Backhoe Added a ripper to my Woods BH90x: Trees beware

[IslandTractor]

That looks like some good firewood, Island. I would not let that go to waste...
Do you have a wood stove?

Our house is not winterized but we have a retired year round neighbor who benefits. I fell the trees and move them to a pile where another neighbor turns it into stove sized lengths and delivers it. Little goes to waste and none is burned as brush.

 

[TO_Bud]

Finally got my MIE root ripper into action last week so I thought I would weigh in on the post. First off thanks IT for the great idea to start with. The ripper is mounted on Ford 758B hoe that is connected to my NH TC40D. The 758B is an older version of the 758C and is slightly less powerful. The hoe is moderately less powerful than IT's BH90X (about 1000lbs less Bucket force and 700lbs less dipperstick force). The rippers performance in my configuration is dependent on the type of tree I'm pulling and I've pulled about 35 so far. I have many sassafras trees of various diameters, they are soft wood without tap roots, and they come outrelatively easy even up to 12" diameter. I have quite a few Elm and Ash trees, some dead and some malformed, that have a substantial tap root that give me alot of trouble even at 6" diameter. I've observed these tap root trees seem to double or triple in diameter a foot or so below the surface. I can still get them out but it might take a half hour or so. Complicating the process on a lot of these trees the close proximity of other live and large trees and their root systems trans versing the area I'm digging. I'm real happy with the purchase and quality of the ripper and the people at MIE were great to work with. They are only a 1.5 hour drive from me so I went to pick it up and see their operation. Just want to caution any future buyers that the performance you get is directly related to the backhoe's rated power but in the long run the ripper is much more effective then the same operation with the bucket.

Bud

 

[IslandTractor]

Finally got my MIE root ripper into action last week so I thought I would weigh in on the post. First off thanks IT for the great idea to start with. The ripper is mounted on Ford 758B hoe that is connected to my NH TC40D. The 758B is an older version of the 758C and is slightly less powerful. The hoe is moderately less powerful than IT's BH90X (about 1000lbs less Bucket force and 700lbs less dipperstick force). The rippers performance in my configuration is dependent on the type of tree I'm pulling and I've pulled about 35 so far. I have many sassafras trees of various diameters, they are soft wood without tap roots, and they come outrelatively easy even up to 12" diameter. I have quite a few Elm and Ash trees, some dead and some malformed, that have a substantial tap root that give me alot of trouble even at 6" diameter. I've observed these tap root trees seem to double or triple in diameter a foot or so below the surface. I can still get them out but it might take a half hour or so. Complicating the process on a lot of these trees the close proximity of other live and large trees and their root systems trans versing the area I'm digging. I'm real happy with the purchase and quality of the ripper and the people at MIE were great to work with. They are only a 1.5 hour drive from me so I went to pick it up and see their operation. Just want to caution any future buyers that the performance you get is directly related to the backhoe's rated power but in the long run the ripper is much more effective then the same operation with the bucket.

Bud

Glad to see you are operational. That is a great summary of the difference in ripping the relatively softwood trees and those with big tap roots. I haven't had many of the tap rooted trees to deal with so far but I concur that they are more work. That is one of the reasons I like the scoop back of the ripper as you can dig down to loosen up the tap root and make it a bit easier to push them over.

How are you using the tractor/FEL? I've described that I've been ripping roots then pushing trees over with my Kioti DK40se. I think once you've ripped lateral roots and loosened the soil or even dug a narrow trench front and back of the tap root that the tractor weight and power make a big difference in how big a tree you can push over. My Kioti is not a lightweight but I do end up "climbing" the trees with the grapple (front wheels a foot or two off the ground) as I push over the bigger trees.

 

[kattywumpus]

The land was a community field/park that suffered from lack of maintenance for many years so a lot of invasive junk trees, vines and briar took over. Large parts were simply impassable. Plan is to remove the invasives and plant native or fruit trees as well as to preserve the wild blueberry bushes.

My wife wants me to preserve wild blueberry bushes too. That's a little difficult when the bushes are all round the trees I'm removing!

 

[IslandTractor]

My wife wants me to preserve wild blueberry bushes too. That's a little difficult when the bushes are all round the trees I'm removing!

Dig'm up and move'm. They seem to tolerate transplanting pretty well.

 

[TO_Bud]

On the softwood trees I've not had to push with the FEL. After I cut both sides of the trunks I've been able to push the trees forward and down with the dipperstick; then a few more yanks towards me with the ripper and out it comes. The hardwoods tend to green stick fracture at the base when trying the push over and then the fight is on to get them out. I've pushed them over that way with the FEL before with similar splintering, they're just a bugger sometimes to remove.

Bud

 

[newbury]

Since this seem to be an epic ripper/stump thread I've a few questions.

My ride has a BH70X, one of it's planned uses will be to remove stumps of relatively small (< 18" DBH) pines and smaller mixed hardwoods in sandy/clayey soils. A ripper tooth looks like a good addition.

Questions:
Does anyone know of an online source for BH70X rippers or equivalent? I've got a message into Woods, I'm looking for other choices.

Has any one tried something like a short FEL tooth bar/cutting bar attached to a BH bucket or mounted by itself? something that sticks out say a 6" or so, such that one could "undercut" the soils and maybe get to the tap root.

Perhaps just mounting a long ripper tooth out to the side.

/edit - the more I think about it mount a ripper tooth perpendicular to the bucket using the regular teeth holes. Would have to be very careful it did not over stress the BH with twisting.

Ideally I'd like a foot long rotating trencher head on my BH that could be operated horizontally, like a pole saw, but that won't happen with my wallet.

 

[IslandTractor]

After searching for several years I never found a supplier for a smallish BH (Note: I forgot about Brotek, they do sell a ripper for the BH70x I believe. Lighter duty than the MIE ripper) so I worked with Michigan Iron to custom build mine. I can tell you that Woods does not have one for their BH line. They did provide me with the drawings of their bucket mount which was very helpful.

I too thought of an add-on bucket attachment but having used the ripper now I can say pretty confidently that an attachment would not work. The lever arm would be too long and would not have the power needed to rip.

My BH90x has enough power to easily rip 2-3 inch roots with one motion. For larger roots I use the tip and down force to spear the root and then curl to rip it in half. A few small teeth front and back would enhance cutting larger roots.

A BH70x has less power but an appropriately sized ripper like mine should work well. Certainly it would work better than the bucket. The correct size is exactly the length of your bucket face including the tooth. I'd guess 18 inch for a BH70x but do the measurement.

Michigan Iron has fabricated a number of the BH90x rippers and they are great to work with.

 

[newbury]

Elsewhere -

I tried getting a large maple tree stump out with my BX24, and after trenching all around with the BH, found the remaining tap root system still held it solidly in place. My pickup wouldn't budge it with chains. I want a Bro-tek ripper, but it isn't in the budget.

I went to Tractor Supply and bought a ripper tooth for $38, bought a new 5/8ths drill bit for $14, and some 5/8ths 2" bolts, nuts, flat and lock washers.

A short time later, I had a reversible ripper tooth attached to my backhoe bucket. Originally I mounted it "tine up", but found "tine down" worked better to spear under the main root ball and strip away soil and break apart the underside roots that kept the maple in place. As soil accumulated in my perimeter trenching, I still had the use of the bucket to pull it out, without switching between a dedicated ripper, and dedicated bucket. I mounted it in 'bucket neutral' alignments, so I can pull in or thrust out; and it doesn't hit the BH frame when I curl the bucket all the way in.

The ripper is very solid, and I was lifting the tractor with the torque applied at times. I may sharpen the inner shaft edge above the tooth, to cut through roots rather than snapping them, but I'm extremely happy with this multipurpose adaptation, that cost less than $55.

Being able to switch it between "tooth in" and "tooth out" in five minutes with just a ratchet wrench adds to the versatility! I've only been playing with it for an hour before losing daylight, but I used it to grab some surface roots I've been bouncing over, on the way to the storage shed, and that worked like a charm, too.

Photos attached, in the "tooth out" original position.

Nowhere near as powerful as your BH90X ripper, but apparently works for someone.

 

[IslandTractor]

Update on my tree removal project with the MIE Ripper: I've made significant progress in the last couple of tractor days. All the larger trees I wanted to take down are down. Most of the smaller trees are down and stacked too. I've been cleaning up some old stumps and even pondering takng the BH off for the winter now that I mostly have just clean up to do.

Practice makes perfect and I've gotten pretty comfortable with the ripper after 100+ trees. I'll try to summarize my "final" technique. For smaller 4-6 inch trees I now cut on both sides then use the BH to push the tree over in stages. If I can get it to lean then without moving the tractor I can get the ripper in behind where the upright trunk was and usually just pop the tree out with help from gravity. Those are satisfying as I don't need to move the tractor.

Larger trees 7-20 inches or so I now try to cut a V shaped area with my BH at the bottom of the V. I can then just "plunge cut" the area directly in front of the tree and disrupt the roots on three sides before needing to move the tractor to reposition. Sometimes that is all it takes as I usually try to push it over with the grapple/FEL while getting ready to reposition the backhoe to cut the final side. I've gotten braver and when working on windless days am not worried about cutting all four sides as none of the big trees have ever budged until I pushed.

Here is a photo of the stump of the single largest tree removed with the ripper. Had to saw it up after dropping it as it was too heavy to move. I could barely lift the stump/trunk after cutting all the branches off.

Also have a few photos of downed trees waiting their turn for chainsawing into firewood.

Overall the ripper has been fantastic. I might add the back tooth we have discussed if I get a chance over the winter but I got the tree removal job done efficiently even without that potential improvement.

I've been working on this 5 acre overgrown field now for several years and making incremental progress with chainsaw, tractor and grapple as well as standard BH to dig out stumps. If I'd had the ripper from the start, the whole job would have taken about a quarter the time or less. It is also much less wear and tear on the tractor and grapple when the ripper does the tough part and I just use the grapple to move downed trees to piles rather than try to uproot smaller trees and dig out stumps after cutting bigger ones. I've also been able to clean up the areas where I have ripped out trees by simply using a landscape rake on the FEL to collect small debris and smooth out the shallow root holes. When I used to use the BH to dig out stumps I had lots of work to do replacing soil with FEL bucket (requiring periodic change over from the grapple) or using a box blade (requiring dismount then remount of the BH). Much more efficient with the ripper and grapple with final clean up using the landscape rake. I'll post some before and after shots once I get the firewood trees moved.