MBTRAC
Gold Member
- Joined
- Mar 28, 2012
- Messages
- 390
- Location
- NSW Australia
- Tractor
- Tractors16-600hp Farm & Earthmoving Equip, Trucks etc.
Welcome to the forum & congratulations on your farm purchase.
IMO steer clear of skid/dozer/loader style tracked machines unless you know exactly what you're getting youself into owning, maintaining & operating.......the cheapest thing about any of these style tracked machines is buying- repairs & maintenance will soon outway the cost of purchase ....We run a lot of farm (16-600hp) & earthmoving gear (skid steers - 20T excavators- D8 size dozers- D75's traxcavators & in between) & with the exception of excavators if I could I'd exit from our tracked gear in an instant, except there are specific jobs this type of gear is best suited......
My advice for clearing a "lot of trees", though it depends on how much land you intend clearing is
- use a contractor: get several quotes on a cost/acre basis & have a clearly defined written agreement on what/how you want the land cleared (i.e. trees ?,stumps? ,roots?, piled/stacked?, mulched?, burnt? ..etc) & mark all trees you wish to remain.
- maybe sell the timber if it's of value, again you need to have a clear agreement on how the land is to be left (otherwise logging contractors will take what's of value & leave a moonscape of stumps/worthless timber debris)
- if practical push the trees over whole as clearing the stumps later may be costly, time consuming & further disturb/erode the land
- unless there are signficant cost saving reasons to use a dozer only, try to minimise dozer use & where practical use an excavator to push trees & stack with a thumb/grapple (excavator tracks & work methods are far "softer" on the land leaving less "witness marks"/damage) into piles for burning (hopefully you can obtain burning approvals.
Sure you can clear c.15ft trees with your own farm tractor but it's slow going & best done with a FEL 4/1, grapple & root rake........just depends how much time you have on your hands....
Whilst I wouldn't recommend a rubber tracked skid steer for private ownership because of the high cost hourly cost of track operation, if you wish to pursue we have found the Takeuchi machines TL 240/250/130 the best overall (post our Bobcat & ASV "experience") - the more viable option for you may be a large wheeled skid steer 4/1 f/w over wheel steel tracks
IMO steer clear of skid/dozer/loader style tracked machines unless you know exactly what you're getting youself into owning, maintaining & operating.......the cheapest thing about any of these style tracked machines is buying- repairs & maintenance will soon outway the cost of purchase ....We run a lot of farm (16-600hp) & earthmoving gear (skid steers - 20T excavators- D8 size dozers- D75's traxcavators & in between) & with the exception of excavators if I could I'd exit from our tracked gear in an instant, except there are specific jobs this type of gear is best suited......
My advice for clearing a "lot of trees", though it depends on how much land you intend clearing is
- use a contractor: get several quotes on a cost/acre basis & have a clearly defined written agreement on what/how you want the land cleared (i.e. trees ?,stumps? ,roots?, piled/stacked?, mulched?, burnt? ..etc) & mark all trees you wish to remain.
- maybe sell the timber if it's of value, again you need to have a clear agreement on how the land is to be left (otherwise logging contractors will take what's of value & leave a moonscape of stumps/worthless timber debris)
- if practical push the trees over whole as clearing the stumps later may be costly, time consuming & further disturb/erode the land
- unless there are signficant cost saving reasons to use a dozer only, try to minimise dozer use & where practical use an excavator to push trees & stack with a thumb/grapple (excavator tracks & work methods are far "softer" on the land leaving less "witness marks"/damage) into piles for burning (hopefully you can obtain burning approvals.
Sure you can clear c.15ft trees with your own farm tractor but it's slow going & best done with a FEL 4/1, grapple & root rake........just depends how much time you have on your hands....
Whilst I wouldn't recommend a rubber tracked skid steer for private ownership because of the high cost hourly cost of track operation, if you wish to pursue we have found the Takeuchi machines TL 240/250/130 the best overall (post our Bobcat & ASV "experience") - the more viable option for you may be a large wheeled skid steer 4/1 f/w over wheel steel tracks
