Log Handling

[Traveling Woodsman]

I know I’ve heard this question addressed a little bit here and there, but I wanted to hear some direct discussion on it.

What kind of log handling does your system require? How do you handle your logs (piece(s) of equipment)? And what would you do differently if you had it to do over again (as far as setting)?

I have worked with a number of different systems. I used to own a knuckleboom loader and small log truck. In Minnesota we stacked by hand or with a jammer, and trucking was done by the mill. The fellow I worked for in WY had an F-550 and 2 skid-steers, one at the job and the other at his log yard. And I have heard of several systems involving horses and a mechanical forwarder, which is intriguing.

I know that the focus of your operation will, to a large extent, determine what your equipment configuration will be. Just interested how your choice of equipment (or lack thereof) as it relates to your system has panned out, what are the advantages/disadvantages you’ve seen.

[Carl Russell]

I have always decked my logs by hand and hired a self-loading log truck. I will often find a bank near the roadside where I can roll the logs down. Other times I will just deck them up using skids. With 12′ skids the angle is pretty manageable so that I can roll up a couple hundred feet with a peavey by myself, leaving the very heaviest on the ground.

I usually only pile them about 3-4 logs high (4 feet or so). I have never felt the need to have a mechanical devise. I have worked with friends with tractors, dozers, and forwarders, and although the decking is a lot faster, and easier, the purchase price and the requisite increased production never really appealed to me.

It has meant that I didn’t set the world on fire with production… lots take me longer etc., but my overhead is very affordable. I will hire an excavator from time to time to build landings or dress up skid roads etc. so that my handling method is effective.

Carl

[Rick Alger]

Hi Ben,

I agree in principle with Carl’s post, but now that the only trucks available are tractor trailers, I need something mechanical to sort and pile in the yard. A farm tractor with forks has been the best for my purposes.

[Traveling Woodsman]

Rick, so do you just use it for sorting and stacking? No log truck loading?

[Rick Alger]

Yes, the trailer has a mid-mount crane.

I have a friend who does load a six wheeler with a tractor, but he works less than ten miles from three different mills.

Most commercial trucks around here have stakes roughly 13′ off the ground. You need a good size crane to load them. Side loading with a tractor is out of the question.

[TaylorJohnson]

I have done a lot of hand piling and piled with the horses with blocks also just hooking logs in the middle and long chaining them over top of each other. It can be done but for me the only way to get any thing done in the woods is to find a rhythm of doing things. I think this rhythm is the most important thing to learn in the woods. The problem I have had with hand piling and blocks is that you cant do any thing long enough to hit the right rhythm, in order to keep enough room to work you have to re gear to pile. Landing space is another big issue when you can only pile the wood 4 foot high it takes a lot of space to land it all on most of the jobs then if your going to string it out and not re gear to pile then that takes even more room. Ben do you remember that wood we piled in MN when it was to muddy to run the skid steer? That was some slow going that few days. We were there another 5 days and piled a lot of wood but with a loader could have been done in 1.5 to 2 days . All that time on the landing could have been spent in the bush, you or I one was on the landing many hours every day sorting those logs when we could have been pulling log to be piled. If you pile an hour a day at the end of the week you have got a fair day of time in that could have been spent skidding. An hour and a half a day and you have a 7.5 hours worth of skidding time spent piling logs. It can add up fast if you think of it that way and most days there is more than that to pile . I did make up some ropes with slip hooks on each end and a ring in the center of rope to load with . It worked well and the rope and ring system was good for unloading my little dray of pulp, bolts , or logs . The rope was weaved though the ring in a fashion that allowed you to adjust the slack up fast or let it out fast.

What ever type of loader you get should be some what mobile, something that can be hauled with a 3/4 ton truck if need be . Even if you have to get a trailer as long as you can be mobile . A skid steer can work well or a tractor with forks but a good log loader is the best I think. Ben were you are at I think a truck with loader on it would be best or at least that size loader on something. What gets me is the small wood not the logs or bigger wood. I could get buy easier with out a loader if I had mostly big wood . As fare as doing things different well I guess every job is so unique that it would change per job as far as what type of log loader system I would want. Mine is nice , a good medium size loader and very agile plus it is easy to move from job to job. The problem or draw back with my loader is that it is limited in real hilly ground , the horses can only pull so long and so much up. With a forwarder or a small truck with loader on you can climb bigger hills. The advantage to my loader is that in wet ground and muddy conditions it gets around very good , in fact the horses sink more than the loader.
When I was working pine before I got my loader there were nights when I was driving home and it felt like my arms were going to pop from piling logs by hand. It can be done but it is not easy. From what I see that is out there for sale a small truck with a loader is the way to go as fare as how much loader you get for the money and for that big hard wood you boys out east get into you need a big loader. Ben I know a guy that has a truck for sale here privately that is dirt cheap and has a good loader on it , it is a hood loader . You can buy the truck and loader for what the loader is worth . Give me a call or send me a message and I will get you details on it . Taylor Johnson

[Traveling Woodsman]

Carl, what was the motivating factor behind your decision to forego equipment? How does it affect your ability to do big logging jobs? Or maybe you don’t get any big jobs.

[Carl Russell]

Traveling Woodsman;16295 wrote:

Carl, what was the motivating factor behind your decision to forego equipment? How does it affect your ability to do big logging jobs? Or maybe you don’t get any big jobs.

Primarily cash-flow. I have always been a pay-as-I-go business man. I also have a very diversified lifestyle, working a lot of my time for no money at all, just investing in infrastructure and personal/farm projects. This creates limits in two ways. First I don’t have the time for the continuity that generally defines a modern logging business, so I need to keep my overhead low. And secondly it does limit the magnitude of the harvest, typical windows lasting 6-8 weeks, and generally taking several applications to accomplish large volume harvests.

This is obviously a personal choice, but I find animal power to be so useful to me that my personal/home/farm-life/career has seemed to be an equally important way to capitalize on that investment.

Moreover, as it relates specifically to harvesting with animals, I have always seen the portion of the financial equation occupied by the animals as being very small. The cost of maintaining them is much less, proportionate to the income, than any piece of equipment.

When I first started out I worked with a small crew of friends using a Kubota Tractor Skyline, and we had an used loader truck. The purchase price was substantial (I can’t remember exactly), and fuel and upkeep were constant and sizable. We needed the rig to move and sort logs that would build up under the cable on the landing so it was a necessary fixed cost, but my experience with that helped me to formulate a business structure based on as low overhead and upkeep as possible.

I have worked with several people who have felt the same as Taylor and have invested in landing equipment, or even additional harvesting equipment like forwarders. In every case, it turns out that the cost of the machinery is what drives the operation. There is no doubt that the machines increase proficiency, but they also increase the cash-flow needs, and that in turn puts more pressure on getting work for the machine, which in turn makes it more difficult to find work that is ideally suited to horses, which in turn requires more use of the machine, which dedicates more income to the cost of the machine, and the efficiency of the horses gets absorbed in the equation.

I will be honest, the thing that attracted me to horses from the very beginning was the physicality of it. I was exposed to men who used horses, sleds, and peaveys. I was always very attracted to the physical intent, and the result of their personal investment. The craft.

One of these men had started working horses in the woods at 11, dragging the harness into the manger to get it onto the horse, cutting with axes and cross-cuts. He had always logged, and during the 60-70’s grown to crawlers, then skidders. By the time I met him he was back to working exclusively with horses, sled, and peavey. He had a crawler on the landing, but he rarely used it. He would say ” It’s too easy to sit on that thing, and before you realize it, you’re feeding it instead of your horses”.

I typically concentrate on one product at a time, but it the case of hardwood, I have to make more than one sort for wood. In those cases I just clear a bigger area, and sometimes I will bunch in the woods and draw it out when I have more room. As the peavey has been my tool I have become quite adept at using it with the least amount of effort. As I said, I thrive on the physical work. Not just the exercise, but the thought that goes into maximizing the return on the effort. A case in point was the red oak log project that I took on recently.

Mitch eluded to something in a post in that thread. One of the limiting factors for us as horse-loggers is the energy required to do this work. Traditionally it was done by larger crews. Currently we are in a very scattered community, and most of us work alone. I can totally sympathize with the need to bring machinery into that equation, but my choice has been to modify the lifestyle that depends on the income from the logging, taking advantage of the horses inwardly, instead of layer on top of the horses more economic demands to provide for a more financially demanding life-style. Personal choices all. No right nor wrong in my mind.

Carl

[TaylorJohnson]

@Joel 16305 wrote:

See, there is another man talking about dancing.

No one replied to me about the dance so I will acknowledge you, Taylor.

It takes a self-loader about 10 minutes to reset. At $75/hr, low I know, that is $15. How long did it take you to deck that log with a cable & block? Did anybody die? was it worth it?

If one has the room, take advantage of it. If not look for another place to deck. 3 or 4 high gets easier with time.

Joel,
I don’t know about the dance I guess, I am not on here enough to know what you are talking about, may be you are reffering to what I say about rhythem in the woods . I don’t know how it is every where else but up here the log trucker are very picky about the logs they haul as far as were there at and how many times they have to get off their truck to load. And as fare as finding a better place to deck logs with more room well there just are some places up here were there are know fields or clearings to deck in. right now I am waiting for a truck to come and haul wood there is close to 5 truck loads on the landing . If it were 4′ high i would have to cut a lot of the trees on the costumers drive way just to pile logs as it is the piles are more condensed and stacked much higher. The nearest clearing is about 3/4 miles away on someone elses property. If a truck don’t show up one week and you get rain the next well you can have a lot of wood on the landing and know were to go with it . I don’t have another job so I can’t go home and just wait for a truck to empty my landing I have to make room my self and keep going . As far as any one getting killed while loading logs, no so that is good.
I would not spend enough on a loader so that it would dictate how I have to log, my loader makes my operation more flexible . 25 or 30 grand on a loader is too much but if you can keep that cost low enough it sure pays to have one. I prefer to put that physical energy into logs ready to be trucked , the more I do the more I make. Are methods are much cleaner and a lot pretty to watch but no matter what it plays out to how much you can “cut down and take to town” as my Dad always said. Unless we are getting paid by the hour ,,, and even then you have to get as much done as possible wile still doing a proper job. Using a loader is just another tool,, eventually there will be one there to pick up the logs any way . Out there in that bigger run of timber you could get by with out one easier plus I think your ground is more cut up with roads and fields. I do think when a land owner is willing to put in the proper type landings and road it is best but with the loader I don’t have to turn them away if they are not able to .
Joel if you asked me something and I did not respond I apologize , I am not on here that much any more and when I do pop in I just scan though fast and more than likely forget if someone asked me any thing . That is for any one else to I am not meaning to answer questions . And Every one know their own struggles with logging and every one will have there own methods of dealing with them. Ballance in life,,, and every thing you do is important don’t commit to any one thing to easily. Flexibility will make you strong but rigidness will break you . Taylor Johnson

[Carl Russell]

Taylor, I understand completely where you are coming from, I just answer those questions differently. I pay truckers what they need to haul my logs, not to give me a bunch of crap about how my logs are piled.

I would never be able to afford to wait for 5 loads of anything to get moved. I call my trucker and tell him I’ll have a load ready in a week of so, then I call him a day or so before it’s ready, and if he can’t schedule by then, I call during the next week.

I certainly can’t afford to go home and wait for wood to be moved either. If I had 2 loads waiting on the landing, I’d be calling a new trucker. Typically I can accommodate about 15 MBF on any landing I have. In fact that is one of my requirements. If there isn’t enough room, I make a bit more.

I strongly agree with you about rhythm being a huge part of successful woods work, and log trucking can be a big part of that. At times I have seriously considered buying a 6500 series truck with flatbed that I could use to haul horses, hay, fuelwood, lumber and logs. I had one years ago, and moved a fair amount of my own wood, but the local mills have mostly shut down now, and I send my logs 35-70 miles to sawmills and concentration yards.

We have also thought about a road-worthy loader trailer, but nothing affordable has come along. And then there is the part where I start to figure that a piece of machinery is not cost effective if it is sitting around, so I start thinking about hiring someone to drive the truck for me….. Currently I find paying a little more, and pestering the truckers is more effective.

Carl

[TaylorJohnson]

Currently I find paying a little more, and pestering the truckers is more effective.

Carl ,,,, LOL That is funny man .
Carl these guys up here are some of the hardest truckers I have ever dealt with . It is just unreal how independent they are. Plus when fuel was high a lot dropped out and the gap has not been filled yet. The trucks that are left are so busy hauling for big operators that they don’t want to commit to a small out fit like me. They get spoiled hauling for the big operators , the piles are so big they never have to move to get a load and the piles are usually right off of a huge road that was built to look like a landing strip 🙂 . I was going to go to the drive way of LP ( Louisiana Pacific ) and just flag them down on their way out to try to get one to haul for me LOL ( I have done it before ) . We are getting some warm weather up here and break up could be early. Every year it is the same about the middle of Jan every logger starts working like mad to get as much done by the middle of march when they put the road limits on. Right now t is like a preshur cooker up here every one scrambling to get there wood out . The worst part is that they will get the limits on and then it will drop down to 25 bellow for about a week or two ,, happens every year .
Carl I have though so much about the same size truck you are talking about . My cousin has one that size and it is a handy tool . He pulls his horses with it , hauls hay , and sorts logs and even hauls some small loads. He got the truck cheap and the loader cheap ( bought seperate of corse ) . He has less that 5 grand into the hole thing and it runs like a top. We got some cheap loaders for sale up here at time but the hood factory is 40 min north of here and printice factory is about 1.5 hours south of here,,, lots of loader around . That truck has a fule miser motor in it and gets about 11 to 12 miles to the gallon know matter what you are hauling .
I have thought about it and I will say that if I had to just pik one piece of equipment to be able to keep and I could not sell it I would want my arch above my loader . Taylor Johnson

[Gabe Ayers]

Down south there is no logging hauling available of any kind, except maybe another small logger that is willing to help. So most of us have our own trucks and loaders.

Our rig is smaller than some and is a flat bed dump that can serve many other useful purposes, like hauling gravel/rock, sawdust, slabs, firewood, logs, lumber, beams, tractor, skid steer, on and on…Our loader is an antique JD that runs on the motor of the truck but we are hoping to upgrade that this year to be on a diesel truck instead of the current gas engine. I have been dealing with the same family garage locally for thirty years. We have about $3500 in this truck and about the same in the loader.

A self loader truck is seen as to expensive to run around empty here and I don’t know of about three of them in a hundred mile radius. When we were in the NE we saw that many in every village. Big difference in culture regionally.

Photo of our fancy Appalachian logging equipment….in photo, Jagger Rutledge and Donn Hewes

~

[TaylorJohnson]

Jason , that set up is a dandy I like the versatility or that type truck. We have so many log trucks up here it is unreal but they are all busy. One out fit about 20 miles from me has 70 log trucks on contract. I live on hwy 63 going to Hayward and you could count them one after the other all day long hauling into LP and the other mills in Hayward. The Dot. cops will be on you every day up here with those old trucks though,, think it is stupid because I would love to haul my own wood. My old trucker retired and I am in the process of getting on another ones schudle but I would love to just haul it my self. When I was a kid down in Kentucky we hauled with trucks like you have there, loaded a lot of them with fork lefts. Worked good until it rained and then you might as well have been on the ice lol . We have some big wood up here oak ,maple , white and red pine but we have a lot of small stuff to . My loader is good but if I was buy you guys I would eventually get a bigger loader or a truck like you all have. Jason how are the DOT cops by you guys ? Taylor Johnson

[Gabe Ayers]

Depends on where you are with the DOT. Out near the interstate I have been weighed and inspected once in 35 years or so. We live in a pretty isolated community and I don’t get out near the big road much any more.

I like it that way. Lately we have been custom harvesting and processing on site for landowner builder projects, so we get paid by the m and hire the processing, tag on handling and management cost and don’t run our truck anywhere but local. There are many advantages to community based forestry and this is just one of them….

Another is the tag on the front of that truck – Farm Use….not state tags, just farm and in this case since we log with horses, this is farm use. This may be only applicable in Virginia. So our only cost of the log truck is upkeep and maintenance (done locally by the fellows we bought it from), taxes for personal property and liability insurance. Simple deal.

We have turned around our markets from being 75% sold to the mill and 25% value added to the other way around in last two years. It is a better way than competing with the machines, but I get tired of arguing this point with some on the open forum at DAP. It is more rewarding to just share with the ones that are really logging with their animals – today.

[TaylorJohnson]

Jason ,
I have a small network of small mills in the area that are willing to mill just about any product for me now . I have one guy that builds some of the best post and log rails I have ever seen and he wants to use me exclusively for a supplier . I am going to just keep pushing hard in this direction . I even am trying to get set up to do a local net work for fuel wood costumers . All of this I am trying to do local like 25 to 30 miles from home . I am trying to get a meeting with a guy tha owns a big mill and logging business up in Hayward for an out let for my pulp. I am trying to get them to by it on the landing from me and truck it when they get time. He could buy what I put out in a month and lose it on the way to the mill and it would not hurt him a bit LOL . His head forester really like me and my work and said he would get me a meeting in the next few weeks , we will see.
I will tell ya what though man i don’t think any one could pay me enough to do any thing else , I love this work and I love this craft. Taylor Johnson

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