PTO Chippers

[Lucky Dog]

Looking at adding a 3 pt PTO chipper to the attachment fleet.

It seems that there are two styles of shippers, one has some king of hydraulic or mechanical system that feeds the wood into the chipper, and the other relies on the cutter wheel to "pull" the wood in.

What are the pro's and con's of each type?

For my use, I'll be chipping more brushy type stuff with limbs and leaves. I'm thinking that some sort of feed system would be better for that type of stuff?

Feel free to post up your favorite chipper and why you like it.

Thanks

 

[Gem99ultra]

I like the fact that the chipper will pull in the wood/limbs/vines, etc. without me having to stand there and feed every piece. I can just shove it in to get it started and go back to collecting the next item to feed. For me, there's no comparison in a self feeding chipper and a manual feed chipper.

 

[Minsid]

Feeding separated from cutting allows control the intake speed for thicker stuff, reverse if it gets plugged or catches on clothing. Thats the only option I considered.

 

[Hughman]

I have the hydraulic feeder on my woodland mills chipper. Highly recommend it.

 

[AndyMA]

I have a Valby Ch260 hydraulic feed chipper for sale in Woodstock Conn

 

[oosik]

Manual in-feed or hydraulic in-feed. It, more or less, depends upon what you will be chipping too.

I thin my pine stands and chip the small ( 1 inch to 6 inches, on the butt ) trees only. Little to no limbs and the small trees are chipped whole.

My manual feed Wallenstein BX62S - powered by my Kubota M6040 - works great. Just feed the tree in, butt first, and the chipper pulls it in and does the chipping.

You might need a chipper with hydraulic feed if.......
- your tractor is on the lower end of the required power. This can allow you to slow down the speed of chipping when chipping larger material.
- you will be chipping gnarly, twisted limbs that might get stuck. This can allow you to reverse - back out - stuff and clear what is stuck.

 

[ericm979]

I have a manual feed chipper (MacKissick TH-184) and a hydraulic feed one (Woodmaxx 8H). The manual feed tends to "grab" and pull material in at a very fast rate. To the point that I made it a rule to always handle material in such a way that when it grabs it won't pull my hand down the chute. The other problem is when it doesn't grab and you have to shove stuff in to get it to grab.

The power feed is much safer because it feed slower and at a constant rate. If your material is at all variable I suggest paying a bit more for variable speed hydraulic feed.

The only reason I still have the manual feed chipper is that it's also a shredder and my wife likes shredded leaves for mulch. When I got the power feed chipper I stopped using it to chip.

 

[oosik]

My Wally chipper will chip my young pines faster than two people can feed it.

Every two to three years I thin my pine stands. This ends up with 800 to 1000 small trees to be chipped. Usually ten to twelve to fifteen piles.

I don't have the time to wait for a hydraulic in-feed to meter the flow.

My M6040 has the power and the Wally has the ability to deal with continuous feed.

A note - if you are dealing with trees with a rough, granular bark - like my pines - wear gloves. Bare handed - my pines will literally shred the skin in the palms of you hands.

I will go thru a brand new pair of top quality leather work gloves in two sessions of chipping.

 

[grsthegreat]

I have an old chinese jimna 6 chipper that is maybe 20 years old. Still works great. Has a self feeding, non hydraulic feeder that works pretty good, but not perfect. The best thing about hydraulic feeder is its ability to reverse.
That would be the only reason id get rid of my old chipper.
During covid i was on a wait list for new hydraulic chipper, but after 3 months wait along with a nearly $600 increase in price while waiting, i cancelled order.

Glad i did. I spent a day tearing mine apart, replacing blades and anvil, realligning stuff and welding up some weak spots. Its working like brand new again.

 

[ericm979]

My experience is that pine and fir is the easiest to chip. The wood is soft and the branches don't stick out at funny angles too often. Some of my brush like french broom, it also pretty easy to chip. Wood that is harder and has branches that grow at 90 degree angles is more difficult to chip.

The power chipper will easily pull in stuff that I'd have to shove really hard into the self-feeding chipper. That's what makes it easier to use and safer.