Hmm. This is a 4th one that's in the approximately $1500 range. This one looks very much like the
chipper-only DR unit for this price. You can also get the Jinma and a MacKissic. Think the MacKissic is the only one in this price range that is a
chipper/shredder. The TPH-122 is what I have. I paid about $1600 for it from a JD dealer, but you can get it for $100+ less from Northern Tool (possibly without the PTO shaft). This is what I've read from other TBNers.
I like both the
chipper and shredder and would not be happy without the big chute to do small stuff and leaves. I save lots of mulch money by "stealing" leaves that town people leave at the curb and shredding the leaves with the Mac. Did probably about 100 or so bagfuls last fall and just stole 2 truckloads this afternoon. You can't do this with a
chipper-only. Also, you'd be lopping or hand pruning a lot of small stuff to collapse it into a small enough bundle to get it into the
chipper feed. With the Mac (and on my old TroyBilt) you just drop the small stuff, often multi-branched, etc. into the bigger hopper, and it sucks it in (most of the time; sometimes you have to diddle with it, but at least you don't have to hand prune it into smaller pieces to fit into the
chipper chute).
I had a shredder-only MacKissic that ran on my 12 hp Gravely. Missed having the
chipper. It was better for leaves than my TroyBilt though. So, that was about it was good for.
The TPH-122 is a good combo unit.
An acquantaince of mine recently bought a Jinma, all 800# worth of it, AFTER he got it out of its iron crate that it came in and assembled it, etc. It's the most capable of the $1500 units, as it'll take up to 6" limbs. It's a
chipper only unit. The blades do come through-bolted with nuts on the back like the
chipper blades are attached on the old TroyBilt Tomahawk. The allen-screw-only attachment of the
chipper blade on the Mac is NOT a good design. I stripped out one of the 3 screws my first time removing them. Now, I only put the screws back with the BLUE thread stuff, not the red that they probably used initially, and I use a real allen wrench that fits on my socket handle, not one of those icky little right angle things.
A shredder assembly, like is on the Mac and on my old TroyBilt Tomahawk has 4 shafts with 4 hammers on each shaft held in place by some very hard steel hammers that rotate about the shafts. These hammers will smash apart anything that's smaller than about 3/4". Eventually, these hard steal hammers that have square edges get rounded off, and the spacers between them get kinda beat up; so about every 100-200 hours you have to drive out the shafts after removing some keeper pins and replace the spacers and at least rotate the hammers. You can usually rotate hammers 4 times until all 4 corners get rounded off. Then you replace them, too. This is not the most pleasant maintenance job in the world but isn't a show stopper to anyone mechanically inclined. I just did it on my old TroyBilt. I understand it's easier on the Mac because the hopper comes off, and you can get at the shafts from up top rather than wallowing around on the floor with the TroyBilt. Haven't done it on the Mac but have heard from another TBNer who has a couple or more times.
A guy is coming to look at my TroyBilt tomorrow to hopefully buy it. It's getting kinda long in the tooth in some minor ways but still works well after 15+ years. It's made of thicker steel everywhere than the Mac is, but it's a VERY noisey beast. Got it priced at $150, just to get at least my $75 worth of spacers I put into it. Sold the shredder-only Mac last fall to a guy with another Gravely to drive it. He wanted it to whack up his blueberry canes. Canes and leaves it did fine.
Ralph
