Chipper buying new wood chipper

[ihuntbear]

looking for 8" wood chipper.All kinds on the market but don't have any experience with them.Which one to buy ? need your help.Don't want to spend money on something that won't do the job.People say walenstien $ 3300.00,some say jinma they are on ebay for $ 2000.00. .some guys say buy one with self feed.Need it for my wood lots shredding thorn bushes( 4 to 6 inch at the base ) and other tree tops and branches

 

[Gordon Gould]

From what I have heard I would stay away from Jinma. I dont own one but have seen lots of posts with problems and complaints. Check very carefully before you buy.
8" is pretty big. I would rent one for a day. $300 will show you what you are in for.

 

[amigauser]

I would also recommend renting a hydraulic feed tow behind unit. I have owned gravity fed chippers and also a hydraulic fed unit and there is no comparison. The hydraulic fed is much faster/easier to use especially with larger diameter material as it prevents stalling. It is also safer as you can stop or reverse the feed instantly.

To chip 8 inch material is going to require quite a bit of PTO HP. Probably 40+ PTO HP. Generally if you are chipping something say 8 inches in a chipper the chipper should be designed for larger material say 10" or 12" maximum as it means less trimming and faster feed. I know my 6" hydraulic fed unit had a 25 HP engine on it and it was SLOW with 6" material.

I sold my last chipper and now have an area were I can make piles with the ends facing the proper way for me to feed them into a chipper. When I get enough piles made up I just rent a chipper for under $200 a day. It take a LOT of rentals to pay for a chipper, especially a new one. But we all like our toys. I purchased the three chippers that I have owned used and was able to sell them for what I paid for them or more after use. That may be an option to for you as Craigslist always has a large number of them for sale.

 

[Treemonkey1000]

I second what amigauser said. If you plan on doing lot's of chipping a tow behind is the way to go. Do you burn a lot of wood? Then getting an 6-8" chipper would help get rid of a lot of small stuff. As mentioned knots and crooked branches might only be 3" thick but can still get caught in the feed and have to be cut down a bit. Get a unit that has hydraulic feed would be my best advice also.

 

[Craig Clayton]

Another fellow Canadian
I agree with the others, rent a few different models and try them. To keep up to a 8 " chipper you need a crew of workers just to keep it feed. And volunteers are hard to find unless you are going to use it for business.
Craig Clayton

 

[wedge40]

From what I have heard I would stay away from Jinma. I dont own one but have seen lots of posts with problems and complaints. Check very carefully before you buy.
8" is pretty big. I would rent one for a day. $300 will show you what you are in for.

I've never had any issues with my Jinma chipper.

Wedge

 

[ihuntbear]

i have a fifty hp tractor.Problem with renting no body here rents 3 ph units

 

[Affordable]

We have sold Jinma Wodchippers for years, no big problems at all a great value for the money, I also have a 8" Chinese self feed Woodchipper,with some added features that Jinma does not provide.E-mail me for more information if interested. We keep every part for both in stock.
tommy@affordabletractorsalesco.com



Tommy
Affordable Tractor Sales Co
"Your Jinma Parts Superstore"
Home of compact Jinma, Foton, and Koyker Tractors and Parts, Wood Chippers, Backhoes - Affordable Tractor Sales Company

 

[ihuntbear]

how much and do you ship to canada

 

[Dead Horse]

I have this and I run it on a 3710. it works very well and has chipped a substantial amount of brush. I have put up 70 cord of fire wood in the last 3 years and it has chipped up the slash from that work as well as a lot of slash from other brush cutting.


I believe it is a Valby 150, made by the same folks who make Farmi logging winches.


This thing is VERY stout and robust. I have owned it for 12 years and had zero issues with it.

He picture on the right is the most accurate one I could find on the internet. Aparently Valby now calls this model the CH 150 HF (hydraulic feed). Mine is a two stage hydraulic feed. I find it best to make a big pile of brush and then stand there feeding the chipper......... It makes very fast work out of a LOT of brush. nOisy though, I wear ears when running it.

 

[Affordable]

how much and do you ship to canada

Yes we ship to Canada,or you can pick up at a boardering town

Send me a e-mail tommy@affordabletractorsalesco.com or give me a call I will send you pricing,or click on my website below

Tommy
Affordable Tractor Sales
"Your Jinma Parts Superstore"
Home of compact Jinma, Foton, and Koyker Tractors and Parts, Wood Chippers, Backhoes - Affordable Tractor Sales Company

 

[RoyJackson]

We have sold Jinma Wodchippers for years, no big problems at all a great value for the money, I also have a 8" Chinese self feed Woodchipper,with some added features that Jinma does not provide.E-mail me for more information if interested.

I have a Woods, but after researching chippers for several years, those chinese chippers require someone who is willing and able to do the required repairs. There are a lot of guys on TBN who like 'em (mostly because they are quite inexpensive). Those men are wlling to do the work required to keep them operating.
So, for the OP, you buy cheap up front and pay (in your labor) later or you spend the extra $$$ up front and keep chipping.

Personally, I'd look on CL for a used chipper made in the US or Canada. It took me a while, but I did find one (Woods 5000) which does an outstanding job. But it will not be easy to find a unit that has an 8" capacity.

Speaking of capacity...a 5" capacity chipper work great for gravity feed. I feed mine 5" trees/branches up to 20' long frequently...but that's not a 5" diameter for that 20' length. If I had to do an 8" log (8" full length), I surely would want a self feed hydraulic unit. That hydraulics adds a fair amount of weight to the chipper, so make sure your tractor can handle the weight (assuming a 3PH unit).

 

[jake98]

Every time I come down with chipper-monia I remind myself how I hate picking the stuff up once, and that if I had one I'd have to pick them all up again. Then I just dump them in a pile and burn them. I wish I could rent a pto chipper just to get it out of my system.

 

[gwdixon]

Every time I come down with chipper-monia I remind myself how I hate picking the stuff up once, and that if I had one I'd have to pick them all up again. Then I just dump them in a pile and burn them. I wish I could rent a pto chipper just to get it out of my system.

Renting to get out the urge is a wise idea. I wasn't so wise and burn a lot more now than when the chipper was new.

As far as handling - unless the material is stacked all in the same direction you have to turn half of it around to feed the chipper as mention in a previous post.

One pile was enough to convince me to stack it all in one direction, carry it to the chipper on forks, and put the feed ends close to the chute. Chipping the piles in place works well too but the slash seems easier to haul than the chips for me.

It does take extra time to stack that way but it speeds up time at the chipper. No reason to have the chipper/tractor screaming away while one fools with rearranging the limb direction.

I agree with RoyJackson, the Chinese-made chippers require quite a bit of service. A friend bought one, drove 500 miles to pick it up, after a month drove another 500 miles to return it. We spent hours on that thing trying to get it to work correctly. It was a self-feeder that was respite with problems. The knives were a nightmare to access. It was similar to a Jinma 6" but probably a knock-off.

 

[jimmyj]

I have a much smaller chipper than 8". I can only say I really made a mistake not getting self feeding, that feature is a must. 8" is huge man!

 

[Dead Horse]

After a decade of experience with the Valby two stage, I have to agree with the post above about the benefits of hydraulic feed.

The one I have is 8" capacity, though I rarely ever run something that big through it as I am doing most of my cutting for firewood. The stuff I am running through it is often beech or other hard woods, or the slash from pine spars and orchard trimmings (ie dead, sharp, knarley, hard pieces).

One thing I noticed early in my chipping "career" is that a longish, knarley piece feeding into the anvil and knives will have a nasty tendency to spin in the shute as it feeds. This alone makes the hydraulic feed a real joy, nay one could say, a necessity!

You have not experienced the true joy of running a powerful chipper until a branch being fed into the shute pivots and smacks you upside the head as a last belligerant act of resistance.

The other true benefit of the HF is that if you are running a LOT of material through the chipper, evenutally it will get jammed up. Once one becomes familiar with the signs that this is about to happen, being able to reverse the feed can be a real time saver.

Often the thin green stuff (or foliage), conspires to build up in the exhaust shute to the point where the flywheel fan cannot keep up. If you keep feeding, you get a pretty good blockage that requires shut down and shute disassembly to clear out the jam.

By watching the material leave the exit shute as you feed, you can get a sense for how well the material is moving. The beauty of the HF is that when things begin to plug up a bit, you reverse the flow, clearing the input shute and put a dry, stout, foliage free branch through. The chipper creates nice dry, large chips that blow out the exit shute quite effectively.

Done right, you can go all day chipping a huge pile of slash and not have to stop for a jam.

My opinion is that cheap tools are way more expensive than premium ones....

Better to by a used, well made tool than a brandy new piece of junk, even if you have to rebuild and or replace the "wear" items.

 

[RoyJackson]

As far as handling - unless the material is stacked all in the same direction you have to turn half of it around to feed the chipper as mention in a previous post.

One pile was enough to convince me to stack it all in one direction, carry it to the chipper on forks, and put the feed ends close to the chute. Chipping the piles in place works well too but the slash seems easier to haul than the chips for me.

It does take extra time to stack that way but it speeds up time at the chipper. No reason to have the chipper/tractor screaming away while one fools with rearranging the limb direction.

I accumulate a pile or stack of limbs, saplings and what ever. I hook up the chipper 3-4 times a years when the accumulation makes it worthwhile.
And, as gwdixon wrote, I stack it in a direction the minimizes movement.
Just a matter of working smart...

 

[Dead Horse]

Roy, when I am cutting a stand for firewood (often an area that I need to clear which has encroached my orchard and I am tire of limbing to keep them back) I will fell several trees and then set my winch at a central, level spot where I can also set up the chipper.

I will winch each tree in and then limb and run through the chipper. That way I am only handling each piece once.

Winch, limb, limb, limb, feed, feed, feed. Winch some more, buck the length, reset the choker and winch some more.....

Rince and repeat until I have 6 or so 20' lengths, and then skid to the bucking/splitting yard. I will do that until I have the area cleared and all the slash in a single pile of chips.

The chips get moved by big loader for landscaping purposes and then I move down to the bucking/splitting yard for a stint at that end of the firewood production. I put up 40 cord this year, so I had to learn to be efficient in my movements.

My avatar tells nearly the whole story..............

here is the rest:

 

[FLHayman]

I have the Wallenstein BX62, and I don't think it's too big. Like others have said, it's the gnarly branches that go out at odd angles from intersections that will be the ones you might have to trim down. My JD 3010 is in charge of keeping the chipper going, and it is maybe 50 hp at the pto, maybe, and it will get bogged down with a solid, knotty piece at the upper limit.

I love the machine, though. My method is to leave the branches where they fall, then drive up near some, and turn the chute towards a weedy area under the trees. The mulch doesn't hurt anything, and doesn't get to be too big of a pile, since you're always moving along. Mine is not hydraulic feed, but it pulls the branches in great. Green, wet leaves or green palm fronds can gum up the chute if you don't chase it with a dry piece afterwards. The knives are super easy to get to and reversible.

I agree with those who said you might come out better renting, but I love having something right when I want it, so I'll take the hit on depreciation. With no hydraulics, only a few moving parts, I don't see much to go wrong with this particular machine. I keep an electric saw on the tractor for those pieces that I didn't get just right, so I can make one more cut without having to go get the Stihl again. After some experience, you can cut 99% of the branches right the first time during your trimming or piling phase.

I have brought my flatbed dump up to a big pile and kept the shavings, since they dump easily, and store well, but I don't really landscape much. Easiest for me is to scatter the chips as much as possible while doing the job, where they blend in quickly.

 

[Gordon Gould]

I consider chipping fairly hard work but it goes along good if you are organized and only handle stuff once. I have a mile long road to keep clear of branches and saplings, birch, red maple, popple (aspen), fir and spruce mostly. I chip 20' long hardwood trees 2 to 3 inches in dia at the base in one shot with my manual feed chipper. It pulls this stuff right through on it's own.
Big stuff I actually have to hold back. I cut the stuff lay it down with the butt towards the road. Cut any big branches right then and let them lay.
Then back up along the row with the chipper fedding stuf in and blowing it into the woods. I dont drag anything far at all. To me this is much easier than hauling it all to a burn pile somewhere then waiting for the right weather for a safe fire.