Chipper incident follow-up

[TMW]

We have our new chipper, after losing the old one when the winch hook and cable were drawn in. (See earlier post for details).

The operator’s manual and the decal on the winch recommend that you disengage the winch clutch when not in use. This is what allowed the incident to happen in the first place.

We contacted the manufacturer to ask why they would recommend that practice and received a legalese, sidestepping response.

What are your thoughts on this? (The recommendation, not the response).

Thanks,

TMW

 

[Norm_Hall]

Tim, we have a policy that says "all winch lines shall be stowed and secured before any chipping operations begin". All chipper winch lines have to be completely rolled up on the spool, the hook secured and the diverter selector in the chipping position before any chipping starts.

We came to this policy after sucking in several winch lines, which causes major damage, not to mention flying shrapnel.

 

[TMW]

Norm,

We now do the same. It is odd that the manufacturer recommends an unsafe practice.

TMW

 

[huggybear]

you should try black widow instead of the steel cable. We have it on most of our chippers now and it's pretty nice, no more cut hands on frayed cable. One problem though if your winching from odd angles the line gets sucked under the fairlead and it breaks, but you can tie it back together with a double fishermans.

 

[Demo]

You should have seen what happened to the Morbark 2400xl when I took its winch cable in, The drum tried to lift out of the machine, Lock it down any way you can god forbid if a disk or drum actually came out of a chipper, Oh and make sure your crew knows the proper torque of the blades to had almost nasty experience with that as well.

 

[daveyclimber]

Whats the dael with your old chipper ? what specifically was damaged , how old/new was the unit? worth fixing ? Pics ?

 

[sal88]

we just got a vermeer 1800 with the rope winch but it has about three feet of chain. been using a few months and the thing is awesome