Saturday, February 14, 2009

Skidder Operator Now

It is always good to learn new things. The last couple of months in the bush I have been a grapple skidder operator. It is a John Deere 748 GIII.

It takes a little getting use to. For a person that is use to seeing the trees from ground level, walking gently on the forest floor, this is a bit of a change.

The grapple skidder is used in most conventional harvest operations in the boreal forest. After the layout of the block is completed a fellerbuncher harvests the trees and leaves them in bunches in the harvest patch. The skidder backs up to the bunch and pulls it roadside.

The idea is to have the trees piled a couple of bunches high to make it easier for the next machine, which is a delimber. To get the pile high you drive over the previous placed bunches. Sometimes the machine does not go where you want it to. Sometimes it gets a little sideways.

Sometimes you have to call a more seasoned operator to get the machine off the pile.

One picture below I am stuck and have to get Peter to get the machine out of the pile. When the front tire was up in the air, it made me just to uneasy.

In the second picture I have the machine stuck in the pile when I was attempting to flatten the branches to be able to drive over the pile from behind.

Guess I need to show you a fellerbunch and delimber, I will get some pictures next week. If you want to see processing of the wood in the bush you can see the youtube video.



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