Anyone use a mini excavator for tree work?

When I rented chippers I had the same stress. Work the machine to it's fullest and make sure it's back on time. Did a weeks rental once and it rained hard for almost four days. The chipper sat the whole time. Once it stopped raining the yards were nothing but bloated sponges. I never rented again after that. What a waste of coin.
 
It's a big deal to get a piece of equipment but when you actually own it, the extra hustle that comes with it is nice. I'm only working on weekends so when I buy things for me it's a big thing. I only split wood after work everyday, and tree work on weekends
 
Sweet, good find. Jersey always has the deals. Mine Is a kubota u55. Just picked up a hammer for it, been doing a lot of stone walls after we clear lots etc. I looked up that guy in jersey for the root rake you guy I have been meaning to contact him. I have inquired about the hydraulic cork screw splitter just haven't wanted to fork over 12k for that
 
Uncle J's Komatsu.
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I'd never been around the baby Komatsus prior to that day, but I'm impressed with that machine.

The TB135
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Minis shine when feeding a skid steer, if you have the room, because you can sort & stack to cut down on tracking with the skid.

Someone looking to pick up a used machine should consider Rental Sales: the machines are typically current model machines with maintenance logs, & a lot of life left.
 
Here's my excavator on a residential job. It's a Kubota KX057 that I bought in December of 2013. It replaced the KX121-3 I bought on Feb 14th of the same year.

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It is my most used piece of equipment, hands down. If I were to get rid of equipment, the excavator would be my next to last thing to go, before the grapple truck.

Here it is on a felling job:

A residential job with the jib:

Another residential job:

And a small clearing job:
 
I use a bobcat 325 with a valby grapple and it does a great job. As said before it's not good moving material long distances but it's really good for grabbing and sorting limbs and tops and logs and loading logs in a trailer, or feeding a chipper. last year I got a branch manager edition Giant articulating wheel loader. Now using both machines on a job is perfect. The bobcat sorts and stages and the Giant shuttles it to the chipper or trailer. Can't use them on all jobs but it's really increased production on the jobs we can use them. In hindsight I'd go with smaller grapples on the bobcat, the bmg would be fine. Much lighter. The valby's weigh 800 pounds.
 
I needed something to move the bigger logs but given that I work mainly in upscale or gated communities I wanted to minimize impact on the manicured lawns. So I went the way of a small yard tractor with front end loader and bought a grapple to put on instead of the bucket. Nice thing is there are stump grinders I can acquire that will work with my rear pto as well. I can even haul a chipper behind it if the client wants the mulch from a job. It's also great for picking up all the brush and loading it or moving it around. It has come in very handy and not left but small prints in most yards.20160821_183628.webp
 
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We just looked at a used cat 304cr on Friday. I'll get some pictures up when it arrives, but 3 or 4 local tree services run with mini excavators. And every landscape company around also... we assume it will be like the mini skid steer and after having it for a little while, will wonder how we managed all this time without it. The only thing is nobody around runs grapples on them. Just buckets. Curious on different grapples, as we would be getting one. Maybe not right away, but eventually. What do you like about yours? What would you do different?

@Lumberjack i really like that jib idea... we may have to give that a go.
 
Rotation is a major plus though. That is where a mini excavator with a grapple shines, sitting in one spot and grabbing brush and logs and orienting them butt first, feeding a chipper, loading a trailer, the ability to rotate a load is great. But you lose out on a few things too. A dangle grapple is a floppy thing. If you could get something like DTS picture that also rotated you'd have the best of both worlds. But we as tree people seem to adapt to our situations, and make do with what we have. Either style is going to increase production.
 
chiselbit said:
Rotation is a major plus though. That is where a mini excavator with a grapple shines, sitting in one spot and grabbing brush and logs and orienting them butt first, feeding a chipper, loading a trailer, the ability to rotate a load is great. But you lose out on a few things too. A dangle grapple is a floppy thing. If you could get something like DTS picture that also rotated you'd have the best of both worlds. But we as tree people seem to adapt to our situations, and make do with what we have. Either style is going to increase production.
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Hi chisel b. Your rotator grapple is valby brand is that what I gather? Do you know of any other gaps and of rotator grapples for mini x s. Thanks for your time!
 
5t is very useful for stump removal but hacks up a yard if having to skid the tracks, if can get a clean straight line can touch up indents with a little sand to restore.
 
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