Grapple or 4 way bucket? Which one?

[xxxsandman]

Well I ended up buying today a supper heavy duty 72" open style grapple with dual rams, 72" Low profile bucket, Pallet forks, and hay spear all skid steer compatible.

I just installed the skid steer adapter plate and 3rd valve tonight on my L48. I hooked the grapple up and only got to play a few minutes in the dark. First thoughts are it's very BIG and feels very STRONG. I will try to find the brand and model tomorrow and post it.

It worked great moving some railroad ties while I was testing it.

My only concern is I'm worried I bought too heavy of a grapple. The L48 has good lift capacity, but I can tell this thing weighs a lot empty. I just hope it can lift it and a full load of trees/brush.

I spent right at $2,600 on all 4 items. The grapple was the most expensive at $1,500.

I almost went the 4 in 1 route, but the ones they had in stock at the place I went looked a little weird at the back of the bucket and I wasn't sure.

 

[alchemysa]

Out of interest, did you get a price on a 4in1?

 

[xxxsandman]

I did, but I can't remember what it was. It would have been less expensive then the grapple and new bucket I got and I considered it strongly, but it looked kind of weird in it's design, it had a pretty deep V near the back, where the front meets the back blade. I know material would get stuck in this V. Lifting the clam would probably free the material, but I just wasn't sure about it.

 

[IslandTractor]

I hope you have adequate net lift capacity left over with that heavy grapple. If you have 1000lbs net lift remaining you should do fine if you're interested in moving brush and logs. I've always argued that tractor based TLBs are really nothing like skid steers and that light duty or at most medium duty grapples are more than adequate. There is also no reason to buy a grapple that is as wide as your bucket. At least one size down makes more sense as you are not using the volumetric capacity of the bucket and you can clamp just about anything with a single grapple. I have yet to find anything at all that I could not clamp into my 48" single grapple that weighs 285lbs. Sometimes I grapple things I cannot lift but I have never had trouble grappling any object. The extra grapple is just more weight and expense IMO.

I must confess that while I am a grapple first advocate, I saw a deal on eBay I could not refuse and just won an auction on a 60" WR Long 4n1 bucket with an electric diverter kit (Total cost was less than the diverter kit including shipping!!! ). I will need to modify the attachment from a JD quick attach to a universal QA but that shouldn't be too difficult. So, I'll have a bit more experience with a 4n1 soon to add to the discussion. The 4n1 is a bit oversized for my tractor but as lift capacity is not important to me we'll see how it goes. My first major use will be in renovating an old lawn so I anticipate using the scaping and bulldozing functions more than the grappling function of the 4n1.

 

[xxxsandman]

Well I believe my L48's lift capacity is 2,500 pounds, so i would hope I could lift 1,000lbs of material in my grapple, but I might be pushing it, since this grapple is so heavily made.

The sun in shining today, so I will go play with it. I'll see how many rail road ties I can lift, they are heavy!

 

[xxxsandman]

Here's a picture of me lifting a 18' long, 2' diameter pipe that has about 3/16" walls. It's HEAVY! It lifted it all the way to the top, no problem. I think I will be OK with this heavy duty grapple, but I wouldn't recommend it for any compact tractor, it's just too heavy and big. It would work good on a large tractor, backhoe or large skid steer. Man it's powerful!

The brand is Piranha.

 

[Grrrr]

Glad it has worked out for you. It sure looks like one heavy duty grab

 

[IslandTractor]

Well I believe my L48's lift capacity is 2,500 pounds, so i would hope I could lift 1,000lbs of material in my grapple, quote]

as you found out, with a lift capacity that great you won't have any trouble.

 

[Glowplug]

I haven't been around for a couple of months. It's good to see that IslandTractor is still the grapple authority here. Hopefully that 4-n-1 bucket doesn't convert you. I AM very jealous though. I would LOVE to have a 4-n-1 bucket. . .mainly for yanking out fence posts.

That grapple looks almost identical to mine. I got mine from Markham and it is really almost too heavy duty. It is the 66" version. If your lift capacity is 2,500lbs you should be okay though. My lift capacity is a little less than that. I moved a huge stump with mine and it wasn't maxed out.

Keep us posted on the grappling fun!

 

[ksmmoto]

I have the Piranha 66" on my Kubota L3430 with the L513 loader and it does fine. I can't hardly believe some of the loads I have lifted! The bucket does feel real heavy, but it hasn't held me back any. I am in the middle of a large project with clearing brush and I will post photos in a day or two.

ksmmoto