agrimog

whoops, that didnt copy across quite as well as I had hopped, sorry about that

here is a copy of the latest info from DOT on agricultural tractors and trailers, it might clear up a few misconceptions.:- This information sh eet provides an overview of the safety requirements for agricultural tractors used on the public road and covers the main points that are likely to arise , but for the definitive requirements, the regulations themselves or a knowled geable trade association such as NFU , AEA or BAGMA should be consulted. Details of how to obtain the regulations are in section 4 below . 1. Overview . An Agricultural tractor i n road vehicle legislation i s a vehicle that is designed for, and used solely for , agricultural purposes . If it is a multi - purpose tractor , used partially for Agricultural purposes, and partially for general haulage, it is no longer an Agricultural tractor and it must meet the stan dards applying to standard road - going haulage vehicl es . Haulage vehicles are subject to „plating‟ and annual testing with VOSA, Operators licence, use of tachographs, and use of white diesel only. Agricultural purposes is defined more precisely by HMRC on their website and is interpreted exactly the same w ay by the D epartment for Transport . The following link gives guidance. HM Revenue & Customs geLabel=pageExcise_ShowContent&id=HMCE_CL_000164&propertyType=document#P312_3128 3 Many Agricultural tractors (when new) are subject to type approval (the governm ent inspection of a vehicle before it is registered). Other categories are exempt. (Consult the manufacturer for details). All tractor s still need to comply with the standards for road use that ap ply to all vehicles in Britain. 2. Maximum weight, length a nd width . The maximum (gross or fully laden) weight of an agricultural tractor is 24,390 kg. The maximum weight of a n agricultural combination (tractor plus trailer) is also 24,390 kg . The maximum length of a n agricultural tractor is 12m. This is unlik ely to be exceeded so it is more useful to list the maximum length of trailer that is allowed. This is normally 12m. In the case of a “ Composite trailer ” ( semi - trailer and converter dolly ) the maximum length is 14.04m. In the case of an Agricultural traile d appliance , in other words towed equipment (with gross weight less than double the unladen weight) the maximum length is 15m. The maximum width of a tractor (or trailer) is 2.55m. Certain essential parts such as lights and mirrors can be ignored when mea surement of width takes place. Under special circumstances Agricultural vehicles wider than 2.55m are permitted to use public roads. The Road Vehicles (Authorisation of Special Types) (General) Order 2003 (known as STGO) permits the road use of Agricultur al vehicles that are up to 4.3 metres in width, subject to terms and conditions. The key ones are as follows: Wid th – between 2.55m and 3m: speed must not exceed 20mph. W idth – between 3m and 3.5m: maximum s peed 20mph as above, plus if the journey is ove r 5 miles or the speed limit in the road is 40mph or lower, (or both), the operator must notify the Police in advance of the journey. W idth - between 3.5 m and 4.3m: the P olice must be notified, the maximum speed is limited to 12 mph and the vehicle(s) must be accompanied by an attendant, who may ride in a different vehicle but must ensure no danger is caused to the vehicle or other Information sheet AGRICULTURAL TRA CTORS : a brief guide road users. The police, following notification, may place restrictions on the use of the vehicle in the interests of road safet y or to avoid undue traffic congestion. For full details on the requirements applicable to agricultural vehicles wider than 2.55m, the legislation can be found at: The Road Vehicles (Authorisation of Special Types) (General) Order 2003 3 . Braking requirements The braking requirements depend on the speed at which the tractor travels , and its age : Agricultural tr actor used at speeds not exceeding 20mph, or which was manufactured before 1986 – braking efficiency of at least 25% is required. In the event of failure of any part, the brakes must still be capable of bring the vehicle to rest in a reasonable distance. A mechanical parking brake is required, which can hold the vehicle stationary on a gradient of at least 16%. Agricultural tractor manufactured since 1986 and used at speeds exceeding 20 mph - braking in line with ECE Regulation 13 or EEC Directive 71/320/E EC. Consult the manufactur er to check whether the tractor complied when it was new. Most tractors do not comply with these requirements so should only be used at speeds up to and not exceeding 20mph. 4. Amber w arning beacon Tractors which are incapable b y design of exceeding 25mph, may be fitted with a flashing or rotating amber warning beacon , which may be used where necessary to warn other traffic. If such a tractor is used on an unrestricted (i.e. 70mph national speed limit) dua l carriageway, other th an crossing it by the quickest manner practicable, an amber beacon must be fitted and must be kept on. Any amber warning beacon fitted, whether voluntarily fitted or required by regulation, must be fitted in compliance with the requirements of Schedule 16 of RVLR. Schedule 16 requires the centre of the lamp to be not less than 1200 mm above the ground, and the light to be visible from at least one beacon (but not necessarily the same beacon) from any point at a reasonable distance from the vehicle (i.e. t hrough a full 360  ). 5. Other lighting . Lights are not required on a tractor which is only used on the road during the hours of daylight , in conditions of good visibility. If this is the case, the driver is required to use hand signals to indicate chang es of direction a nd when he is slowing down. Otherwise, lighting is required as in the table , based on the maximum speed of the tractor and also when it was first used. Maximum Speed Types of lamp required to be fitted Any speed Front position lamp ( side light) Rear position lamp ( tail light ) Rear retro - reflector More than 15 mph As above, and also Dipped - beam headlamp * Direction indicator * Hazard warning flashers (4 way direction indicators) * More than 25 mph All of the above, and also Main - beam hea dlamp * Rear fog lamp * Stop lamp * * - not required on agricultural vehicles first used before 1 April 1986 Direction indicators are not required on agricultural vehicles (e.g. ATVs) with unladen weight less than 255kg. 6. Maintenance of agricultural tractors in a safe condition: Farm vehicle health check scheme The manufacturers of agricultural tractors must build vehicles which comply with the rules when they are new, but it is the owner’s responsibility to ensure that the tractor is properly servi ced and maintained so that it remains in a safe condition . This is legally required under various Health and Safety laws. To help farmers and contractors achieve this, industry partners have prepared guidance in the form of a Code of Practice, setting out a Farm Vehicle Health Check scheme. This is available on BAGMA‟s website and sets out what is required in plain language: http://www.bagma.com/newsroom/bagma - news.html 7 . T he Road Vehicle (C onstruction and Use) Regulations 1986 , and the Road Vehicles Lighting Regulations 1989 . These are the two main sets of regulations governing vehicle construction standards. T he first set of regulations ( Construction and Use: or C &U) are not available on the internet , and both sets have been amended several times , particularly C&U, which mak es it difficult to piece together the latest version of the se regulations. However these regulations are available in a consolidated format in most city reference libra ries, from companies who publish law. One example is 'Sweet and Maxwell' who publish the “The Encyclopaedia of Road Traffic Law and Practice”. This publication is continuall y updated and Volume 4 contains full version s of the above - mentioned regulations in consolidated format. Other p ossible suppliers include InterRegs, who charge around £16 0 for a fully consolidated version of the Construction and Use R egulations. This can be obtained from: SELECTREGS.COM from InterRegs - SI1078 8 . Other matters – driving licence It is important to ensure the correct driving licence entitlement is held. More information is here: http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/Motoring/DriverLicensing/WhatCanYouDriveAndYourObligations Agricultural tractors are class F, if you have this entitlement you can also use your tractor to draw any (legal) Agricultural trailer although there are some restrictions for young drivers. The standard car licence (B) gives entitlement to class F automatically. However it is advisable to undergo some training and practice off the public road, before driving a tractor for the first time on the public road. 9 . Important disclaimer about this Information Sheet The views expressed in this Information Sheet are based on the Department‟s current understanding of what the law means and are not definitive. Only the courts may inter pret legislation definitively. If you are in any doubt about your legal obligations, you should take independent legal advice as this Information Sheet is not a substitute for such independent legal advice.

fortunately, or unfortunatly, for me, they need my skills and kit more than I need them, I wont be jumping through any of there stupid hoops as I have a full work book for the forseeable future and I am already looking at scaling back my workload and starting to do the things I want for a change, one of the joys of getting to be an old grumpy...lol.. It is dissapionting to see the industry going this way, and in my opinion it will destroy it, a few "big" guys making the rules, being controlled by the bean counters with no thoughts to the long term effects that there having

this is going to bite some asses soon, here in the southwest of scotland we have some of the largest stands of softwood in the uk, I was out for a "sunday drive" at the weekend and the forest road I was on took me past an area that they had started to clearfell by harvester....surprise surprise, about half the area had to be done by hand as it was too steep, you could see the tracks where the machinery had been sliding about, and a "line" had been drawn about halfway up a hillside, now from memory of my youth and stories from others most of the forests around the south west were planted by hand back in the late '50's early 60's and no thought was ever given to mechanical extraction, I've seen stands of timber planted up near vertical faces on some of the large plantations, a lot of this timber is going to have to be hand felled and either skylined out or be left,If the owners get to fussy with there call for all this extra certification and paperwork there going to be left with vast tracts of timber that no-one will cut for them and ultimatly be seriously out of pocket, the next couple of years is going to be very interesting in the forestry side of things, in a way I'm glad that I'm getting a bit long in the tooth for some of it these days, but the fact that the numpties who havent served there time in the woods, and are starting to make the rules will gradually kill the industry in this country

as the sawmill is obviously a dedicated "forestry" machine, you should have no problems with an agri registered mog, and a crane only strengthens the case, have you looked fully into the trailer brake situation as some american brake setups are legal in the UK, although as an agricultural setup brakes arent an issue, a swb mog, U1000, U1200, or even a U1500, the "smaller" ones would be ideal for your needs, (your looking around the 10-15 litres an hour, forget mpg..lol) and get used to around 45-50mph. Itll get you and the mill into most places, get you noticed(more work), and make loading the mill easier, plus all the other good bits a mog can do

all the info Ive got :-137-667-611/f297c 12.5 horse

kill wire was not connected, (got to short it to the casing to stop the engine, old school style), motor was running, broke a drive belt, then wouldnt start, usual checks gone through, and only one showing up is no spark when engine is turned over....therfore must be the coil pack, its got compresion, its getting fuel(good fuel), just no sparkjust trying to source best place to get one

the coil has two HT leads coming off it, there is no seperate electrical feeds to it, only the kill wire coming off which runs to ground, the coil is mounted on the side of the flywheel with only a few thou clearance and everything else has been checked, as I said earlier this thing is ancient!!!!

how can there be legislation for some thing that isnt covered by law, only a H&S advisory paper, sorry about that

help, our much abused MTD lawnflite ride on has spat the dummy and to the best of my knowledge its the coil thats packed in (no spark) Does any one know where I can get one, its a 12.5hp horizontal twin briggs and stratton, god only knows the age, but I reckon Adam maybe used it

nothing wrong with welding a bar, used to be how extra long ones were made, before the manufacturers caught on to the untapped market...lol

how can a climbing rope be the wrong rope?, its all made in the same factories with the same materials, supose youll be saying rescue ropes are the wrong kind next

if your expecting the winch to do any hard work, then a hydraulic or PTO driven one is a must, the duty cycle on even the best electric ones is awfull, and the warmer the motor gets, the more current they draw for the same pull, ( I used to fit the Electric ones on fire engines and these were electronicly de-rated to 3 tonnes for this reason), even the cheapy hydraulic ones will run at a constant pull all day, just watch the fluid temps, and your PTO ones, well how good's your gearbox, depending on your base vehicle, there are a multitude of fitting kits and systems out there, just depends on the depth of your pockets, and your level of "engineering" ability as to which way you go (running a mog I'm spoiled, one werner on a TPL mount , and two cheapy ones, one rigged to fit on the hiab, and one for a front or rear mount off the tow hitch points, I wouldnt go back to electric for any serious work ). good luck with what ever way you choose to go

big respect for these guys, going to be hard to replace them, thoughts go out for there families

you can run as many liners up the stack as you can fit, the lazy bas***ds just dont want to do it, once the flue gas has went roughly a metre up the liner,its not that hot anyway

nothing says its got to be accurate, its a survey, make it up as you go, why should you have to waste your time for a bunch of ex uni civil servant bean counters

2 cicuits at the front and 2 at the back is a std setup , the tipper ram will run off one of them, the front linkage will plug into one of the front pairs, you cannot plug anything into the same circuit front and rear at the same time( there are ways of doing this, but its difficult to explain without showing). Iff you get a connection stuck, turn off the engine and operate the spool valve lever in both directions, this will dump any pressure in the circuit and let you disconnect the couplings, DO NOT slacken any hydraulic connections while under pressure as fluid at 2500+ psi can cause serious(fatal) injuries, as stephen says, first make sure all the mogs own "bits" work ok, and if they do start looking at the trailer, I would check the saftey check valves in the spool block first, then start traciing the circuits looking for problems

gray git, the free flow return on the mog is usually sited off to one side of the back and the red collars lock the levers in the neutral (off ) position, they should lock in the operating position if you pull them over( they will "pop" back to the neutral if the bypass valve in the block is operated(usually caused by the circuit in use "deadheading")

first, how many levers in the cab, 1, 2, 3, or 4, does your mog have a three point linkage, does it have a tipper, , you say you have 4 plugs on the back, this says to me you have 2 circuits, there is a feed and return in each, normally the tipper uses 2 of these, but you say youve moved the lever to switch the tipper ram out of the circuit. you should have more than enough flow for your trailer, you say its putting the legs down so it sounds like you have placed the lines in correctly, is there enough oil in the tank, are the rpm's set high enough to get maximum flow( can you borrow a flow gauge and a pressure gauge and check ). its just unfortunate your at the other end of the country or we could soon have had you working

the joys of having a crane!!!

its a skill that takes an age to learn, remember the saw only really cuts on the pull stroke, trying to make it cut on the "push" is why your getting a curved cut, it takes a while to get this into your mindset 'cos its the opposite of a normal saw

have a look on you tube for rojek style chippers, some of the home made ones are perfect for 6 inch logs, I'm in the process of building my own oneto run off the mog pto, big timesaver, and gets rid of all the smaller stuff that you normally have to chip

as silky fox says, theres only two times in a day, light"o"clock and dark"o"clock, was ruled by time watching for too long, now eat when Im hungary, work when its light, and sleep when its dark, anybody who knows me doesnt expect times off me, they get "around 4 or 5 ish" and thats it

as I dont do "domestic" work, the problem doesnt arise, all my work is on commercial timber or forest work, and I only carry tools or produce associated with the job, as I said above, once you study what the "law" actually says, it is very easy to stay within its remarque and plod or vosa cant argue, youve got to be willing to tell them NO, thats not what it says, you are wrong, get a senior officer here NOW!, this usally causes them to back off as they are not willing to be made to look stupid in front of another officer

as long as your unimog has pto's and at least one TPL, its a tractor, and not even VOSA can say otherwise, construction and use act cannot be argued with, and as for use, agriculture, horticulture, and forestry, are your three options, arbculture, contrary to what some might like to think, isnt one, so a chipper on it and doing some gardens doesnt count, however towing a sawmill to a wood to process some trees you have felled, is classed as forestry, and as such falls under the remit of the ag excemptions, Ive found that carrying a copy of what construction and use actually says, and the HMRC guidlines on red useage, and presenting these to any over zealous plod, or vosa idiot stops them in there tracks, they must follow the law as it is written, not make up there own interpretation of it, there isnt really any "grey" areas as you speak of, its all written down in black and white, youve just got to know where to look, and stick by it