Rent or buy a chipper-- I need to decide soon

[plowhog]

because the branches break off.

You mean like this ... small branch ... that recently came down? (This is what prompted me to do trimming this year.)

 

[plowhog]

Here's a picture that provides better reference for the size of these trees. I still can't fit the whole tree in the picture-- it continues up!

 

[GirlWhoWantsTractor]

Here's a picture that provides better reference for the size of these trees. I still can't fit the whole tree in the picture-- it continues up!

View attachment 574644

Amazing!

 

[newbury]

If you have limbs like the one pictured falling frequently buying instead of renting certainly makes sense.

I'm partial to piling limbs and letting them rot, if possible. I bought a Jinma 8" chipper because I had about a quarter acre of saplings etc. to cleanup in Alexandria, Virginia. No burning allowed, 20 miles 1 way to pay to dump, couldn't have big piles of brush around without the County and neighbors complaining. Renting a chipper would have cost me more than the $1700 I paid for my Jinma.

Of note is that the only difference between a 6" Jinma chipper and an 8" Jinma chipper was the size of the hole and the cost at some vendors. But when I bought from Ranch Hand supply all he had were 8 inchers.

 

[plowhog]

I have about 50+ acres that is forested, the rest is not. It is heavily "overstocked" and I will likely do a timber harvest in Spring. There are pines, oaks, madrone, cedar, and a lot more. Around the house there are tulip trees, a regular oak, a red oak, the large oaks in the pictures, more oaks not in the picture, a walnut, a chestnut, doug firs, about 20 apple trees in the apple orchard, and the list goes on.

The bears (five of them) finally finished eating the apples, but since they break branches there is a lot of cleanup already. I have acres of ground where there are far too many small pines for the forest to be healthy, so cutting some out to give the others breathing room would be good. I guess I'm talking myself into buying a chipper?

When I looked at chippers a few years ago, my favorite at that time was the Salsco. But it was also very expensive. I need to get back to shopping, but if I recall the Woodland Mills and the Woodmaxx were both about $3,500, and both seemed to have a good reputation.

I was hoping to find a good chipper that would run either on my small tractor (19 pto HP) or the bigger one (45 pto HP.) But I think it might be more sensible to size and fit a chipper to the bigger tractor and give up on finding one that works on only 19 HP.

In Fall, I have leaves on the property measured in .... feet above the ground. I use a Husqvarna GT48DXLS and Cyclone Rake on that. Have not considered a shredder-- I just pile the debris up and burn. (The County requires burning a mix of wood with the leaves, not burning sole leaves themselves.)

 

[HillStreet]

I used to have a chipper and made a lot of chips. In the past 3 years I stacked the branches after harvesting firewood and just burn once a year, usually in winter. It’s now my preferred method.

 

[plowhog]

Did you have a use for the chips? In my case I could put them down on some dirt roads through the property. Or put them down where I am trying to get weeds not to grow?

 

[Jack Yuan]

My farm is getting pretty wooded. As time passes I will use the wood for my winter heating rather than buying as is the current process.

I don't want to hire tree removal done as I don't want the liability and other things I can't control. I have been seriously thinking about a chipper and looking at them in the 4" 3 pt range....running around $1700 and all seem to be of the same design, aka same source, just different stickers, like after market power steering units and drum mowers which I have one of each.

Nearest town is 25 miles and my limited experience with rentals is you don't know what you are going to get and not knowing how to operate it is a big negative. Still thinking about it.

Hi Mark, Nova Tractor company is located in Houston, Texas. They have the chipper you want, if you want, you can go there and have close watch on their chipper. Just give them a call. This is their site: NOVATRACTOR

 

[plowhog]

Hi Mark, Nova Tractor company is located in Houston, Texas.

Nice to see the spammer pitch man again ... not. Q- where are you? You are not in China quoting Ronald Reagan in your signature: "Man is not free unless government is limited." You would be instead strung up by your appendages.

I recommend never buying anything Nova Tractor-- their stuff is cheap made crap and is way overpriced. My brother-in-law's second cousins best friend had a hand chopped off by a tractor product-- it might have been a Nova. Can you try selling condoms instead?

 

[papachaz]

I bought the chinese knockoff of the wallenstein bx42. This isn't big enough for what you need by any means, and it's gravity feed, but man I love having my own chipper! just go ahead and buy one, you WILL get enough use out of it (based on your description) to merit it. Plus you'll have plenty of mulch composting and ready when needed