Ideal grapple size ?

[bcarwell]

I have a smaller FEL bucket that measures 21" from cutting edge to top of bucket (on compact Kubota 7500). My bucket is only 48" wide, e.g. not exactly a monster. Conventional wisdom is apparently to put a 28" grapple fork on it that will make the tip of the fork just about touch the cutting edge in the closed position.

Here's the deal though: I'm just picking up piles of brush and twigs. I doubt I'll ever be lifting boulders, tree trunks, etc. (one reason being the limited lifting power of my FEL). So I'm more concerned about grasping biggest "bites" of brush than I am grasping ability around boulders.

With the shorter grapple fork, I'm concerned that the forks won't extend far enough out over the top of the brush pile and most of it will just not be grasped. I am planning on using some forks or tooth bar that extends the cutting edge out a few feet so I can grasp bigger piles and if so, think I need longer grapple forks than would be conventional.

Does anyone see any problem in me getting maybe a 34 or 36 inch grapple fork such that when fully closed the fork tips would extend below the FEL cutting edge ? Or would the extra 6 or 8 inche lenght of the grapple forks not do much over a 28 ? I know its added weight and less power at the end of the longer grapple fork. But again I don't think I'm going to need grasping power so much as length. I had though maybe I could have the best of both worlds by getting the 28" for boulders etc. and fab some sort of detachable grapple fork extenders when I'm moving brush piles.

Any thoughts and advice ?

 

[Renze]

You're talking about putting a grab on your existing earth bucket ?

When loading brush, i'd make the hinge point of the grab about a feet above the bucket, and maybe a bit forward as well. Then it sweeps a lot of brush into your bucket, instead of only -holding- the brush that you can pushload into the bucket.
I decided to not go polyvalent, but convert an old silage block cutter into a conventional muck fork with hardened tines and a simple top-down holding clamp, and later (if i ever have time) use the 6ft lengths of 60x40mm bars i have around, to make a brush fork, with a filling clamp as described above.
Reason is that i need to be able to handle the muck fork on the 3pt of my 3011 to clean out barns with a low door height, which weighs only around 1800kg so it isnt a lot of mass to penetrate hard packed muck: thin hardened silage tines are better. But for brush, branches get tangled up between the tines and bending them past their breaking point. For muck, i want to work quickly with a small cylinder (little oil displacement, quicker load cycles) which contradicts with the optimum for brush: a big clamp that compresses a big bite of brush into the fork opening, which you tip forward before taking a bite so it actually works like a clamshell bucket.

 

[jd2305cd]

You might consider making it like the conventional grapples, that goes right to the bucket cutting edge. Then make something that slips on, or pins in when you want the extra length.

I agree, when grabbing a pile of brush the more you can get in one shot the better. I think with a set of bucket forks and the regular grapple, that you would be surprised how much of a grab you can take..

 

[jimgerken]

For brush and limbs, fork tines and a grapple work better than a bucket with grapple. Tines are able to stab right into a pile or scrape up the limbs off the ground. You can pick up several times more material than a bucket would.

 

[alchemysa]

With the shorter grapple fork, I'm concerned that the forks won't extend far enough out over the top of the brush pile

Does anyone see any problem in me getting maybe a 34 or 36 inch grapple fork such that when fully closed the fork tips would extend below the FEL cutting edge ?

Any thoughts and advice ?

When you need to pick up big piles you tilt the bucket forward while the claw is open. This way you can cover and pick up a pretty big pile of brush. And I think you will be much better off with a grapple with points that make contact with the cutting edge. Getting a grapple with points that extend significantly below the bucket would be a mistake in my opinion.

 

[JasonL]

I second what Alchemysa said. To grab big bites of brush you simply open the grapple as wide as possible then rotate the bucket down and lower it over the pile. Then close. You want the grapple and bucket teeth/tines/forks to nearly touch or you will lose a lot of brush! Jason