Your opinion please?

[Deerlope]

I am designing and building a 3pt hitch logging winch and as yet I am undecided whether to go with a pto winch or a hydraulic. Each unit will cost about the same. e-bay has hundreds of them for sale. I figure that I will have around $650 bucks in the whole thing. I already got the frame made out 3x3x1/4 hollow square tube so all I need is the winch and to mount it.

 

[wroughtn_harv]

hydraulic, period, paragraph, page, chapter, book.

 

[ges]

Opinion....I agree with Wroughtn harv, hyd.

My brother went through the same thing, alot of thinking, research, and then fabracation.

He mounted it on his 3pt., bought the hyd. remote kit from Kubota, installed the kit himself, and runs it from that.

He also has a woods hyd. boom that he uses with it at times. Works good. He had alot of thought as to what size verses speed for his use.

In the end he bought a new hyd. winch, and with the remotes it was more than $650.00.

Oh, it's set up on a Kubota 4310. If you want more info, let me know and I will track him down and find out for you. George.

 

[rambler]

I have no experience with winches, but 30 years of farming makes me pick a hydraulic unit of 'something' over an electric unit for durability & service about 99% of the time....

--->Paul

 

[Youare]

I have not operated a hydraulic power winch, only experience is with a PTO driven unit so my comment is more of a question.

Having used the same winch on two different horsepower tractors I have noticed a difference in operation which leads me to my question.

One tractor an older gas powered engine which generated more torque at lower RPM vs. a diesel powered engine which required higher RPM to develop the about the same torque.

I currently operate my winch with the tractor RPM's around 1500, 30 hp. Kubota.

If you are running on the tractor hydraulic to power the winch at what RPM would you have to run the tractor to get the proper hydraulic flow rate and pressure?

Randy

 

[Deerlope]

At this point in time I am looking at Milemaker hyd. winch rated 10,500 lbs. on e-bay. I guess from what I have researched so far they hook up to the power steering on a vechile and require 3.5 gpm. My tractor produces 4.9 gpm but I would not hook to the steering I would go to the remote which is 8.3gpm. still doing my home work.

 

[Deerlope]

Ges,
I agree that having to buy the Bota remote would put the price well over $650 but I had the remote put on a few months ago and it was not cheap.

 

[missourihick]

I never used a winch on a tractor,but I have used both hydraulic and pto driven winches on rollback car haulers and tow trucks and there is no comparison between the two.
GO HYDRAULIC!! GO HYDRAULIC!! GO HYDRAULIC!!

 

[AndyMA]

Clearly the tone of most of the responses is to go hydraulic and I am a hydraulic fan myself. That said, why do you think most of the commercial logging winches use the PTO setup with a large clutch that resembles a car clutch? I myself use a Farmi 501 PTO winch and find it works great. Speed is very variable and it never fails to get the logs out.
Rember you need slow speed and a lot of pull to get the logs moving and then you need some speed to pull them in the 150' feet or so to the tractor.

Andy

 

[Deerlope]

Andy, I agree that the PTO winches are very nice and do work well, but they are just a little bit out of my budget. Also I like to design and build things.I am retired and have the time . I am not into logging any long. I do fire wood for myself and don't want to have to string out 50ft. of chain. I got a lot of dead Tamrack in hard to get at places and think that a wicnh would be just the ticket even if I do build it myself. Thanks fo your input.