/ month over 5 years. The E10 is a great machine and I love mine, but unless you are always needing narrow access it’s too small to be effective when you are on a priced job. As regards finance- go new. I was refused finance on 12k of second hand 2.5t machine, then approved for 31k of new E27 and attachments. ?‍♂️ I go five years warranty, five years finance. Like long term hire only you get the residual value too.

I used to get up at 4am every day and deliver papers to cover the rent before working on my business, so I know where you’re coming from. Used to work till 11 at night on commercial strimming work some nights too. Insurance is also always a killer when you’re young. Keep on keeping on, and increased age and profit will make it seem insignificant in the future. I now have five vehicles, all oldish but always the perfect one for whatever job we’re doing. If you end up with three vehicles somehow (maybe truck, van and missus car?) then that’s the minimum for a mini fleet policy, which can save you money sometimes. Subbies who want £200 a day take note- some of us have damn well paid our fucking dues, and we’re not being tight when we say we’re not paying you that!

If you’re thinking about getting a digger, the most profit (for normal work, especially landscaping, but also small scale clearance jobs) is in a mini digger. I have three from 1.2t to 2.7t and I can move them with a normal 3.5t trailer, no haulage required. Some great finance deals around at the moment. Head on on over to the plant talk forum if you’re interested- planttalk.co.uk

Glad to hear it mate. You might not believe it but I was once your age and hot headed just the same. I’m 30 now, much more chilled and make much more money. Some pointers based upon what you’ve said in recent threads. You complain about customers not taking you seriously. It’s a real issue. You can’t change your age, but you can adopt mannerisms, clothing style and the like- effectively a slightly different persona when you go to quote a job. Also, it might not be popular with some, but I had no hesitation lying about my age to appear older. You’ll soon work out who is trying it on because of your age- drop them, they won’t improve. A certain type of ‘customer’ is always looking for a mark for a cheap job. The flip side of this is that you will need to deliver the results to back this up. It seems like you want to take a pride in your work, but funds don’t always allow. Charge more. Pretend you’ve been in business longer. Get yourself a Spons landscape price book (£130 for the ebook) and see what the actual going rate is. PM me if you want a couple of rates from the book, but it’s a great investment. Then, deliver over and above what the customer wanted and they will recommend you. You sound like you’re pushed for time- this is great, but is also usually an indication that you could be charging more. Don’t run stupidly overloaded, and as mentioned, never do it as a ‘favour’ for a customer. They extend the job- they pay extra. It’s all in how you frame it to them. You could have said ‘tell you what guys, I’m flat out at the moment, but I’ll rearrange my diary and get the extras done for you because there’s no sense coming back to do it. The depot have problems with the lorry at the moment, but I can get the blocks on my truck and trailer in two loads. It’ll only cost you £200 for me to go and collect them, so cheaper than having them delivered by lorry anyway.” You’d still have been a hero to them. Above all, be safe. It makes my blood run cold to think of some of the stupid shit I’ve done because I was desperate for £50- luckily I’m still here to tell the tale. Invest in your kit and skills-I’ve not had a proper holiday in years, but I’ve got three new diggers and all the tools you could imagine. Work is easy for me now, we never break a sweat. I can make £3-400 profit after paying a labourer most days, with anything from a ride on to a welder.

That one is always doing the rounds. Total scam.

Fuck off, you’d put a 21 tonner on it! ??

Meh, I've had plenty of 'trained' lads who hit the ground with the second cut. Ones trained for places like the National Trust seem to be the most hapless.

Can\t see why not if specced properly. That 2.7 tonner posted would usually use DN08 couplings, good for around 50l/m. The smallest MultiX I can find (and the one fitted in the photo by the looks of it) uses DN10, so oversize for that application.

Every third post you make here is about how 'some geezer offered you a job, but it wasn't enough money'. You go on and on about how you won't work for less than £200 a day and then when you get offered that servicing pumping stations, you work out that the boss man would be making (shock horror) profit upon your work. So you post on here about how he's taking the piss. Why don't you go and get your own service contracts then? Maybe your own insurance, advertising, staff and machines? See how the real businessmen on here do it. If you really were Billy Big Bollocks, drain engineer supreme, who's highly skilled and won't work for less than '2 a day mate, take it or leave it', then you wouldn't even be enquiring about a job posted that's clearly for a general labourer. Instead, you enquire and then puff your chest out on this very thread about how the 'money was poor'.

Best to go heavy on the grease. It tends to emulsify and collect above and below the gears, but not on them. I usually give them a good half dozen pumps every month, it'll only work its way out past the plastic seals, you can't do any damage. On the long reach machines the grease port that does the angle adjustment doesn't need that much.

Yes, we just stick the grease gun nozzle in and pump away.

With your attitude and track record mate, I don’t reckon anyone would employ you anyway.

You need a hedge trimmer ticket these days??

If the grab claws will close around it, it’ll often lift or pull straight up/back with the power of the E27. I’ve been pleasantly surprised. Takes a bit of getting used to to not use the crowd ram so much- just a different way of working. They spec a 5ton rotator for an application like this with axial load

Couple from today. Bunching up and pulling out brambles from behind a fence and then removing selected hazel stools on a nature reserve. Loads of lifting power even with the rotator- I didn't take it off in the end as it wasn't struggling and it's so hand to be able to rotate when windrowing waste for rehandling. Turns out the fuel guage reads high when working uphill- so I ended up walking back to the truck...?‍♂️

Is that on a front quick hitch? Easy enough to put a grab on the front ??

Loncin engines are fantastic. I have half a dozen in various guises. Would take loncin over Briggs any day, probably Kohler too going on past experience with them. The Jansen type will handle most stuff that you can fit into the hopper, but you have to be prepared to help feed it sometimes and also hold it back from choking on certain stuff!

Can’t speak for Gray, but I have an almost identical setup. I find that with the rotator on, the opportunities are much reduced to do most of the things that could cause bent tines and the like such as grubbing out stumps. This is down to the geometry- way less breakout force. I plan to direct mount mine sans rotator in the near future, so watch this space.

At a guess, just a wild stab in the dark, I'd say it involves groundying on jobs, with some climbing on easier jobs. And maybe a bit of fencing. Plus, probably not using text speak.

I keep finding myself buying more machinery and focusing on skills and machinery rather than staff. I can't be the only one.

Actually, I might know where there's a JCB 1.4t for sale. Got a cab, but it's sticks, not servos, so is a dog to drive IMHO. Year around 2000 if memory serves. Should be cheap however.

I’ve been on my micro today with the tracks pulled in most of the time. So tight. As we’ve discussed previously, there’s no perfect digger, which is why I’ve ended up with three! There is a similar amount of engineering that goes into a top end micro like an E10, so I’m not surprised the price is close.