Conor Wright

As mick said, hard to go wrong with a 560.  stihl 261 if you're thinking of changing brand.

For occasional use the makita/dolmar offerings are well regarded but not sure about availability anymore. Echo make good saws, 501 would be comparable to 550. anti vibe isn't as good as stihl or husqvarna but I've found my few to be reliable saws. A step down from the big two but not bad machines.

If you want to cheap out and take a chance on chinesium the holzforma brand copy some of the older saws, mate of mine has the stihl 660 copy and it's a good grunty saw for occasional use, maybe they do a 254 copy?

Sounds like you're limited to a stroke head then, theres a few offerings with no computer. You will struggle to get a hire machine with the oil flow and auxiliary hydraulics, make sure you know the base machine's abilities before you buy a head. 

Maybe a hypro processor for the back of a tractor would work? You still have to fell, but it delimbs and cuts to length. Expensive though.

4 hours ago, coppice cutter said:

Well I do always say that there's a big difference between asking and getting so I can easily accept that as being the case.

 

It does make buying harder though as you need to find a seller that's either desperate or realistic.

 

 

Has the subject changed from tractors to marriage?!

4 minutes ago, Zaman said:

I know it may sound strange but are alpacas agricultural animal? 

Can't speak for the UK but in Ireland, yes.

50c to €1 per meter with a tractor mounted circular saw and two lads on rolling stop go and one more with a polesaw and hook. Around here anyway.

Cut the line and its on you.  

Tight margins but it can be profitable.

Get alpacas instead, less hassle than sheep, waay less hassle than goats (never again),the fleece has a value, they can be halter trained and offspring have a higher value. They will need some similar maintenance to sheep but not as intensive. 

They can be kept back with 3 or even 2 strands of electric fence. Plus they look cool and are good guardian animals for poultry as they fend off foxes and some dogs. Bigger dogs or packs of dogs may well just see them as big sheep with more neck to bite.

Just now, monkeybusiness said:

Nope. Money isn’t an issue here. 
I’ve been taking trees down for 20 plus years and have never removed yew of this size and quality before.
The comical ‘price per tonne’ figures bandied about are irrelevant. 

Knock em, bring them home and mill them/cut turning blanks, stack n strap them and forget it for a year or two. It'll be worth well over 1k per cubic meter.

Unplaned yew here is about €2k per cube. Even if you sell half you're on a winner. 

Talking firewood prices, small, crappy, forked and chalara infected ash I helped knock late last year sold at €110 per ton roadside. 

Dirty oversize stuff is getting 50-60 quid alright because a lot of processors can't take it so there's less competition for it as a result.

Personally if I got decent yew there's no way I'd take "common wood" tonnage prices for it. 

If it was viable for you to debark them I'd consider importing a load. There's always someone asking for yew and I never have any.

5 minutes ago, trigger_andy said:

Thanks for that! I’ll pass the borax solution suggestion over to the log owner. 
 

It certainly looks close to mush/rotting but surprisingly still bloody hard. The white was a good give away it was damn close but could not get a fingernail into it. 

If you're going to do ot for yourself, make sure when you're mixing the solution that the water is about 70°c to fully dissolve the borax, otherwise the little crystals left behind will eat planer blades later on. Speaking from experience.

More important to have it level across its width so you have 90° angles on your cuts. A small forward slope, as long as its across the same plane should be OK. Better to have it level though. Makes everything easier, like levelling the band when setting up. 

First time I set up the woodmizer it was on an uneven floor and it was a bastard. Any bit of movement caused by loading it threw it off and gave wonky boards as a result. Second time around I spent a day getting it level and bolted it down. 

It's been moved again since and I'm not looking forward to setting it all up again.

I still got wonky boards but that's more to do with band set or knots, dirt, wire etc.

It's addictive though. You'll enjoy the results, even if the process can be tricky at times.

5 hours ago, Mark Bolam said:

Oh no, imagine having to take a tree down in sections. Nightmare.

 

I think I’ve got the same picture in my head as everyone else of the ‘Tree Surgeon’ passing sections down to his ‘assistants’.

3 men with distinctive accents, a polesaw and two stolen ladders strapped together with lidl bungie ties?

If you do cut it down, don't forget to plant three more poplars in its place.

The next generation will need work too.

Around a grand, maybe 1100 considering it does look clean and has a couple of bars and chains coming with it. 

You'll probably do better selling in Europe than the UK the way things are at the moment. 

36 minutes ago, doobin said:

Concrete and leading out to a concrete ramp. No way through at that height without taking the roof off.

At 1.6 wide the outriggers might be less than 1.9 high. My hinowa 1470 has been through a similar sized gap and that's how we got it in. You can undo the pads too, takes a few cm off overall height.

Go 550 or 261. He'll learn to respect the saw a lot more than if you get a pos entry level saw, He'll also be able to keep up with what he is being taught. Good luck chasing that hinge with a ms170, theyre just not up to it.

On the other hand, you could go for the ultimate entry level saw, the silky, in which case he may never speak to you again.

11 hours ago, WirralBoy said:

 

Obviously it's for deadwood only

I tried this. It was a disaster, did damage to the bags, squeezed logs out, deformed the bags making it harder to stack them etc. Literally gave up after half a dozen bags. Now I just put them on pallets, helps airflow too.

Maybe if you had solid sides on the grab instead of fingers it would work better. It wasn't my grab (friendly farmer nextdoor) so couldn't get the welder out. 

Is there a UK version of the fallen families fund or other similar organisations which may be able to help?

https://www.screwfix.ie/p/oregon-yukon-safety-chainsaw-boots-black-size-5/183jh

Cant help regarding the breatheflex but my better half recently got herself a battery chainsaw for the garden and got oregon boots (size5) and oregon saw pants along with it. The pants are OK, don't think they'd hold up to daily use but the boots were better quality than I expected and she says they're comfortable.

Can ask her for a link to them and post it here if it's of any use to you.

That's rough. Hope you heal well. Stark reminder to us all how easily it can happen.

Just now, Ratman said:

😂😂😂 my thoughts too! Minus his bike though! 

I can imagine where someone shoved it.

Here you go

Just reread your post, if you're planning on getting ready made trusses into position id assume you're going to need the outriggers down due to the amount of boom extension required.

It'll lift and drive to a point but you won't be able use the slew function or extend the boom upwards or outwards to its full capacity. There should be a load range sticker in the cab with the weight capacities and extension ranges in mobile and crane function. Check that and find out the weight of your materials. That'll answer your question.