Chipper Large wood chipper

mcruc · May 16, 2007

Other than the standard engine stuff, the chipper parts are
fairly maintenance free. Knives (if a disk chipper) occasionally
need to be flipped or sharpened. Bed knife clearance (distance from
the infeed bottom to the knife) needs to be kept intact and every 4 years
I change the hydraulic filter and put a fresh 8 gallons of 10W-30 in the
hydraulic system.

No doubt the bigger ones are useful if you've no need for firewood. We had
an 18" drum when we built the house and it was amazing as long as you
didn't need to move it around much

Wow was that ever heavy.

If that's not enough power, check out the Vermeer TG9000:
Tub Grinders - Tree Care and Landscaping Equipment and Machinery

rdbrumfield · May 20, 2007

I'm with you bgWI. Have used both the trailer and the 3pt. Of course the trailer mounted have more power, but unless the ground is solid don't take them off the road. I have a Bearcat 9" hyd feed and find that it does the job. Like someone said above, anything over 3" is fire wood. Sure is nice to be able to back up to the material on tough terrain instead of pulling branches to the machine.

LoneCowboy · May 20, 2007

I ran a tree chipper for about 3 months in teh mid-90's after a huge early season storm knocked down tons of trees. We had the vermeer one for about a month (company rented it), I always thought it was slow and it was. Then we got one of those V-8 gasoline ford ones. Now that was FAST. As someone said, you can throw huge trees in, as big as two guys can carry and it will suck it up in about 30 seconds. We were NEVER able to stall it out. (we did slow it down a couple times). You would shut the motor down, drive back to the shop and the flywheel would still be turning, 30 minutes later.
We could do a couple truckloads a day.

BUT

Let me tell you, I'm not scared of much. I'll drive tractors up things no one else will think of. I've trenched along slopes so steep I had to use the 4 wheel steering and a rope by the guy at the top of the hill. and this thing SCARED THE ***** OUT OF ME. (still does, 10+ years later)
On my 2 or 3 man crew (depending on the day), we had rules.
1. always throw the branch in from the side, that way when it catches you (and it will) you get thrown to the side by the panel.
2. If anything landed on the table, it stayed there. NO ONE touched the table until the motor was off and the flywheel was stopped.
Even with this, we lost two pagers and a radio. (two way, that was spendy I'm sure, glad it wasn't mine).
I would NEVER rent one out, or even lend it out. You would lose everything when someone screwed up.

True story, this summer, in Longmont CO, a professional crew was cleaning up some 100 year old elms (huge trees), guy was in the ropes cutting and his helper was feeding them into the chipper. Long time experienced crew. and the guy in the rope didn't hear the thing change at all for like 5 minutes, so he comes down and finds...........

that his helper of years is well, no more.

As the one above, he went to kick in a stuck one, lost his balance and it sucked him in. It didn't even slow down.

Don't screw around with these, truly deadly machines.