Purchased Dougherty Turbo Saw (3 point) - First Experience with Video

[Piston]

I missed this thread when you posted back in January.

Can you give us a quick review of how you like the tree saw now that you've had it for a little while?

have you cut any other trees? I"m curious how you think it would work on typical eastern hardwoods, like maple, birch, oak, hickory etc?

Do you have some pictures that you could post?

I've been thinking about one of these saws for a long time, but hesitant due to my relatively low hp of 39 pto hp.

 

[christophercale]

The saw performs as advertised, it is very heavy duty and it cuts through trees with ease. Once you start to get above about 10 to 12 inches in diameter, it becomes a little more work since you may have to come at the tree from a couple of different angles to get all the way through it.

I've learned that it is best for the larger trees, to first cut the tree off about 1.5 feet or so above ground level first, then come back and cut the rest of the stump at ground level. This allows the PTO shaft to be more straight when cutting the heaviest portion of the tree. Then when you lop off the rest of the stump, you don't have the weight of the tree pushing down on the blade.

I found that I was pretty clumsy with the unit when I first started, but I've gotten pretty good at handling it since. With some finesses, you can use the grapple to push trees backwards as you cut to; A) Keep the cut open while back into it, and B), Make it fall backwards so as not to hit the tractor.

The biggest limitations that I've found are:

1) It is not always easy to use the grapple to grab and drag trees. The design of the grapple requires that there be something to grab onto at the base of the tree, other than the trunk, in order to drag it out by the base of the trunk (so that the tree is in a straight line with the tractor). So, you either need a lot of lower level branches, like with a cedar tree, or you need to come at the tree from a different angle and grab the trunk about midway so the tree is perpendicular to the tractor. This can require some maneuvering and requires extra time and effort.

I had a need to drag trees about 200 yards from the cutting site to an open field where I planned to burn. I had to go through a 15 foot gate and the only way to get the trees through was to drag them out in a straight line because the trees were too long to fit through the gate sideways (which is easiest way to grapple them). I had to rig up a chain system which allowed me to attached a looped chain to the base of the sleds on the saw, then wrap a choke chain around 1, or more tree trunks, then attach that to that loop chain, so I could drag them out to the burn pile. This allowed me to grab several large trees at one time for one trip to the pile.

2) It can be difficult to cut on a slope. I've been able to cut on terraces with a gentle slope, but an the bank of a stock pond...forget it. It all depends on the angle and where you can safely place the tractor.

3) Some trees are very difficult to back into to cut. This is mainly trees with large, low level branches which prevent the saw from reaching the tree before the branches are crushing into the tractor. I've had trees where I had to trim low level branches with the chainsaw first just to be able to reach the tree for cutting with the saw.

So, even those these limitations exist, the benefit far outweighs them, at least for me. Once I got the operation of the saw down, it was able to move through a lot of trees pretty quickly. The biggest time consumer for me was dragging trees through the small gate to the burn pile.

One technique that I use for burning is that I will start one pile up and let it start burning. I then have a separate pile of trees that I can grab one-by-one with the grapple and then place into the burn pile. Since I burn in a large open field, I can easily grab each tree about midway up the trunk, lift it, carry it to the burning pile, back up, and drop it. I can move all of the trees without ever getting off of the tractor.

Regarding the HP required to run the unit, my tractor is about 89 HP at the PTO and I'm sure glad that I have all of that power, especially when I start cutting into 10 in + trees. I think that a 40 HP tractor would do fine on smaller trees, maybe 8 in or less, but I don't know if I would want to cut much larger. The saw weighs over 800 lbs, so you would probably benefit from having a FEL or counter weights on the front of the tractor for safety.

The only trees that I have cut are Huisache and Mesquite, both of these trees are pretty dense, especially mesquite. I can't tell you how it will do on other types of trees.

Hope this helps.

Christopher

 

[LouieJunior]

What about keeping the saw blade sharp? Cutting at ground level (into the dirt) suggest to me sharpening often. Can you elaborate on this? I use a brush cutter which is a high-powered weed wacker with a saw blade to cut scores of 3-4" willows. The blade is only sharp for one day -- tops.

 

[Piston]

Chris,
Thanks for the excellent info, and the honest review.

Do you have a powershift transmission, or are you having to clutch in and out when your backing into a tree? I can see how one of these would be great with an HST transmission, but you just wouldn't have the power at the pto.

Louie,
Until Chris comments, I'll mention that I believe the teeth on these saws are simliar to our stumpgrinder teeth. They supposedly have a "life" of something like 300-500 hours or so, according to the website. They can be rotated 4 times as all 4 sides are cutters.
It is not like a typical sawblade like on the brush saws.

 

[christophercale]

I was surprised how long the cutting teeth stayed sharp. Since I'm cutting at ground level, I am hitting dirt and rock. My property has a lot of rock ranging from pebble size up to softball size. I keep a garden hoe with me while I'm working and if I'm in a patch where I have a lot of rocks, I will walk around the trees and use the hoe to knock rocks away from the immediate vicinity of the tree, just 2 or 3 feet is all that's needed. Yea, it takes extra time, but I'm sure it will extend the life of the blade.

The teeth are very tough and can be rotated 4 times. I have only rotated one time since January. Of course, I'm only cutting mainly on weekends because of that pesky full time job I have. They are really easy to rotate. There is an allen head set screw in the middle of the tooth, just loosen, rotate the cutting tooth one quarter turn counter clockwise, put a dab of loctite blue on the screw, and nail it down. It took me about 30 minutes to rotate all of the teeth.

The unit is very heavy duty, there is nothing flimsy on it all and it easily has stood up the abuse that I've put it through. On a side note, I sure am glad that the unit has a slip clutch instead of a shear pin. I've gotten into 4 or 5 trees where the blade got bound up in the cut and either slowed down or just stopped spinning, all while the PTO shaft was going full speed. In those cases, I quickly disengaged the PTO shaft and pulled the tractor forward away from the tree. I could then re-engage the PTO and the blade just starts spinning again and is ready to cut.

Also, I've learned to go full throttle on every cut. The faster the blade is spinning, the easier it cuts. Of course, the tractor is only running full throttle for a few seconds while you are backing into a tree. The saw can cut through an 8 in tree in about 2 to 4 seconds (yes, really). Once you get above about 10 inches, cutting time may be longer because you may need to hit the cut 2 or 3 times, or even move the tractor to hit it from another angle.

I don't have a powershift tranny, I am having to clutch and shift. It was quite a chore getting used to both the tractor and the saw since I bought them both at the same time. However, clutching the tractor has become second nature for me and I'm able to move about pretty quickly.


Christopher

 

[Piston]

I think for anything over 10", I'd be using the chainsaw anyways. For me, I have a TON of trees just too big for the brush hog, but not so large that they're worth much for firewood or sawlogs. I have been thinking for a while between something like the Turbo Saw/Brown Tree Saw, or something like a Brown Tree Cutter. I am low on HP for a 5' tree cutter so it wouldn't be very efficient, but I've heard from other's that it would "work".


Did you look into a Brown Tree Cutter at all? Or, any other tree saws? What about tree shears?

 

[christophercale]

I looked at every option that I could think of for about 6 months which included: A) Hiring a dozer, B) Renting a dozer and doing it myself, C) Hiring an excavator with a grubbing bucket, C) Hiring a Hydro-Axe, etc... These options were costly and in the end, I would not have anything to show for my investment, other than the cleared areas.

I wanted to invest in my own equipment that I could use on future projects in addition to the clearing. I did consider a skidsteer and tree shear, but it was also pretty costly. Plus I did not feel confident that a tree shear would be able to cut stuff larger than about 8 inches, or cut very cleanly at ground level.

I did look at the Brown tree cutter and I would LOVE to have one of those, but they are very expensive. I decided against it because I wanted to cut trees at ground level and I didn't want to spend $8K or more.

So, I narrowed it down to the tractor and the Turbo Saw and I've been very happy with my choice. My next purchase will be a heavy duty shredder, and I already have the tractor to pull it, so I'm getting more for my initial investment.

 

[deerseeker001]

that Saw could do some serious damage.

 

[ns_in_tex]

Is you L4610, HST transmission? If so, I think you could cut most any kind of tree.
We have a L4610, and looked as some of these saws, but decided to build our own. We have cut stumps at ground level that were up to 48" diameter. This is where a bigger blade helps. Ours is a 48" blade and will only cut about 19" deep in a single cut. Sometimes we have to cut as deep as possible, then use a chain saw to cut some of that off so we can reach deeper.

While more HP is almost always better, we are happy with ours and we do have a 105 HP gear tractor, which we have not tried it on. One other thing, I don't know about the store bought ones, but ours can sometimes sling a lot of chips toward the operator. (we have a cab)

I missed this thread when you posted back in January.

Can you give us a quick review of how you like the tree saw now that you've had it for a little while?

have you cut any other trees? I"m curious how you think it would work on typical eastern hardwoods, like maple, birch, oak, hickory etc?

Do you have some pictures that you could post?

I've been thinking about one of these saws for a long time, but hesitant due to my relatively low hp of 39 pto hp.

 

[My Gym]

I purchased a turbosaw about 2 years ago and have used it on a 30 HP pto John Deere 3038e. It is a load for the tractor and strains the tractor getting the saw up to speed. It cuts trees up to telephone pole size easily. I do not have rear hydro so I cannot use the grapple. If a larger tree leans towards the tractor it will bind the blade and stall the tractor. I have cut about 500+ eastern red cedar. Sizes from 1/2" to about 20" stumps. On level ground you can cut the tree at or slightly below ground level. I have not rotated the teeth yet, but about 1/2 of them are chipped by hitting I believe metal in fence lines. (a couple of electric fence posts, imbedded barb wire and woven wire, and a couple pieces of scrap metal.) I get hit by wood chips when cutting trees, and the ROP has saved me from a couple of trees that fell on the tractor. I found it safer to cut larger trees with a chainsaw at 1-2' above ground and cut the stump with the turbo saw.