Matthew Storrs

Belarus are supposedly the largest tractor manufacturer in the world.... Do Fiat even make tractors anymore? good tractors

Yet to try a zetor which had good ones-if any, and iv tried a fair few now.

Got to be the operator I reckon where machinery is concerned- its only dangerous in the wrong hands. I should add with modern machinery- some old school machines were hideously dangerous no matter who was using it!

Haha would you want to go any faster with those brakes:001_tongue:

Bit of a grey area really as they don't need an mot/test. Who,s to blame for an un road worthy agg vehicle? the farmer ? he,s not a mechanic/mot tester. Sure, but MOT is meaningless anyway really- its valid for about the day of the test, if your brakes fail 8 months down the line you can hardly turn around and say "it passed its MOT though" accidents happen- but bady secured loads- speeding- lack of lights etc all come down to operator error and should be fined/banned IMO

But aren't the subsidies helping prices in the supermarket? how is it possible to produce 4pints of milk for not much more than a £1 otherwise. Not that this has anything to do with unroadworthy vehicles- they should be heavily fined/ banned farmer or not.

I'l second that, we had a demo for the GM130 ARB the other day, we were very, very impressed with it and it pulled in armfuls of oak branches like you wouldn't believe, its amazing what they,ve managed to do considering its a fairly small engine powering it- shows you how good the design is, those vertical rollers just make sense. Ive never tried the timberwolf 125 but this GM 130 pulled brash in better than the timberwolf 150 I had. No stress kicked in a bit more - but that's to be expected with the smaller engine and it kept up with 2 of us feeding it ok.

certainly a massive project, its starting to look like spaghetti junction round penn inn now!

Iv used a 3 ton jcb803- awful awful awful digger, totally gutless, slow and at times nearly stalled itself during heavy digging- id sooner have been in a 1.6t takeuchi any day.

Many many threads on Arbtalk now on this subject- may be worth searching out a few threads as there is some good info out there. As Eddie says, an idea of budget and what size chipper your planning on feeding and what you have to transport the machine will help.

Few more, the last 2 were my old digger tb016 doing some riverbank revetment works last year using materials (Alder) cut from the bank- drove in some uprights and tucked some trunks behind and then backfield behind using weave willow and tons of silt which we dug out from deposits the river had left after years of flooding.

2nd picture, the backround trees were the river bank trees we felled, opened the river right up and hopefully should be more inviting for salmon spawning now.

Nice job we've been on recently About 800 meters of river bank scrub/trees to clear leaving any large specimens, big Oaks etc, digger was ideal really as we could fell any leaning trees straight into the river and just pull them up over the bank into the field. Tak lifted some fair chunks of timber.

That'd do nicely:thumbup1:

Never been, but Australia sounds like a good candidate for this title, beaches, weather, loads of space, intriguing flora and fauna, not too many people and they still drive on the right side of the road and appreciate a good cup of tea.

Whats the maximum size digger you can get on a 7.5tonner legally- am I right in thinking much bigger than 3 ton( with buckets etc) and you'll be over your payload?

If your looking to lift big lumps of wood, id avoid zero swing, friend does a lot of stonewalling (big lumps of granite on Dartmoor) he reckons his zero swing 5 tonner (hitachi) isn't much better than his 3 tonne standard swing Kubota, zeros just don,t have the weight out far enough behind them.

keep tipping them into a big pile at the yard- push them up with a tractor until I have no space left then set fire to it on a nice dry day.

To be fair, I wouldn't turn my nose up at any of the mainstream mini diggers if they turn up at the right price- base it on the general wear and tear and condition of the machine rather than concentrating on which brand seems to get the best reputation. There is no doubt that takeuchi and Kubota will hold their value the best. The main reason I like Taks is that all the body panels are metal, doing tight woodland/scrub work in a small digger invariably the panels get knocked around a bit so metal ones don,t crack- but they do rust... Also find the hydraulics to be very smooth too operate- and of the 2 Taks iv had they have cost me bugger all in repairs, very tough it would seem. look at the tracks/sprockets, wear in slew ring and bushes, these will all be good indicators of how well the machine has been looked after. Engines don,t tend to be stressed too much in a mini digger so normal checks aside I wouldn,t be too worried about that, if the rest of the machine has been looked after chances are engine will have been too. I'd like to try a Hanix or Whacker Neuson- both these machines seem to be getting a good reputation, I was looking at a 2t Neuson the other day, seemed well built and they seemed to have a good counterweight design and good rear overhang, which is good really unless your working in very tight situations.

Big Takeuchi fan myself, im on my second now. Bad bits about them are poor paintwork, possibly have a bit of a reputation for wearing quickly on the bushes, I personally put this reputation down to them being a very common hire machine and generally getting abused/lack of grease, I have always over greased mine and never find wear to be a problem at all. both tb016 and 125 are cracking machines, but im disappointed that the new 228 (replacement for the tb125) is now too heavy to tow legally so when it comes to replacement I think the kubotas kx61-3 &kx71-3 will be an option.

Cos after 6 months iv done about 5k miles so reckon its about time for a change for a 300tdi doing a lot of heavy towing? 1 million miles- wow that must be a record for a small engine.

Can,t see any issue with a 1.5 tonner. you could put one on a tipping trailer with a load of attachments and still be well under 3500kg. 2 ton diggers plus start to get a bit more awkward depending on towing vehicle.

personally I would say rotator grab is a waste of time on a 1.5 digger- particularly just for arb work. just get a fixed 3/2 tine grab, and with a bit of practise you'll get any log where you want it. I stack up tons of timber with mine. much cheaper than a rotating grab and more versatile too, you can grub out roots and find all sorts of uses for it- not to mention avoiding possible complications regarding hydraulic plumbing for the rotating bit. with regards towing, I tow a 2.8 ton digger round on an ifor flatbed with 500kg of attachments in the pickup bed of a defender 110. im not going to lie and say it does it with ease, but its been coping fine for a year now and it is all legal too.

Tempting stuff if its that good- but it'd cost £150 per oil change every six months? compared to the standard havoline stuff I use which costs about £40 per change. If it really is that good I guess the extra £100 would work out in favour.

iv climbed a few tree forestry plantation trees 100ft plus spruces and firs, just for the buzz, I tend to wonder into the plantation away from footpaths and away from any bother, yet to have any bother but that's probably because I haven't been caught yet!