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Timber Harvest Methods & Equipment

Started by Ron Scott, March 24, 2002, 02:14:52 PM

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Okrafarmer

I'm slowly working my way through this thread-- about 10 pages a night. Wow.
He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. Psalm 91:1

Operating a 2020 Woodmizer LT35 hydraulic for Upcountry Sawmill, Dacusville, SC

Now selling Logrite tools!

Writing fiction and nonfiction! Check my website.

Bobus2003

Timberline 3800 Boom Delimber w/leveling Cab Working Ponderosa Pine, Black Hills SD

northwoods1

Quote from: Okrafarmer on October 31, 2010, 01:45:19 PM
Quote from: sawguy21 on October 31, 2010, 01:26:10 PM
:o We wouldn't be allowed in the bush in those conditions.
That looks normal for Maine. The land heals itself. These are the conditions skidders are built for. If they didn't have to contend with these conditions, they would look a lot tamer.

How forestry equipment is designed and built and what conditions it can operate under, and managing/harvesting timber land in a sustainable manner are two different things. Just because a skidder can drive through wet ground up to the axles making ruts 2' deep with #20,000 of wood on its back is no excuse or justification for doing it. Acceptable damage standards on logging jobs varies everywhere.  Up here loggers have to operate under guidlines... BMPs, or best management practices in order to have contracts with many mills. Loggers are required to have training on the hows and whys of BMPs'. True enough the land heals itself but that is still not justification for damaging it unnecessarily. That is why we have people who are foresters who determine the best way to prevent damage to land/timber and promote things like management of timber, protecting watersheds, improving land for recreation or wildlife habitat. How they go about harvesting the swamps of the southern U.S. really can't be compared to how forests are managed in other parts of the country.

northwoods1

Quote from: treefarmer87 on October 31, 2010, 02:38:25 PM
heres the cutter






What the ?????? , do you have any info on these pics like who, what where, when? I've never seen or heard anything about a machine like you showing and the pics look like there taken somewhere right up by me, I wonder what year?

northwoods1

Quote from: Okrafarmer on November 01, 2010, 08:27:28 AM
You're absolutely right. It's all about what's acceptable for the given circumstances. The free market means that if there is a demand for lighter impact  logging, it will be supplied by the loggers.

No not really that is not what I was saying. What constitutes sustainable forestry managment practices has nothing to do with the free market or what loggers or landowners want. If a landowner wants to ruin there land through unwise timber harvesting method, maybe to make a buck,  that does not make it acceptable or sustainable forestry. The entire challenge of sustainable forestry practices, the way I see it, is to figure out how to be able to incorporate them and still be able to make $$ in the free market not the other way around :)

northwoods1

Quote from: treefarmer87 on November 01, 2010, 08:58:34 AM
its in michigan in the 60s try this http://www.heavyequipmentforums.com/showthread.php?t=12720



I find that to be some very interesting equipment :) , this was such an innovative time up here in the forest products industry people were just beginning to figure out the potential of mechanization. My neighbor has sitting in his shed the very 1st Timbco ever made and that was right around the time Case was experimenting with a shear head on a tracked excavator. I really can't believe how far it has come since then, that 1st timbco spawned todays timber pro machines. I can remember when they first got that machine up and running and cutting on some of there large sales here, they really thought they were on to something  :o and they were!

northwoods1

Quote from: thecfarm on November 01, 2010, 09:23:34 AM
I know of one guy that guy fined for cutting in a brook like that back in the 80's.I remember reading about it in the paper.Still see some butcher jobs around,or at least in my eyes.I've been told before that I'm to fussy with my woodlot.  ::) Most jobs are very well done.Even back in the 80's and 90's too.There are still are few around that will holler,"Well you got to get the wood out" A nice,neat job can be done without destroying the land the tress grow on.Just takes more time to do it.And of course time is money.

I saw a very sad situation this past summer. Long time friend of mine called me and said he was having 40 acres of timber land logged which was located up near Florence WI. He is an absentee landowner and lives 300 or so miles away. He got a forester from up in the U.P. to set up and administrate the job. He called me because he was concerned about the cords coming up short it had been estimated at 1300 cords total aspen. When I got out to the job I couldn't beleive what I saw. =To access the  timber the logger had tried to cross a black ash swamp by laying down timber mats for 150 yards, (totally unnecessary he could have went around this swamp if he would have walked the job and looked for the path of least resistance)  The mats were all floating there and they had things royally screwed up. The job should have been a winter only job and they came in and started april of the wettest year on record here. They had things so rutted up I have never seen anything like it before in all my years of logging. To top it off they had all the timber cut, the wettest area skidded and totally rutted, trails up hills with springs running out of the ground right down 2' deep ruts, and a small creek only 150 yards away the whole 40 acres wide running in to a large creek just off the propery line. All the soil was washing off the hills down in to the creek. And they ended up pulling out because it was too wet and leaving 70% of the wood to be skidded all of it cut.  I got on the phone with the forester and I found that he hadn't even been out to the job since marking the property lines even though he had told my friend he had been and was monitoring things. My friend had not received any money down, which the contract stated he would have, and that they would not haul anything from the job without it being payed for, which they had done. I simply told him things better be corrected and in a hurry. The contract had only a $1000 performance bond which wouldn't nearly cover repair of the damage they had done or how much they devalued the land. My friend is still working things out on that job. I take a lot of pride in doing a nice neat job. Staying out of the mud and not doing that kind of damage is a matter of sheduling jobs correctly for conditions.

Ron Scott

Ponsee Fox Harvester. Harvesting lowland timber species in a Michigan lowland area.The Ponsee Fox Harvester has a good lighting system for working in low light or night time operations. These machines are often worked 20 hours per day with only 4 hours down time for maintenance. Grayling. MI 11/10







~Ron

barbender

That's one of the few Ponsse Fox's in the states there Ron, isn't it? Ponsse just had one up here demoing it.
Too many irons in the fire

Corley5

Ya gotta have lots of lights and run those Ponsee's 20 hours a day just to make the payments on them :-\
Burnt Gunpowder is the Smell Of Freedom

Ron Scott

This actually was a Ponsee demonstration. Ponsee bought the lowland timber sale so as to have their own demonstration area and operator/service training for their machines. They were giving this demonstration at a Michigan SAF meeting.

The machine with tracks works very well in lowland areas. Yes, at a "1/2 million $ purchase price", they have to run constantly. There was a logger coming to look at it for possible purchase however. Ponsee's are starting to get popular here over some of the other historical brands.
~Ron

Okrafarmer

Quote from: Corley5 on November 07, 2010, 09:18:43 AM
Ya gotta have lots of lights and run those Ponsee's 20 hours a day just to make the payments on them :-\

I think I'll pass for now, my mama warned me not to get caught up in any ponsee schemes.
He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. Psalm 91:1

Operating a 2020 Woodmizer LT35 hydraulic for Upcountry Sawmill, Dacusville, SC

Now selling Logrite tools!

Writing fiction and nonfiction! Check my website.

Ron Scott

Ponsee Fox Harvester. Harvesting spruce pulpwood in a lowland area, Grayling, MI 11/10. It is powered by a quiet Mercedes Benz 4 cylinder engine.





~Ron

treefarmer87

thats $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ high dollar
1994 Ford L9000
2004 Tigercat 718
1998 Barko 225
1999 John Deere 748G
FEC 1550 slasher
CTR 314 Delimber
Sthil 461
Sthil 250

Corley5

Wonder how it'd perform/hold up in gnarly, knotty northern hardwood  ??? :-\ :)
Burnt Gunpowder is the Smell Of Freedom

snowstorm

i have a 150 keto on a valmet. you be surprised at the hardwood it will limb. a 3"  limb dosent even slow it down...4" back up an hit it a couple times

treefarmer87

1994 Ford L9000
2004 Tigercat 718
1998 Barko 225
1999 John Deere 748G
FEC 1550 slasher
CTR 314 Delimber
Sthil 461
Sthil 250

snowstorm

its been pretty good. did buy a reman computer for it. 2500 bucks and it comes with a dent in the screen screws missing and the battery is flat. but it dose work fine for 2 months then throws code short cirkit-cable bk. call the dis. in quebec says he will look into it . that was in june....2 weeks ago i hear from him "the display is fine must be somethind else"..........anybody on here ever deal with quadco???

chevytaHOE5674

Quote from: treefarmer87 on November 08, 2010, 07:55:02 PM
do the processors break down much?

I know many guys UP here break the feed wheels often trying to ram large hardwoods through to delimb them. Often times in the process they chew the logs up (which can knock them down in scale and grade) and where the limbs are sheared off it can cause fiber pull and such .

Bobus2003

Quote from: treefarmer87 on November 08, 2010, 07:55:02 PM
do the processors break down much?

My Patu 410 Has tendancy to Shake the Processor Board loose after 30-40hrs or limbing (Stroke) so it has a bit of abuse thrown at it..

snowstorm

keto dose not use feed wheels. it has tracks there are times they will slip. most of the time they dont. there are lots of vids of them on youtube

Ron Scott

A well trained operator is certainly needed in these high priced technical machines.
~Ron

barbender

Do processors break down a lot? Yes, but it depends on the abuse they recieve. You can't take someone that is used to hammering through the woods in a skidder and just throw them in a CTL machine, they will destroy it in short order. But even with a good operator that doesn't abuse the machine, they are high maintainence machines.
.
Too many irons in the fire

TW

I found some short film clips of some classic forwarders on Youtube.

Stornalle was considered a great forwarder back in the days. They still have a great reputation for being able to work in rocky terrain where everything else gets stuck.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MqNd-SUhhZM&feature=related

Skogsboxer was a common logging tractor back then. They are still sought after in Sweden.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xp97W0QPvpI

Both were based on the strongly built Volvo BM 350 farm tractors. The motor was a three cylinder slow running thing giving about 60hp. They were manufactured in the 1960-ies.

LOGDOG

I like the throaty sound those tractors have. Reminds me of my little John Deere 450C when he's under load. Pretty backdrop with all the snow too.

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