Some sawing, logging and skidding pics and videos ......

[056kid]

I see your cutters don't put much effort into their strip layout, then again its probably really hard to manipulate wood with only one specific technique such as GOL.

 

[Metals406]

Hey Sam, would a forwarder be a viable machine for you? Seems like on these flat jobs, a forwarder might speed things up as it can load a bunch from where the trees lay -- granted, they'd have to be bucked into manageable lengths after felling.

I know you buck a lot, after the fact, when the buyer marks them -- but would it be possible to have him give you lengths ahead of time?

I guess the only catch would be that you would have another investment in yet another machine. And you'd have to use it on almost every job to have it payoff.

You ever get the light-bar mounted on the skidder? If so, post up some pics, I'm curious to see what you came up with.

 

[Metals406]

I see your cutters don't put much effort into their strip layout, then again its probably really hard to manipulate wood with only one specific technique such as GOL.

Looks laid-out to me Ted. Look at all the tops going into the gully (from the right), and then butts' out, coming out of the gully directly towards the camera.

That just might correlate to their skidding plans.

 

[056kid]

Maybe so, I wouldnt want to run the skidder in it though. . .

 

[Metals406]

Maybe so, I wouldnt want to run the skidder in it though. . .

It probably looks worse than it is. . .

 

[lfnh]

Sam -

Thanks for the latest shots (and all the earilier ones).

Nice looking at bare ground for a change.

Great progress.

 

[anymanusa]

wow, tons of good pix, a hot chick, A+ thread, and then a bunch of 'days of our lives' drama.

Don't let this kinda crap keep you from making more threads in the future, your pix are awesome.

 

[056kid]

Soap operas are about nefarious lovers not weird logging practices. . .

 

[banshee67]

Soap operas are about nefarious lovers not weird logging practices. . .

at any rate, they almost always include a troll, thanks for filling the position :kiss:
you sure do get burnt up watching this guys successful logging business go from job to job huh?

 

[Slamm]

Hey Sam, would a forwarder be a viable machine for you? Seems like on these flat jobs, a forwarder might speed things up as it can load a bunch from where the trees lay -- granted, they'd have to be bucked into manageable lengths after felling.

I know you buck a lot, after the fact, when the buyer marks them -- but would it be possible to have him give you lengths ahead of time?

I guess the only catch would be that you would have another investment in yet another machine. And you'd have to use it on almost every job to have it payoff.

You ever get the light-bar mounted on the skidder? If so, post up some pics, I'm curious to see what you came up with.

Traditionally, I am only paid to get select cut logs out and bucked up (Big, nice stuff). This is my first pulp job and we are doing it with handing cutting not machine cutting. We have to cut everything 5" and bigger, everything whether its rotten, dangerous had fence in it whatever we have to level the place. That being said, I am partly working with what I have and can pay for, and secondly not real interested in investing in going down that "pulp road" where it dead ends into a big financial mess of debt and bankrupcy. I have no future pulp jobs lined up, and I don't want any at this point, as I can't see the end of the regular jobs that we have for next year. I know that a loader and buck saw with delimber would maybe be nice, but I don't get paid to load trucks, that is always the other persons problem. I have one very large Ace in the Hole and that is my workers/friends, we work hard, period and we have very fast saws. To level that 20 acres it took me and Bert two days and then there was three guys for three more days, while Jerry and I started to skid it out. So I had a weeks worth of wages and around 26-36 gallons of saw gas to get it all cut and delimbed. We skidded out that big landing in 2 days and another big landing in another 2 days and we have about 1 day's worth of skidding to do and we are done with that 20 acres. Possibly machine cutters could do it faster and maybe a forwarder could do it "neater", but neither could do it cheaper and not much faster than what we did it in. The other big deal breaker for the machine cutters is mud, my human cutters cut from first light to one hour past light or more if we get a good snow and plan it right, by dropping trees for the last hour or so and then topping in the dark against the snow. No machine cutter can cut and delimb in as many crappy conditions that myself or my guys will or have worked in. We joke that the only thing we haven't cut trees in is an earthquake, LOL. The roads getting to the skidders are so bad that we have walked 2-3 miles in mud into the different cutting zones carring our saws and gas the whole way, worked all day and then carry everything back out and do it again and again. A typical machine cutter operator wouldn't have had the physical ability to just get to the machine much less get it to operate in the muddy conditions, and if they tried it would have made the ground very bad for the skidders.

The forwarder would possibly be nice, and I was told that one of the investors that hired us is getting a forwarder to get the pulp out the additional 2 miles of dirt roads to the rock roads for the truckers, but I don't know, cause it isn't my problem, LOL. I'm doing what I get paid for with what I have and so far we are putting up numbers that few have seen matched, and certainly not for the low tech way we are doing it, LOL. That said, again, I couldn't do it without the swing boom, there is no way. I can keep one or two skidders going full tilt all day with full grapples, and that translates into a lot of wood coming out in. I been working on sorting the sizes better in the woods and now we are getting landings that are half pulp piles and other half is saw logs with much less pulp in it. Because I have built the bunches in the woods with the appropriate sized trees in them already and it doesn't take me anytime to do this with the big swinger, and I don't really care how the trees are laying, cause I can put backward trees with backward trees and correct trees with correct trees, the cutters do their level best with directional cutting and for the most part it works great, but it is a complete waist of time to try to drop every darn tree in the same direction, when as the swinger operator, I simply don't care, cause it doesn't slow me down in the least and we aren't using wedges or anything just swinging what we can and the rest falls how it has to. I can make order out of the chaos of pixy sticks, LOL.

Bert with his modded 441 is dropping big sawlog trees in 28-34 seconds per tree at the stump, that is start to finish, the other night he was doing this for 1.5 after dark. He is fast and crazy, the guys were timing him with a stopwatch on a phone, he is amazing with a fast saw, and those were either oak or hickory and no less than 20" on the stump most were in the 26-28" range. Thats not topped, just cut through at the stump in under 34 seconds and walk to the next tree and again and again. He gets pinched once a day tops, has gone three full days with no pinching 2 weeks ago and is standing at his first tree of the morning waiting on first light, like a coon dog waits by a treed coon looking up. No machine cutter can do that, and he can lay them with pretty good control so as to not kill 3 guys topping for him in some instances, LOL. When me and him cut together we are dropping trees pretty close to each other and we just make sure we get a look from the other guy for approval and let'er go.

I will try to get some photos of the finished land, as it is just paths of leaves and stumps and then some brush piles of tops. It looks like vacuum went in there and clean everything up and piled the tops in neat piles for burning later. After the cutters have seen the process a few times they are getting better about dropping more trees with the tops together and the butts out, as best as they can so that its just a star shape or whatever pattern with butts out and tops in, then as I go by I might push a few tops into place and it all looks very clean for a clearing job. I really think the end customer's dozer operators will really like our work, and all of the wood that can be sold is coming out, right down to little sticks, cause I drop bunches of pulp size trees onto the few little trees that really aren't worth going out of our way to get, but since I position the bunch/hitch right on top of the little trees the next grapple skidder just picks them up for free and out they go to be turned into pulp, and since most are under 24' already we don't even have to buck them at the landing, they are just free weight and that makes for a very clean site, certainly more than what the contract stated we had to do.

I have the material and lights for the light bars and have the tubes of metal that I'm going to use but didn't get a chance to build them yet, some things came up and we were getting so much done during working light times that I could stop to drive 2.5 hours back home or up to the machine shop to make them so they aren't done yet, but soon, as I do have all of the materials and measurements. One problem is the amount of wattage that I'm putting up there, 1300 watts, I have to wire that in and the alternators aren't going to like that, LOL. I have some solutions to the problem, but I want a lot of light so I am still working on that small obstacle, and maybe its nothing, but I'm still working it over in my brain for now. You will like the design I have come up with super easy to make and the skidder could be lifted by the light bars when I'm done with them and for cheap too.

Later,

Sam

 

[Slamm]

Looks laid-out to me Ted. Look at all the tops going into the gully (from the right), and then butts' out, coming out of the gully directly towards the camera.

That just might correlate to their skidding plans.

I see junior is still thinking he knows all and we don't, LOL.

Yes, there is a system to the madness, typically the trees are studied, and groups of trees get dropped with the tops together and move to another section and do the same. I tell them to not get too hung up on it if a few trees don't work, just drop them and move on.

All of my guys are good cutters and they all are good skidder drivers so at any point one of them might have to skid out a crappy layout, so nobody is intentionally dropping trees in a stupid manner just to say they got them down. We work together as a team trying to make money, if one guys screws up we all suffer.

When we were dropping tree one day in 40 mph winds, we did get several acres to all fall in the same direction ..... east with a west wind. There was one big rotten white oak that wanted to fall west and it did ...... the next day, LOL.

There are few cutters/loggers that would work as consistently as we have in every single type of condition, and certainly not those windy days 20-40 mphs for several days. Most cutters start whining at about 15 mph and 20 mph is certain suicide, LOL.

Put I guess, there is always going to be someone better, LOL.

Sam

 

[redheadwoodshed]

Really like the thread you started!Keep it up, if you can find the time.

 

[056kid]

Just because I comment on strip layout dont mean I know it all.

Someone quote me so the the flat lander can read. .

 

[Slamm]

at any rate, they almost always include a troll, thanks for filling the position :kiss:
you sure do get burnt up watching this guys successful logging business go from job to job huh?

LOL, while it surely seems prideful and that is not my goal, but I was wondering when someone was going to figure that out or see that.

I'm sure the first to admit I don't know everything, but if I don't know what I'm doing I sure have a lot of work to show for the ignorance and stupidity, LOL, while those that are throwing the stones, don't seem to have anything but a few pulled fiber shots of 10 trees and thats about it. Others are looking for work and complaining about the lack of logging work, and I'm hiring people and getting more machines paid for and making money, and certainly having fun by getting to work with guys that love to work.

I don't get it, but that is the internet for you. Some people just get off, on griping about everything that isn't done how they would do it. Some things aren't right or wrong they are just different. My stuff is all paid for and my guys make the wages they ask for, not what I tell them they will work for. I rent a house for them to live in and paid for most of their meals and if they need boots or winter clothes or gloves or something I get then what they want or need. Everyone runs modded saws ...... they all love that, LOL.

Thanks,

Sam

 

[056kid]

Something here does completely light my fire I will openly admid. Like, it makes me really angry. I guess it is because I was trying to be helpful in the very beginning, that of which was not greeted with anything but a dose of ####.

Yea slamm seems to be doing really good. and I guess that is what does it. A guy that doesn't even know how to put a chain back on it's rail without disassembling the saw, a guy that pays 5 dollars for a foot of rope, a guy that uses rope, A guy that loads someone's trucks with a bob cat,
A guy that seems to have everything in his favor, to the extent where he doesn't even have to play by all the rules, how can you fail?
I have never seen or herd of a logger that has the capability to cut 20 acres in 2 days yet he has to wait for boss man to grade logs for him, and then have a different party haul the wood? WTF?

To me this is the highest levle of farmer logging. Ide rather be pulling wood out of the biggest trees I can find on the planet.


Damn you make me angry Slamm. I feel like you dont have respect for logging. Just throw a bore cut in her and say #### it. you got it easy dude. That rope you use, it would not last 2 days in the setting that I worked in, it'd snap like a shoe string trying to get a big top 120 feet up on a skid road. The nonchalant way of flopping timber would not last either. Its obvious to me, but the super mega sized landings wouldn't work either. Ive cut on mountain sides that didnt have 1 road on them. The whole landing, the main road, and every skid trail cut out with a d5, and made with logs, and dirt, Trucks have to be dragged around with a skidder to get them next to the loader, then they have to be driven by someone with skill so they don't end up turned over.

 

[atvguns]

Kid your problem is you are stuck in the (where I come from we do it like this)
mode you need to just accept it for what it is and move on. Don't try to change everything you don't understand

 

[lfnh]

Sam -

Couple of posts back,in your answer to the joystick, you mentioned getting
used to the Esco rotator and the Deere rotator having more smarts.

Was this related to picking logs/tossing tops or just maneuvering the
grapple in general.

Just interested in hearing what differences you find between the two.

 

[056kid]

Kid your problem is you are stuck in the (where I come from we do it like this)
mode you need to just accept it for what it is and move on. Don't try to change everything you don't understand

Your right, but since I live on both coasts, (and even though not here on the west coast, I have done high lead logging) do I cancel him out? LOL.

 

[Slamm]

Sam -

Couple of posts back,in your answer to the joystick, you mentioned getting
used to the Esco rotator and the Deere rotator having more smarts.

Was this related to picking logs/tossing tops or just maneuvering the
grapple in general.

Just interested in hearing what differences you find between the two.

The esco grapple is not the brightest idea that fell into logging. That being said, I don't want to say that I'm too dumb to figure it out, but the rotator motor and gear drive on the Deere is stronger and more precise allowing for better or more exact placement of the grapple. With the Esco you kinda flop and drop it and hope it lands with the tongs on both sides of a log. I'm exagerating a bit, but it isn't the same precise control that a Deere's control has, and not by a long shot. I think the newer Esco's are better, but someone else with more experience would have to chime in on that, as I have zero experience with anything that is newer in relation to skidders, mine are all old ones, LOL.

The stronger Deere rotator is nice for when logs are under tops or branches and with the Deere rotator it will just go ahead and spin that grapple no problem, twisting branches out of the way, where as the Esco grapple just gets stuck and you have to pick the grapple up out of the branches and then spin it and then drop it through the top.

Again, if you had to get an Esco grapple it obviously isn't the end of the world as billions and billions of feet of timber have come out of the woods with Escos, I just happen to think that Deere's way of doing it was a better idea ..... starting back in the 1980's.

Hope that helps,

Sam

 

[Metals406]

Have a beer Ted, relax.

Let Sam row his boat the way he wants to row it, and you row your boat the way you want.

We might log a little different here too, but that don't make us logger queers. We have all the steep ground, we have all the bad weather, but a man will run his show the way he wants to run it. . . Right, wrong, or indifferent. If it works, it works.

Let people be adults and have free volition. . . Just as others should allow you to make choices, and have free volition.

Enjoy Sam's pictures for their simplicity for Christs sake, and quit nitpick'n the #### out'a him. He's a big boy, he can handle his business.

Now go cut something down damnit! :chainsawguy: