Grapple Buying Advice

[lennyzx11]

I thought long and hard about the bucket grapple thumb but ended up with a Wicked 50 inch single lid. My thoughts are that it is so easy to change back and forth between bucket and grapple why not have both?. To me the bucket grapple is kind of like one of those multi-bit screwdrivers. Very useful most of the time, but not quite as good as two different dedicated screwdrivers at other times. If I could only have one screwdriver, sure I will take one of those. But if I have the luxury of having different screwdrivers that are optimized for each job then that is the way I am going to go.

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Yeah. What he said.
I went with the EA 50" also because of already having a bucket and SSQA makes it a minute to swap back and forth.
The dedicated grapple is better for me to root grub, dig out and pick up large rocks and carry longer stuff (though the bucket will make do with all those also. Lighter means a bigger payload also.

Perfect setup?
Dedicated Grapple and a bucket with a piranha tooth bar that ALSO had a top lid grapple or maybe a thumb. Not sure where a thumb could be a better tool than a grapple lid anywhere specific though. Since the hydraulics and controls are there already, it'd be nothing but money to be spent!<laughing>

 

[Wolf Bayou]

Great advice from everyone. I looked hard at the wicked root grapples but felt like a bucket grapple was a better fit for what I do and my current budget. I ended up purchasing the tomahawk single cylinder bucket grapple and I am pleased with it so far. If I was doing only land clearing the wicked grapple looks like the ticket since it looks like it would get under stuff easier without digging dirt. I find myself doing a lot of cleaning up of small trash and debris that would fall back through the open slats of the wicked grapple. I also like being able to move a little dirt without having to switch buckets and I can back drag with my bucket grapple to smooth things up after I pick up junk. Not sure about the durability on the one I bought but hopefully I can get a few years of good service from it....thanks

 

[Rocky Hoffler]

You won't go wrong with a EA grapple had one for over a year and have used and abused it with no problems thinking about up gradeing to the one i heard they were building with more opening