Mini skids, Loaders and Attachments

southsoundtree · Sep 7, 2018

Something shearing, with a raised load = Bad News!

Why would you need a lock at 90 degrees, just tilt it back?
Maybe there is something lost in translation.

The more rigid, the more shock-loading occurs.

Nobody would chip with the hitch adapter in place.

@tnttree, Dave is there a recommended repair for the hitch adapter. My round pipe particularly, much more than the grapple, has egged out over a couple years. Its a less straightforward welding repair, in my thoughts, from my (unskilled) welding-armchair. Maybe its just fill the holes with weld and grind back down to size??? Will the weld be brittle at all to shock-loading.

I was thinking that some thin, small angle-iron might weld to the outside of the round pipe to fill out the internal square tube of the grapple would make the hitch receiver tight, and not rely on the round-tube and pin. From memory, each side of the angle iron would only be about 1/2" or less. Two opposite corners might be sufficient.

I moved my stuff a lot with the hitch-attachment, and my chipper is on a pintle, so I'm dealing with slop/ shock-load more than a ball-coupler would create. I've just ordered a dedicated mounting plate, because sometimes I tow my chipper to the max (tight places, hills, mega-tight places, cross-slopes, plus the chipper is 4400 with little tongue weight and the mini and grapple is under 3000 pound...as in, no way will I let my employees tow it), but I know that most of the time, I will slap the hitch into the BMG, as it gets most jobs done quickly and easily.

evo · Sep 9, 2018

southsoundtree said:
Something shearing, with a raised load = Bad News!

Why would you need a lock at 90 degrees, just tilt it back?
Maybe there is something lost in translation.

The more rigid, the more shock-loading occurs.

Nobody would chip with the hitch adapter in place.

@tnttree, Dave is there a recommended repair for the hitch adapter. My round pipe particularly, much more than the grapple, has egged out over a couple years. Its a less straightforward welding repair, in my thoughts, from my (unskilled) welding-armchair. Maybe its just fill the holes with weld and grind back down to size??? Will the weld be brittle at all to shock-loading.

I was thinking that some thin, small angle-iron might weld to the outside of the round pipe to fill out the internal square tube of the grapple would make the hitch receiver tight, and not rely on the round-tube and pin. From memory, each side of the angle iron would only be about 1/2" or less. Two opposite corners might be sufficient.

I moved my stuff a lot with the hitch-attachment, and my chipper is on a pintle, so I'm dealing with slop/ shock-load more than a ball-coupler would create. I've just ordered a dedicated mounting plate, because sometimes I tow my chipper to the max (tight places, hills, mega-tight places, cross-slopes, plus the chipper is 4400 with little tongue weight and the mini and grapple is under 3000 pound...as in, no way will I let my employees tow it), but I know that most of the time, I will slap the hitch into the BMG, as it gets most jobs done quickly and easily.

Not seeing/reading eye to eye.

The grapple locked would be nice for reaching over logs in a deck, picking the ones you want where you can’t get the grapple to swing between very well. Also when coming at a 90* log deck > reach out > pick > curl in > traveling curled in at 90 isn’t too bad.

The round insert leaves me wondering too. Harder to line up the holes as it adds another axis to line up. I’d just take it to a fab shop and have them duplicate it with proper square. My guess the reason they went with round is for production streamlining and not function. To do a square insert you would need lengths of a odd size square tubing. The round is the same length and OD as the bollards.

Considering fabbing a insert slightly dogleged back towards the mini, then welding square tubing 90* to stick out past the heel plate. This would give nubbins for the grapple to ride on when stowed for bumpy terrain or trailering. Simpler would just weld ears onto the heel plate, but the increased width might not fly.

This is/was my poor mans solution on a hitch adapter (total cost $200). I had some of the steel, no time to zap it together. Da' Irish Welder Jimmy, did it for me for $100 bucks, it would have taken 2-3 hours for me just to clean the shop and dust off the welding tools. It was so surprising useful it still lives in the truck. It’s great for pushing, picking, sneaking under logs/brush, lowering, etc. If I were to do it, and spend time (and buy steel) I would have made it a little longer north of the bollard, either with a flat spoon, or point. A burly sling can get draped over the post > each end choked > drag > pull forward > take wraps to close haul > lift the ends for the drag.

southsoundtree · Sep 9, 2018

I think it's mostly just learning the subtleties.

A slight, quick twist with the machine, with a well-greased machine, and you will get rotation of the grapple without touching anything. Timing the swing and spin comes with hours.

If you plant one tine in the dirt, you can twist the machine to 'walk the other tine' into the 90 degree position, easily.

Only recently did I figure out that if you lift the boom and curl just so, you can clamp the grapple to the corners of the heel plate (without getting off), without interfering with any articulation, allowing the grapple to not dangle, making it easier to move logs in a truck/ trailer with the pushing spikes, without grapple interference (the bolts want to hang up on my ramp brackets on the bottom layer of logs in my chip truck).

How often do you need to pick specific logs Off a deck?