Dragline mats

[woodbowl]

A friend of mine that owns a circle mill works a dozen people or so and makes dragline mats of various sizes. The most common size is 8' X 18' X 8".

Anybody else out there making dragline mats?

[getoverit]

I was asked about sawing some of these a while back. Seems like heavy equipment rental businesses like to have them as well as heavy equipment companies. Bolting them together is the big issue and then handling them afterwards... have to have some mighty big equipment just to move them.

[customsawyer]

The mill I work at is making a bunch of them just calling them crane mats. Anyone getting the Rock and Dirt equipment magazine could tell you about a bunch of folks wanting them. ;D

[thecfarm]

That takes some good size equipment to move them 18 foot ones.We call them swamp mats up here.I checked out a sawmill that wanted hemlock to saw into 12X12 for the mats when I was cutting hemlock.Sems like he wanted a certain lenght.I do know it wasn't 18 feet.Probaly 10 feet.

[BBK]

I will saw out matts for a couple of the local contractors when they ask for them. Usually use white oak and sometimes locust. The sizes vary a lot depending on what they need. The most called for is 12"x12"x16' in sets of four or six cants per matt but I have made up all kinds  from 6"x6" up through 20"x20" in all different lengths over the years.

[LOGDOG]

Anyone know what these mats typically sell for?

LOGDOG

[schmism]

do you just cut the materail... or do you assemble with threaded rod also?

[Reddog]

We normally cabled them together. 3/4 or 1" cable, the ends looped so you could pick them up. Threaded rod will break after to much flexing.

[customsawyer]

Most of what we are cutting is 8X8X18. Then they take them and drill a hole about every 4 ft and put a bolt through them, putting 6 beams to a mat. They take and put 2 beams in the middle that are 16' and stagger them with 2 of the 18' beams on the outside that way there is a 8" gap at both ends that will let them put a chain around the bolt to pick them up. Some of them even have a cable going through them as well. The last price I knew of was some where in the $550.00 per 48"X18' mat. Just remember there is alot of work goes in to one drilling the holes and then the cost of the 48" bolts that have to be counter sunk can't be very cheap.

[Bibbyman]

We've sawn out quite a few heavy timbers for a crane company.  They fasten them together some way to make mats.  Or sometimes they're used for blocking.  Or sometimes they're just used under the crane to keep it from sinking in the earth or breaking up a street.

With oil at $92/ barrel there will likely be more drilling and pumping of our domestic oil in the USA. 

We were contacted in the early summer to saw out 4x12s 12' out of oak for oil drilling rigs in Kansas.  We didn't have the logs to take the order.  Now we got the logs and no order.

[Larry]

Pictures to illustrate how they are built...just as customsawyer described.

https://forestryforum.com/board/index.php?topic=25914.0

A while after I posted the thread I was talking to a local mill owner (north Missouri) who had inquired about manufacturing the mats.  He said he could hardly buy the logs for what the pipeline company was paying for mats delivered out of Mississippi.

[WH_Conley]

Crane mats that I have worked with, must add I do beleive that this is area sensitive , were usually 1x4x20 or 1x4x24, price I was told was $1000.00 each. I can not swear to the price, I would think a 12"x12"x 20' would be a little easier to come by than a 12"x12"x24', neither one of them easy. The bolts are easy, slick rod, threaded with a LARGE tap and die set, offsets for hooks are just 1/2 half of the cant cut away with a chain saw.

Sounds easy, good money. I know I worked construction.

Downsides;

Getting a 12"x12"x20' cant, getting four of them, drilling all 4 so that the bolt will knock through them :'( :'( :'(.

Get them on the truck, most truckers want to haul 6.
12"x12"x20'x4=960 ft x 5.5 lbs (oak average) =5280 lbs

This would be the average matt that I worked with, when a crane company calls, they want them tomorrow. There enters the broker, if we are going to deal in this stuff we will have to deal on a wholesale market. Figure the percentages.

If you can get a deal with an end user, and you can meet his demand, if he will realize you are a small guy, no large volume, he will talk, as long as it makes him money.

There is profit out there for this product, if you can get in the nitch.

[customsawyer]

I don't think there is that much profit in there for small mills as the shear volume that some of these companies are talking about right now is staggering. The last time I talked to some one at the big milll about the orders they were taking alot of 4000-5000 mats orders than the last one was for 85,000 mats! Well if you figure it takes 6 8X8X18 to make these mats you are only talking about 43mmbf for that one order.

[LOGDOG]

Where would a guy find long threaded rods like are necessary? I'm going to build some mats for myself. Right off I can't recall ever seeing rods and nuts that large at any of the places I frequent.

LOGDOG

[WH_Conley]

Use slick rod with a flat plate welded on one end, other end wpuld need to be threaded, large tap and die set. About any industrial supply house should be able to steer you in the right direction.

[pineywoods]

Where would a guy find long threaded rods like are necessary? I'm going to build some mats for myself. Right off I can't recall ever seeing rods and nuts that large at any of the places I frequent.

LOGDOG

sucker rod  ???

[LOGDOG]

Sucker Rod? I'm not familiar with the term. Unless you mean that with the cap on one end and threads on the other one side would suck the other towards it?

LOGDOG

[Tom]

I was one of the "go-fers" that made mats for our draglines when I worked for the county back in the Late 1950's and early 60's.   We used timbers like 8"x8" or 12"x12"x18' or longer.   The shop forman made us a long drill so that it would go through 4 timbers at once.  It didn't work too good.  We ended up drilling them one at a time but using one as a pattern.  The trick was to keep the holes straight.  It isn't the easiest thing to do because you get a slant on the drill when you get tired.  Drilling one at a time and always using the same one for a pattern doesn't let them get off too much though.  You have to line up one side of the timber to drill it, not put the hole in the middle, else the holes are hard to line up when you assemble the mat.

The Shop forman gave us a length of cold roll that he had threaded on both ends, two nuts and two square washers about 3/8" in thickness.   We put a washer and nut on one end.   Then we lined up the timbers and began driving the cold roll through the holes.  We started as many as we could and drove them through with a sledge hammer.  When the bare end protruded from the last timber, we put a washer and nut on that end and tightened it and all of them with a big wrench and a cheater bar (piece of pipe)about 10' long.

I was concerned, in my teenage mind, about how tight to get them.  I can picture him now, telling me, "You aren't big enough to hurt it, pull it as tight as you can and take another half turn".

Once the mat was assembled, a piece of cable was looped through holes drilled in the ends of the two outside timbers to form a handle for the hook on the dragline.

These mats would last a year or better supporting a 3/4 yard Linkbelt as it dug through miles of saltwater mangrove swamp.

We had first tried building mats from crossed layers of 2"x12".  It didnt work because we couldn't find fasteners strong enough to hold them together.

[LOGDOG]

As to drilling the holes in the beams I'm seeing a roller table line that the timber would travel on with a fence on the back side. In between two sections of the rollers I'd put a drillpress with enough vertical travel in the drill to drill straight down through the timbers. I'm thinking if you squared at least one end and then took off from there measuring the holes on center with a square you could probable get pretty close. Hanging on to a big drill like you mention Tom and keeping it straight would be a real chore.

LOGDOG

[Tom]

It's also a big chore to keep that many holes lined up.  Not only do they have to match from timber to timber, but the hole has to be straight too.  If it isn't then the cold roll has to be bent as it is driven through the timbers. 

[Jeff]

Seems the mats I saw at the sawmill over by my sister's place was constructed with cable, not cold rolled.

[pineywoods]

Where would a guy find long threaded rods like are necessary? I'm going to build some mats for myself. Right off I can't recall ever seeing rods and nuts that large at any of the places I frequent.

LOGDOG

sucker rod----think oil well with a big old pump jack pulling a skinny steel rod in and out of the well. that rod goes all the way to the bottom of the well where the pump is. in some areas sucker rod used to be available for almost scrap prices. I've seen lots of interesting uses for it, including dragline mats.

[LOGDOG]

Very interesting Pineywoods. I bet the scrap yards have a bunch laying around here in Shreveport/ Bossier City. I'll look into it.

You're right about the holes lining up Tom. After I typed that last bit I got to thinking that if there were any bow in the mat it could cause misalignment even if the holes are technically the same distance from there respective edge. I guess the easiest way would be to start on one end and then work your way down. With a big lift like mine I could put the weight of the machine (40,000 lbs.) in down pressure (give or take) on the mat. A guy would need a good flat deck below it though. Concrete with some Great big timber benches for the mat to sit on at working height. A man without a big heavy machine could maybe use heavy ratchet straps or a come along to pull the bows down so a rod could be driven in. Did you guys ever do that Tom?

LOGDOG

[mometal77]

I have seen these mats on pipeline jobs and asked how much they were and what they were made out of. oak i was told seen a few made from fir but big logs some had hooks made of cable and some with bars the same bars that held the mats together.  Nice thing to own if you have even an excavator with a hook at the end doing wet work.

[Slabs]

Use slick rod with a flat plate welded on one end, other end wpuld need to be threaded, large tap and die set. About any industrial supply house should be able to steer you in the right direction.

Enco can fix you upwith a threading die up to 1 1/4 inch.  ($36.18) and a die holder for $14.39.  I you would like  a 1 inch it's $19.54 for the die and $7.93 for the holder.

www.use-enco.com    I've been buying their imported tools for years and am quite satisfied.