Franklin Treefarmer
- Thread starter Thor's Hammer
- Start date
- Replies 94
- Views 18K
Thor's Hammer
Wolfish. Sometimes Bites.
- Thread Starter Thread Starter
- #27
It's mostly short haul Cory. On the job Pete pictured, I think it's no more than a couple of hundred meters haul. I know it will be thirsty, but it should be productive too. A lot of the big tractors the Europeans are running on timber these days are 240hp+.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gNyoQ3nN3I
<iframe width="640" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/_gNyoQ3nN3I" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gNyoQ3nN3I
<iframe width="640" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/_gNyoQ3nN3I" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
HolmenTree
Banned
Production on long skids or uneven terrain a cable skidder will out produce a grapple skidder.
I ran Clark 664 cable skidders with the little 353 and pulled 7 cubic meter loads to the landing.
that's about 30,000 kg
I ran Clark 664 cable skidders with the little 353 and pulled 7 cubic meter loads to the landing.
that's about 30,000 kg
Peter
Treehouser
What can you do with a cable skidder that you can't do with a winch on a grapple skidder?
These sites are mostly short runs and flat, albeit often wet and boggy. A winch is essential to get the butts to firm ground.
These sites are mostly short runs and flat, albeit often wet and boggy. A winch is essential to get the butts to firm ground.
HolmenTree
Banned
A cable skidder has a heavy duty 4 roller fairlead, not those little narrow single pulleys most of the grapples run.
You'd be breaking mainline cables steady with that pulley...... never mind all the derailing
Bigger loads with cable skidders too, also when you loose traction drop the load, move ahead, winch back up and your on your way again.
Grapple you drop your load and its pickup sticks.
Thor's Hammer
Wolfish. Sometimes Bites.
- Thread Starter Thread Starter
- #31
Trust me Willard, I've got a lot of experience at cable skidding and yarding, and the European style winch setups are WAY better than the American style. I'll probably run a double winch with Butterflies and auto cable reels through the grapple frame.
7 cubic meters is not 30 tonnes either. That single log Peter pictured will be over 10 CBM.
I really would prefer a Camox style winch setup to a grapple, but its an order of magnitude cheaper for me to buy a grapple machine in the US and import it.
7 cubic meters is not 30 tonnes either. That single log Peter pictured will be over 10 CBM.
I really would prefer a Camox style winch setup to a grapple, but its an order of magnitude cheaper for me to buy a grapple machine in the US and import it.
Thor's Hammer
Wolfish. Sometimes Bites.
- Thread Starter Thread Starter
- #32
Looks a fair machine Ed. Be good to see a video of that pulling some good sized sticks out. A contractor had a TJ grapple by me years ago pulling out some Beech and the damn thing filled the tracks in the woodlands by us with the small sized woodland tracks although very little in front of it would cause much issue! Those camox always look a good machine from YouTube video.
Thor's Hammer
Wolfish. Sometimes Bites.
- Thread Starter Thread Starter
- #34
Camox used to be the French dealer for Timberjack, and built the winches and butt plate setups for loads of other imported skidders. When Timberjack were bought out and consolidated by John Deere, Camox started building their own Skidder.
HolmenTree
Banned
I have a hard time doing metric conversion Ed. I was basing it on a 3 cord load of green black spruce limbed and topped tree length at approximate 5000 lbs per cord. 15,000 lb average load through the day which is pretty darn good for a little 20,000 skidder with a 100 foot 5/8" mainline and 15 to 20 - 7 foot 3/8 chokers......good 8 hour day in 50 - 55 foot softwood topped at 3 1/2" would yield better then 60 cord. Best scale I had in that was 305 cords in a 40 hour scale with a 2 man crew [chainsaw faller and skidder operator in 1986]Trust me Willard, I've got a lot of experience at cable skidding and yarding, and the European style winch setups are WAY better than the American style. I'll probably run a double winch with Butterflies and auto cable reels through the grapple frame.
7 cubic meters is not 30 tonnes either. That single log Peter pictured will be over 10 CBM.
I really would prefer a Camox style winch setup to a grapple, but its an order of magnitude cheaper for me to buy a grapple machine in the US and import it.
Now if I got my calculations right one cord is equal to 2.4 cubic meters.
I think you may not be converting your cubic meter scale to tree length like we do. Also those machines with only 2 chokers and the lexon closed in cabs wouldn't fit our softwood piecework production [we spent as much time out of them as in them].....they'd be great to skid out a couple of big whole hardwoods at a time
Thor's Hammer
Wolfish. Sometimes Bites.
- Thread Starter Thread Starter
- #36
Skidding large hardwoods is all they're designed for. Anybody trying to skid out softwood stems would be commiting financial suicide considering what a Harvester / Forwarder combination can produce in a shift.
HolmenTree
Banned
It must be 2 in the morning there Ed
Yes that's why the smaller cable skidders worked for us up until about 1993 when the bunchers and processors took over and today their stuck cutting smaller wood and have to work around the clock to match what we did in 8 hrs with a power saw and cable skidder.
Tucker943
Bamboo Plantation Owner
About getting stuck with a cable skidder and moving ahead, you can use a grapple to push forward out of a jam. Sometimes even better, sometimes not. Think back to dropping a hitch of choked trees. They don't always snug back up and winch in nicely. Even the best choked hitch can lose some wood if you drop it. Heck, that's the whole point really.
HolmenTree
Banned
You don't release the winch and drop the choked up load.....you let it down smoothly not to fan the butts out.
I'm still amazed when I think what some of the partners I had could do with their skidders, smooth as silk and never wasted a movement.
I'm still amazed when I think what some of the partners I had could do with their skidders, smooth as silk and never wasted a movement.
Last edited by a moderator:
FireFighterZero
Captain Zero!
Been through a lot of engines, Detroit, Cat, Case, Perkins, John Deere, Cummins is our favorite. Mitsubishi is good too.
I would not be too worried about fuel consumption, we have always found Cat to use much more fuel than Cummins.
I would not be too worried about fuel consumption, we have always found Cat to use much more fuel than Cummins.
Thor's Hammer
Wolfish. Sometimes Bites.
- Thread Starter Thread Starter
- #41
It must be 2 in the morning there Ed
Yes that's why the smaller cable skidders worked for us up until about 1993 when the bunchers and processors took over and today their stuck cutting smaller wood and have to work around the clock to match what we did in 8 hrs with a power saw and cable skidder.
Not buying it. In small timber a harvester will cut 200 cbm in an 8 hr shift. A forwarder can service 2 harvesters. One of the main reasons they cut smaller wood is sawmill optimisation. They get better product % and less wastage off smaller timber.
HolmenTree
Banned
Well it depends what part of the world you have your information from Ed.
Here with the province of Manitoba being larger then the whole UK and having 100,000 lakes we have lots of level lowland of water and swamps. Our logging operations here work on timber sales of crown land on "islands " through the Boreal forest.
What we used to leave behind on the fringe for being too small with the chainsaw and cable skidders they now have to cut I'm talking3" to 4" dbh and 20 feet long. A lot of sticks but no volume for the scale.
With a 20 - 2 man cut and skid camp operation [one time 10 camps in our area] we could work the whole year and make good production for the year. Now with all this heavy equipment they can only get in and out of areas for very short times due to the early spring thaw and now common late fall freeze ups. Our hot dry summer months fire hazards shut those big heat making machines down. Now a lot of our mature softwood is burning up , timber we would having been cutting as we used to throughout the summer to reduce the hazard.
Here with the province of Manitoba being larger then the whole UK and having 100,000 lakes we have lots of level lowland of water and swamps. Our logging operations here work on timber sales of crown land on "islands " through the Boreal forest.
What we used to leave behind on the fringe for being too small with the chainsaw and cable skidders they now have to cut I'm talking3" to 4" dbh and 20 feet long. A lot of sticks but no volume for the scale.
With a 20 - 2 man cut and skid camp operation [one time 10 camps in our area] we could work the whole year and make good production for the year. Now with all this heavy equipment they can only get in and out of areas for very short times due to the early spring thaw and now common late fall freeze ups. Our hot dry summer months fire hazards shut those big heat making machines down. Now a lot of our mature softwood is burning up , timber we would having been cutting as we used to throughout the summer to reduce the hazard.
Thor's Hammer
Wolfish. Sometimes Bites.
- Thread Starter Thread Starter
- #43
Not sure what your trying to say Willard. Are you saying the timber is too small? In which case the mechanical cut to length operation is far better than cutters and skidders ever will be. Most of UK and scandinavian forests is on swamp and bog. The machines lay a brashmat and work year round.
HolmenTree
Banned
Not saying the timber is too small, just saying the mechanical harvestors aren't making alot of production in it. Our government conservation and water stewardship are real restrictive with large machinery around lakes , streams and fish stock migration etc. Brash mats wouldn't work here with no govt subsidies for that and the contractors are cut to the bone in pay as it is.
Us old school cut and skid crews did quite well in that little timber that was always scheduled for the winter when the ground and water was frozen solid for 4 ft down. We got paid a premium union wage for the shorter the timber. My old Swiss partner Franz and I were producing on the average 30 cords of treelength a day int the little 20 to 25 ft topped at 3 1/2" spruce with a Timber Jack 230D.
Spring summer and fall we cut on higher ground in the bigger timber
Us old school cut and skid crews did quite well in that little timber that was always scheduled for the winter when the ground and water was frozen solid for 4 ft down. We got paid a premium union wage for the shorter the timber. My old Swiss partner Franz and I were producing on the average 30 cords of treelength a day int the little 20 to 25 ft topped at 3 1/2" spruce with a Timber Jack 230D.
Spring summer and fall we cut on higher ground in the bigger timber
Thor's Hammer
Wolfish. Sometimes Bites.
- Thread Starter Thread Starter
- #45
A harvester lays the brashmat down as he cuts. It's all the lop and top goes straight under the machine. If you're not laying a brashmat you're doing it wrong.
Are you saying that you were more productive hand cutting and skidding? Cause I'm not buying it...
Are you saying that you were more productive hand cutting and skidding? Cause I'm not buying it...
Thor's Hammer
Wolfish. Sometimes Bites.
- Thread Starter Thread Starter
- #47
Yeah, brashmat is a term in of itself. Watch this 1470 working in very small trees. Every scrap of lop and top goes under the machine, creating the 'brashmat'. Being Scotland, the ground will be swamp or bog. Hard to imagine manual labor outperforming this.
<iframe width="640" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/GC34k6XbW_I" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
edit: Why wont videos embed for me?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GC34k6XbW_I
<iframe width="640" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/GC34k6XbW_I" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
edit: Why wont videos embed for me?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GC34k6XbW_I
MasterBlaster
Administrator Emeritus
You must not be holding your mouth right.
<iframe width="640" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/GC34k6XbW_I" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Wait! I can't either! Lemme see...
<iframe width="640" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/GC34k6XbW_I" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Hmmm...
<object width="640" height="360"><param name="movie" value="//www.youtube.com/v/GC34k6XbW_I?version=3&hl=en_US"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="//www.youtube.com/v/GC34k6XbW_I?version=3&hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="360" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object>
You have to use the old embed code for some reason.
Well I guess not. I just embedded a vid in the RIP thread. Da fuq?
<iframe width="640" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/GC34k6XbW_I" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Wait! I can't either! Lemme see...
<iframe width="640" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/GC34k6XbW_I" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Hmmm...
<object width="640" height="360"><param name="movie" value="//www.youtube.com/v/GC34k6XbW_I?version=3&hl=en_US"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="//www.youtube.com/v/GC34k6XbW_I?version=3&hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="360" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object>
You have to use the old embed code for some reason.
Well I guess not. I just embedded a vid in the RIP thread. Da fuq?
Thor's Hammer
Wolfish. Sometimes Bites.
- Thread Starter Thread Starter
- #49
Still not embedded butch.
