Andy from Global brought over an M500 chipper yesterday as we had 9, 15ft leylandii to drop, all grown up together, some more stick than brash.
The M500 was driven up next to the tipper and the brash lobbed into the new, bright yellow machine. I specifically wanted to see if it could "out do" my CS100. The M500 is much bigger in stature and weight compared to the CS. The CS usually being strapped to the back of the trailer to stop it from "wheelying", the M500 didn't need this as it comes with its own handbrake to keep it on the spot. The brash wasn't quite as well snedded up in the way that I usually organise for the CS, again done on purpose to see how the M500 grabbed, pulled it in and chipped.
The machine was started, handfuls of brash rammed into it. The wider opening is a plus, the extra horses from the engine is noticeable and make processing quicker than the CS, especially if you prepped in the same way as Ive prepped brash in the past. Chunks of chip being more variable with some very large pieces by comparison to the CS.
I note here that my mate whos a lot more experienced than me said at this point a TW150 would struggle with some of these gnarly bent stubs we are attempting to shove in and would need further prepping as youd be driven mad by the narrow gob with the feed rollers struggling, especially with conifer.
With the CS the brash has a certain way of being fed through easiest, with the M500 it ate much bigger pieces on average than the CS without the need of you to act as stress control by holding onto the back end of brash to ensure no blocking or too much engine bogging.
The M500 is longer than the CS so maybe harder to lump round really tight corners however you can free wheel the M500.
I didn't use it all day to find out about fuel consumption and the video we shot we found some of the brash had lowered the working speed inadvertently (we knocked it with a piece of brash when it was warming up)as the controls are on the top near the infeed not completely out the way as CS on the engine.
Overall I think its a great machine, being worth the money for the application I have as this will give me a greater processing speed overall with the set up I have. Its no 9-11" but it does seem to be the biggest micro chipper in its class:biggrin: