FEL Bucket vs Brush Grapple

[D2Cat]

Around here I can sell a PU load of apple wood for $100, or trade for smoked meat.

 

[Smokeydog]

Amazing the trees and brush you can take out with a piranha toothbar. BXpanded.com made a special weld on for heavily worn HD bucket. The V teeth really bite trees and the added extension help bunch and carry. This time of year 3-5” trees roots slip out of the ground with minimal ground disturbance. Have to dig deeper with the grapples. Like this bucket for back dragging too.
Can’t carry as well as a root grapples. Have three grapples and they have their place too.

 

[ovrszd]

View attachment 590380

Amazing the trees and brush you can take out with a piranha toothbar. BXpanded.com made a special weld on for heavily worn HD bucket. The V teeth really bite trees and the added extension help bunch and carry. This time of year 3-5” trees roots slip out of the ground with minimal ground disturbance. Have to dig deeper with the grapples. Like this bucket for back dragging too.
Can’t carry as well as a root grapples. Have three grapples and they have their place too.

Where are you located?? Might add a location. Ain't takin out no trees here.

 

[Smokeydog]

Beautiful East Tennessee!

 

[Smokeydog]

The more I use the Piranha toothbar the more I like it. I had a regular bolt in toothbar on another bucket but took it off. Poor performance for the work I require. Maintaining roads, back dragging, cleaning ditches and clearing trees and brush the Piranha is so much better and no need to take it off. Have to be careful not to dig deeper than you want.
Another big benefit is limb removal. Have miles of field/pasture, roads and buildings boarding the woods. Encroachment is a problem. The Piranha bar grabs the limbs and allows me to break or shear them off. This is high hazard work but so is having to work around low limbs so be careful.

 

[vlcakc]

Very interesting thread. I will be starting a pasture clearing project in the near future ( If the weather ever cooperates.) using a Case Farmall 55C CVT tractor. I bought a EA 65" grapple and 84" Land Pride flail mower with the tractor last year and recently added a 72" Piranha toothbar to the FEL. There are several plum and Sumac thickets and also quite a few black locust trees from sapling size up to mature trees to remove. I have been debating with myself on which attachment might be the most effective. The grapple will be used for cleanup, no question. I could mow the small stuff, but the roots tend to re-sprout. I would prefer to uproot as much as possible. I have used the mower and grapple some, but the Piranha TB will be a new experience. Suggestions and tips are welcome! Vic

 

[D2Cat]

If you don't get the roots pulled up, be sure to spray EACH stob with something like Remedy or you WILL have an ongoing battle.

 

[Smokeydog]

Folks at BXPANDED recommend running the Piranha toothbar a couple inches off the ground slightly tilted up for brush and saplings. I find this works real well. Once bigger stuff is “bitten” by the toothbar it can be pull up by the roots by curling or raising bucket. Then level off area by skimming and back dragging. Mower should be able to take care of any spouts from now on.

 

[ovrszd]

The root system of mature locust tree will sprout for years after the main stump has been removed.