Let's discuss machetes, shovels, tractors, bulldozers, weedeaters, brush mowers, and other tools for property maintenance.
I'll start:
What 30-35hp tractor should I buy?
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Let's discuss machetes, shovels, tractors, bulldozers, weedeaters, brush mowers, and other tools for property maintenance.
I'll start:
What 30-35hp tractor should I buy?
You can't go wrong with a Deere
The red one. Red is fasterQuote:
Originally Posted by Leavenworth Skier
Are there better axes than the Fiskars ones? Cuz the chopper and splitter that I picked up have been awesome.
I carved a trail 1000' long and 12' wide trail through the brush with Lop-zilla.
Attachment 205283
Ochsenkopf felling axe or double-bit (pronounced: Oxen cough). They probably make really good splitters too.Quote:
Originally Posted by Cruiser
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Originally Posted by wooley12
They say there's no real cure for OCD, that you just have to live with it and manage it the best you can. What do you think?
convinced myself that I have turned it into a likable assetQuote:
Originally Posted by highangle
There actually is a "which tractor should I buy" thread here. Maybe ten years old, but it's there.
i bumped it in january but kq never saw it i guess
answer: get the old diesel one with minimal wiring
I've got 5+ acres of 1970s logged Cascade woods to maintain.
I let the alders die and sit for the woodpeckers unless they're threatening the drive or a building.
But we've got a boatload of vine maple and salmon berry that needs cutting back. Not to mention Himalayan blackberry, cascade creeping blackberry and black cap vine. No ivy thankfully.
A machete works OK and has that dramatic touch, but I really prefer some loppers, a small set and a big set, though not as big as Wooleys. The bigger loppers have an adjustment bolt on them; I think I got them @ HomeDepot. These manage the salmonberry and vine maple pretty well. Also a set with long (like 10 inch) cutting blades. Metal handles on those.
The Himalayan blackberry are nasty and the only way I can eradicate the fuckers are by digging them up. I have snapped or cracked enough of those shitty plastic or fiberglass handled shovels that I don't buy them anymore. I rely on at least one big bladed and one small bladed wood handled shovel for digging up blackberries and ferns, generally preferring the smaller blade since I have to dig around the packed knots of roots that wind around in the dirt here. Digging in rocks is a lot easier with the smaller blade too. The bigger one gets used gardening or digging in easier soils.
I did the driveway (a 300+ foot long 20 foot wide track through vine maple, alders, elderberry and salmonberry) a few weeks ago with the cloppers, using the longblades to chop back the hanging stuff and then the smaller cloppers to cut out the biggers stalks. The elderberry droops into the driveway and yard, but it's really soft and can generally be cut with the long blade cloppers.
Another angle on yardwork is using electric. I know it's fashionable to burn enormous amounts of fossil fuels to fortify one's masculinity, but if you get a couple hundred feet of big gauge extension cords and a burly electric weedwacker, you can get a lot done without screwing around with the fucking carburetors and gas and oil. If I need a chainsaw, I'll kowtow to that temple, but the electric shit makes it easier since they're lighter with less maintenance. I even got an electric chainsaw for chopping down the smaller alder starts.
Attachment 205289Quote:
Originally Posted by highangle
Better than a gym membership and good for the mind. Natural sounds. Hours spent tending the burning brush pile is an experience all should enjoy.
That's what I think.
They are the best value out there and split Blue Stain beautifully.Quote:
Originally Posted by Cruiser
Quote:
Originally Posted by Buster Highmen
"I was cutting some line
'Bout a quarter to nine
When I decided to have me a smoke.
When I sat in the grass a snake bit my ass
And to top it off I was broke."
-- Phillip The NSFW Coonass
Buster, I have a Worx battery string trimmer that was cheap and does everything I need. Battery lasts a long time and I have 2 of them, I like the thing.
https://smile.amazon.com/32-Volt-Str...ustomerReviews
My core land-management hand tools are a pulaski and a forest fire shovel. The fire shovel blade is sharpen-able and is smaller than a regular one and the handle is somewhat shorter. It is really great for land maintenance tasks. Hard to find in stores, but worth searching out.
I'd like to add, buy local, small biz if you can. I own a garden center. We rely on all sales. Home Depot doesn't helpQuote:
Originally Posted by Buster Highmen
OK, I admit that the cord does make me wonder about my masculinity sometimes since it reminds me of vacuuming, but yeah, go electric.Quote:
Originally Posted by iceman
The only 2 stroke (more innuendo) that I'll keep maintained is the chain saw.
I used to when we lived out in the meth-sticks of Cascappalachia and before the ensuing load of idiotic free market admonishments come crushing down, I would still.Quote:
Originally Posted by t-the-east
But the Home Depot is the closest now.
What kind of cloppers? Wood or metal handle? Carbon blade? Vintage? Terroir? Is there a turbo charged Euro model with a stick?
Woot was blowing out these last week for 159.00. https://tools.woot.com/offers/core-e...d_cat_tool_5_1 I should have mine this week. They make some big claims...45cc, runtime = to 2 tanks of gas, commercial quality. I am skeptically optimistic. There'll be a head to head comparison with the Honda hht35, which is a badass trimmer.
+1 on pulaskis, great for grubbing.
Thank youQuote:
Originally Posted by Buster Highmen
Couldn't agree more. Well saidQuote:
Originally Posted by Buster Highmen
Always been a fan of wood handles, or the new composite ones, Corona or Fiskars are the best we've found. Bypass, never anvil. Take care of them and they will last a long timeQuote:
Originally Posted by Buster Highmen
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Originally Posted by wooley12
Do you get out there and mow that little troche with some scissors to help relax too?
Watch that nasty YouTube I posted. That fat Cajun kid's on his first day or two, and his fat Cajun uncles are giving him some straight dope about how to cut survey line amid all that profanity and low-living.
They're breaking him in to a job which feeds their kids. If there was a better way to tangle with that woolly booga-bottom mess than a ditchbank blade and a machete, they would be carrying it out there.
I know all this from the erstwhile narrator's use of the phrase, "...But that's whut we're in", and the way they keep looking back towards the instrument you can't see to "get on line" so they don't end up wasting their lives in the steamy enervating snake-infested swamp cutting a bunch of fuckin' bullshit they ain't gettin' paid to cut.
"Take heed Old Man!" -- The Prophet Elijah
.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Buster Highmen
Fiskars are ok, but even their big dog ratcheting loppers blow out pretty quickly tbh. Plastic just gets worse and worse until it just buckles. Good for the homeowner but I wouldn't buy another pair. I got a set of smaller pack Florian loppers at a trade show and ended up getting the big set as a gift later in the year- holy crap that is a real piece of equipment. If you want to buy one set of loppers for life, buy a set of Florians. If you can wear them out (most people won't) they will rebuild them for you no problem.
If you're clearing lots of low sticky brambles though, man I can't say enough nice things about my scythe. Seymour aluminum snath and a 20" brush blade makes quick work of just about anything under a half inch or so, and I can move a lot faster with it on steep terrain than most people with gas brush wackers. Check them out, they kick ass!!
Betcha five bucks you made fun of that picture of W clearing brush on his ranch.Quote:
Originally Posted by wooley12
:D
That whole last part was oddly poetic.Quote:
Originally Posted by highangle
Tools: have found most forestry catalogs/ websites are best. Haven't been disappointed with John Deere and in general the more I spend on something the longer it lasts.
Also the value of a good equipment rental place is under rated. Have a place I can rent all commercial grade equipment at a good price, closed on Sunday's so a daily Sat Rental gets you to Monday.
Having just moved to a place in 8 acres, I've quickly realized everything purchased from here on out is commercial grade. From garden hoses to machinery and everything in between.
Welcome to my fan base. Melville and Jeffers may write better, but I bet neither of them fuckers could cut line like me, and if you ever saw my girlfriend, you'd shit yourself.Quote:
Originally Posted by BmillsSkier
that scary, huh?Quote:
Originally Posted by highangle
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Originally Posted by dtown
Purveyors of Choppy Things: http://www.forestry-suppliers.com/ (search for "Ditchbank" or "Machete")
John Deere is class.
Interesting rental anecdote: I buy Stihl saws, Hilti & Cobra drills. I sell said saws and drills to rental place. I lease the very same saws and drills. Capitalism is safe with me, I shan't betray Her.
Im not going to speak for Ice I'm open to sacrificing some undies for naked pics of said girlfriend...
I would, except she's in the Screen Actor's Guild and has a political future, so there are more than the standard release and royalty issues at play here.
Straight-shaft trimmer with a brush cutter blade? Money well-spent but I'm guessing there is another reason for not using one.Quote:
Originally Posted by highangle
I ripped some meat open on the middle finger of my left hand with a log lifting hook when I was 12 helping my uncle with some firewood at his woodlot. It was just a flesh wound.
If you want the definitive benchmark in yard implements follow my guide:
Buy a John Deere walk behind. Don't ever change the oil, sharpen the blade, or remove the gas when winter comes. New spark plug every other spring and you're good to go for 10 years of solid use no problems whatsoever.
Buy a Craftsman mower when you give your John Deere to a family member. Don't ever change the oil, sharpen the blade, or remove the gas when winter comes. New spark plug every other spring and you're good to go for 8 years of solid use no problems whatsoever.
Buy a cheap "Weed Whacker" trimmer. Don't ever measure the oil you mix in your gas, never mind make sure it's 40:1 and not 50:1, clean the carb, or change the spark plug. Keep a full can of starter spray on hand to flood the internals with and jam the throttle wide open and you're good for 15 years of worry free use.
Hire Elver Perez and the boys to deal with the yard and rest peacefully knowing that should anything go wrong you have the most indestructible yard implements in the garage that will be here and operable long after the zombie apocalypse should they eat Elver's brains.
Clearing trail corridor is incredibly demanding on people and tools, so I try to buy the most efficient and durable I can find for my crews and I. I've been impressed with the Lowe pruners and loppers, Silky hand saws and Hultafors axes from http://bigbeartools.com
Also, Corona double pinned shovels and Mcleods, Barco and P3 Pulaskis, Midwest Proflex Shrub rakes, and Rogue Beast and Travis tools.
I'd like to put a word in for Mexicans as opposed to the tractor. Mexicans don't have air intakes for the mice to nest in and wiring looms to get gnawed on.
Also, only cut as much as you're willing to manage regularly. Shit gets old real quick when trying to keep areas clear. After a few years when the novelty wears off you'll thank me. While the rest of your family and friends are off hiking, biking and enjoying themselves, you'll be stuck at home while your exposed parts are getting hammered by mosquito's and blackberry bushes, which in if you stand in one spot too long will grow around you.
Unless they become left handed musicians. Then they're useless, and just a drag on the family finances. Mexicans go home at night.Quote:
Originally Posted by flowing alpy
Here's a vote for getting a few Mexican kids.
Nope, they're all still here. But l wish a few would undocument their way to the Midwest. I need someone to cut my grass at a reasonable price, and what passes for Mexican food here is truly revolting.Quote:
Originally Posted by Timberridge