Disappointing Product Info

[catvet]

I filled in the request for info on the Power Trac site. Was hopinf for some additional info about the machines and attachments. What I got was pretty much exactly what is already on the site.

I'd be interested in an attachment which could handle large rocks for building stone walls. Would the Tree hugger attachment do something like that? Does it rotate at all. There seem to be various attachments available for tractors and skid steers which would do this well.

For Instance:

Jawz

or
EZ Spot UR rock and tree handler

 

[NJBill]

I am currently trying to obtain information about the PT, and what makes it work. Even though I have owned one for two years, there are still so many tit-bits of information, which would solve many problems. I took about ten minutes to read the entire owners manual, quite a number of times, without finding anything new.
I can understand your feelings, information out of Power-Trac is at a very high premium, not necessarily of a monetary nature, it is more of a possessive nature, some thing like, this is mine and nobody gets to know anything about it, unless they...... and this is where I am stumped. I do not have the golden key,or the ingenious code which will take me beyond that point. Direct Email may reach it's point but I do not know, there is never an acknowledgment of mail received.
You are in contact now with your best informative source, most of the PT owners have answers to your type of questions, and they don't mind sharing with others, even when they designed, or redesigned a PT Attachment.
Actually they are the enemies of Power-Trac, because they are, for the most part real super D I Y'ers. Good Luck anyway.
Bill

 

[Charlie_Iliff]

My best source at Power Trac is Terry Estep, who heads the service department.
I haven't looked at the tree hugger, but will when I go there Friday. I would think the best bet for wall building would be the grapple bucket. I also have a Lackender hoe on mine, similar to the mini hoe, which has a thumb, so closes on rocks efectively. I suspect I'm limited to about 250 lb. with the hoe and maybe 750 lb. in the grapple bucket on my 1845. The rotation function would be great, but it makes it more complex, and the weight of the grapples that are available is pretty high.
How big are the rocks you plan to work with?

 

[catvet]

Charlie,

The rocks vary but might be up to say 3 ft. x 3 ft.

I'm sure the people at Power Trac are good at answering questions. The problem is I don't know the questions at this point. I'm trying to get more general info and a feel of Power Trac compared to other types of work machinery. I'm impressed with the info here on TBN but was hopefully that product literature from Power Trac would have more "meat" that could help me.

 

[Charlie_Iliff]

A ton per rock, perhaps? I think a Power Trac 2460 or 2460 would handle it in the heavy grapple bucket, but I'll try to look tomorrow and see if it has 3' clearance.
Anything carrying a rock like that is unlikely to blaze around hilly places with complete safety, but I think I'd prefer a Power Trac's stability to that of a skid steer.
I agree with Moss Road that forks will do the job for most rocks, and you could add grapples to make them a bit more secure. There are grapple kits available. I don't know if PT has ever adapted theirs to forks.

 

[ewl]

I'm considering the MiniJawz for complementing the grapple bucket for clearing paths. Stuart Cave at
316-633-4237 Direct
415-285-2707 Corporate
stuart@starhilljawz.com
www.starhilljawz.com

He provided the following information after I spoke with him:

"Hello Ernie,

It was nice speaking to you this morning. I called Power Trac and asked them about the hydraulic quick couplers. Power Trac uses the 1/2" quick couplers - ball style. Our Mini Jawz uses the 1/2" flat faced couplers. You can easily get adapters to change the ball style to make it compatible with the flat faced or vice versa. As I stated on the phone, Jawz is currently being used to remove honeysuckle very effectively. Instead of using a tow rope to remove the honeysuckle, you can easily grab the bush or vines ripping them out root and all. I will look into shipping without the quick attach backplate."

For 3 ft rocks you would likely need a standard, not mini Jawz, but Stuart is a great and willing source.

 

[J_J]

I'm considering the MiniJawz for complementing the grapple bucket for clearing paths. Stuart Cave at
316-633-4237 Direct
415-285-2707 Corporate
stuart@starhilljawz.com
www.starhilljawz.com

He provided the following information after I spoke with him:

"Hello Ernie,

It was nice speaking to you this morning. I called Power Trac and asked them about the hydraulic quick couplers. Power Trac uses the 1/2" quick couplers - ball style. Our Mini Jawz uses the 1/2" flat faced couplers. You can easily get adapters to change the ball style to make it compatible with the flat faced or vice versa. As I stated on the phone, Jawz is currently being used to remove honeysuckle very effectively. Instead of using a tow rope to remove the honeysuckle, you can easily grab the bush or vines ripping them out root and all. I will look into shipping without the quick attach backplate."

For 3 ft rocks you would likely need a standard, not mini Jawz, but Stuart is a great and willing source.

cHECKED OUT HIS WEB SITE, BUT NEVER DID SEE A PRICE. DID HE QUOTE YOU A PRICE?

 

[Charlie_Iliff]

Catvet:
At Power Trac on Friday, Hans Luginbuhl (Bubenberg) and I looked at the tree hugger, mini hoe, forks and 4 n 1 and grapple buckets regarding your questions about placing rocks in a wall. The tree hugger does not rotate, and clamps only horizontally. The mini hoe doesn't have a thumb and probably wouldn't handle as much weight as you'd like, but with some minor modification to add a thumb would be good at amaller rock placement. (See Babineau's thread and check with Sedgewood re thumb.) Forks would probably do most placement jobs, and give you the most weight capability, and the grapple or 4 n 1 bucket would handle the most shapes. I'd go with the grapple bucket or 4 n 1.
Power Trac doesn't make a perfect rock placement tool, but I'm not sure others do either. The rotating jaw devices look great, but they're expensive, heavy and may have trouble gripping irregular rocks.
I didn't see any rocks in Power Trac's demo area, but if you call them and tell them what you want to do, maybe they can find some for you to try stacking with the various attachments.

 

[MossRoad]

How's Hans theses days? Please tell him we said hi! Thanks.

 

[Charlie_Iliff]

Hans is working way too hard, looking forward to winter when mowing isn't needed. He's also doing some work on websites, setting them up to be more attractive to search engines -- a retirement plan of sorts.