gas powered hand held PHD

Nomoregears · Feb 22, 2006

I couldn't recommend the gas PHD 2 man. We call ours the man killer. I weigh in at 200 and it can toss me. Loud, fumes and it didn't do that well in upstate NY glacial till. I have a PHD for my tractor. Accessibility is usually a problem on the fence lines here.
I use T Stakes now with my home made pounder.

hunterridgefarm · Mar 10, 2006

Chris,
I ran across this piece of equipment yesterday and thought about this post.

The rental place in town has a PHD mounted on a small tracked unit. Don't know the brand or name but it is the kind that has a small place for you to stand on the unit, very compact. Kinda reminds me of the small trenchers. Weight is around 2000# with auger and will fit in the back of your truck. Just might be an easy way to get in between those trees.

Soundguy · Mar 12, 2006

Neat idea.. thanks for the heads up!

Soundguy

midlf · Mar 12, 2006

Home Depot around here (SE WI) have these units, also includes trencher.

flusher · Mar 12, 2006

Maybe you saw one of those neat Kanga G-724 stand-on skid steer loaders with the auger attachment replacing the bucket. See

Kanga loader with auger

Henry · Mar 12, 2006

I live up near Jacksonville, Fla. ... digging thru first few feet of sand is pretty easy. If you don't think you need to get into limerock, I would think that one of the smaller 2-man units would be the easiest / cheapest for your task. You'll probably still need some down-pressure to drill thru the sand, and that will certainly be easier with a 2-man unit.

Diggin' holes up in Pennsylvnia, where I also have property is a different story. I tried a 2-man gas powered unit to dig about 20 post-holes around my pool.... It was a very manly task if you get my drift.... extremenly difficult. I now have a PHD on the tractor!

flusher · Mar 14, 2006

Today I happened to be at my local Home Depot box in Red Bluff CA when they were delivering one of those rental units you mentioned.

This one was a PowerHouse Pro compact utility loader.

PowerHouse Pro compact utility loader

It's a 4-wheel skid steer, stand-on unit (looks like a little Bobcat). It's transported on a twin-axle trailer with ramps. Besides a FEL bucket, it has a post hole digger with 3 auger sizes (9", 12" and 15") and a general purpose frame that can be used to tote stuff around. YOu can also attach scarifiers to that frame for grading work.

The HD rental guy said it rents for $175-200 per day (24 hours).

midlf · Mar 15, 2006

Yep that it. The ones around here also have a trencher attachment as well as the post hole diggers. The picture of the trailer on the website shows the trencher mounted on top.

flusher · Mar 15, 2006

Forgot to mention the trencher attachment. It's a real beast. The guy delivering the unit to the store fired up the trencher and showed how it can be angled almost vertically.

Looks like this is the way to go for trenching. Last May I rented one of those Ditch Witch 1330 walk-behind trenchers from HD. Cut about 1100 feet of trench (12", 18" and 24" depths) in about 8 hours. That 1000-lb moose didn't have a true skid steer capability. Nearly killed myself muscleing that thing into position at the start of the trench lines. And it cost $125 rental for a day (24 hours). For an extra $50 or $75 bucks I'll use this riding trencher next time I have a job like that.