Small Cable Yarder

[Thor's Hammer]

Ok, I know its tiny compared to the big madill's and SyncroFalkes, but I just bought a small trailed yarder for working nature reserves.
Arb work is really slow with the current economic climate, but we have lots of work felling birch and pine and clearing them off special nature reserves in our National Parks.
Some of these are waterlogged bogs, and cannot take any kind of machinery. This is where the yarder works brilliantly, allowing us to remove the trees without taking heavy equipment on the reserve.
unfortunately, its flatland / terrain logging, so not as easy as working a steep slope. Still, we are getting about 1000ft out without an intermediate hanger.

 

[squisher]

Lol, not as easy as working a steep slope eh? Wait until you downhill some westcoast style grades and let me here you say that.

Steep slope doesn't help your lift unless you've got good deflection, plenty of intermediates I've rigged on steep terrain.

Cool looking machine though, congrats Ed.

How tall is the tower and what sorta winches on that?

 

[Thor's Hammer]

I've done plenty of steep slopes here in the mountains the problem with flat ground is the deflection works against you. Mind you, the tower is only 24ft - I would prefer a 40ft tower really. The winches are clutch driven off the same shaft, haul in has 400 yards of cable and a 5 yard per second speed, the haul out has nearly 700 yards and 10 yard per second speed.

 

[squisher]

I hear what you're saying, flat sucks, cause basically you're rigging as if you're downhilling and that sucks too. Man I dunno if I'd want to be hooking beads on that boggy looking ground.

 

[TREECYCLE]

Sweet Rig! Is there a reason the trees must get hauled out verses chipped onsite. As the quality looks marginal for lumber.

 

[squisher]

I've done plenty of steep slopes here in the mountains the problem with flat ground is the deflection works against you. Mind you, the tower is only 24ft - I would prefer a 40ft tower really.

This is a nice 40ft yarder that I worked with for a few years. Skylead c-40 built on a timberjack.

 

[Thor's Hammer]

I assume you mean tails and spars by hooking beads? If so, your right - I've ripped a few tailspars out the ground so far, but I'm getting better

Treecycle, due due the extremely sensative nature of the site, all the woody material has to come off site, lest it change the nutrient levels on the peat.
Here's what we do with all the crap we pull off -

 

[squisher]

Cool looking set-up!

Ed hooking beads refers to hooking chokers. And it doesn't look like much fun to do there.

The bead is the knob on the end of the choker and you hook it into the bell.

 

[squisher]

Ed, does that giant semi chip trailer dump too?

Also what kind of a carriage/choker set-up are you running on your yarder?

 

[Thor's Hammer]

yeah, the guys have been up to their armpits in places. pretty nasty job working as a chokerman on this job, especially as we where hauling in sideways nearly 75 yards... The guys would have killed for a slackpulling carriage

The big trailer has a walking floor for ejecting the chips.

 

[SkwerI]

Skwishey, I assume the trailer has a walking floor.

 

[squisher]

I'm sure you've got it sorted but on non-slack pulling carriages I've worked with it sometimes pays to have a extra guy midway out to pull slack so the chokerman can pull his slack and chokers easier.

 

[squisher]

Walking floor, of course that makes alot more sense.

 

[sotc]

That is a slick setup, never seen such a little thing. I guess your probably guying back the tail holds also?
Squishy, we call them nubbins here, kinda fun to hear the different terminology around the world

 

[woodworkingboy]

Lots of steep terrain in this country, I used to see equipment like that in use all the time when driving through the mountains, when the price of timber was up there. Now you can pick it up for a song.

 

[squisher]

So y'all don't say 'hooking beads' down there? Nubbins, I've heard that but not very common here.

 

[lumberjack]

Here's how they dump chip vans here:

 

[sotc]

Yup, setting chokers, chokin logs.
Carl, thats how we do it too

 

[MasterBlaster]

I've always wanted to be in the cab burning a fatty, pretending I'm on the space shuttle.

 

[squisher]

Running a yarder is fun.

 

[MasterBlaster]

For the first couple of days, I'm sure it is. Not unlike bartending in a strip joint.

After awhile, it gets mundane...

 

[squisher]

Yup I did it/was around it enough that I was very proficient at it. But I rarely got to run it, we called it being the 'engineer'. I was hillside/rigger. Had to be real damn easy pumpkin going before I'd ever get a shift at being engineer.

 

[sotc]

I knew you didn't run one full time just by that comment squish! On occasion, it's cool, every day? Sucks!

 

[MasterBlaster]

Heres a kinda big machine. I bet it coulda been jury rigged to be an awesome yarder! Orrrrrrr, maybe not...

 

[squisher]

I'm questioning it's access abilities.