stahl/arbortech

AmericanArborist

AmericanArborist

Participating member
Location
Omaha, NE
Hey treebuzz. I am looking to see what peoples thoughts are on Stahl/Arbortech. I bought a new freightliner chip truck from them this year. Its not been the best experience so far. I bought a truck off the lot from them and these are the immediate problems.
  1. They were supposed to swap the toolboxes to some larger ones. They not only didn't swap them out when I flew out to buy it a month after ordering it, they hadn't even fabricated the boxes.
  2. They had to jump start the truck when I arrived.
  3. The key didn't work in the passenger door.
  4. The pto arm hit the frame of the truck and kept it from disengaging.
4 months later the toolboxes have arrived. Just today the trucks lights and turn signals all went out. I took it to the freightliner dealership and they informed me that they didn't wire the truck trailers harness correctly. They spliced it into the truck box lights instead of using the prewired plug harness 20" from the hitch. Turns out the trailer draws too much power from the trucks lights and blows fuses. So the trailer plug needs rewired to route it into the appropriate harness.

Has anyone else had a negative or positive experience with them? I feel like for the money I spent this should have been a better experience. Next time I know I am buying Southco.
 
We had a very similar experience when we bought our truck from timberland trucks......long story but when you travel half way across the country and drop 90k you expect a bit more. Here's what I've come up with.....I've learned many lessons the hard way and this is just one more. Hope you get some results on the problems!
 
Wow.

When an order comes back slightly amiss at a restaurant I usually just shut up and eat it anyway. I'll either come back to that establishment again or not.

When a piece of equip that your intending to make money with ends up costing you both time and money it's a whole other story. Spreading the word far and wide on social media to give other prospective buyers a heads up seems so appropriate to me, and a huge contribution. This kind of inept workmanship and purposeful neglect at completing your truck to specifications is what I may well face too if I were to buy from them.

My next purchase is going to be a new truck with my ideal set up of tool boxes and chip box.

I wonder if Stahl/Arbortech would like to know you are informing others? They then have a chance to make it up to you at this point as best they can or continue to do wrong by their customer.

However it turns out, I and others here (and open to google searches) would love to know about it.

(Last research I do before I buy something I already know I want is a google search, "Problems with ....")
 
Jasonk said:
We had a very similar experience when we bought our truck from timberland trucks......long story but when you travel half way across the country and drop 90k you expect a bit more. Here's what I've come up with.....I've learned many lessons the hard way and this is just one more. Hope you get some results on the problems!
Click to expand...
Mind sharing the details of the problems you've had on your truck from Timberland? I've only heard good things about them and they would be on my list of places I'd purchase a complete truck from if I was going that route.
 
@AmericanArborist Thanks for sharing. How do you feel about the build quality on the box and toolboxes? I have a new (to me) truck chassis I'll be either building a chip box for or purchasing this winter, depends on my workload and budget. Does it look like a quality job on the steel fab portion of the truck or do you feel like they cut corners there as well?
 
tc262 said:
@AmericanArborist Thanks for sharing. How do you feel about the build quality on the box and toolboxes? I have a new (to me) truck chassis I'll be either building a chip box for or purchasing this winter, depends on my workload and budget. Does it look like a quality job on the steel fab portion of the truck or do you feel like they cut corners there as well?
Click to expand...
The quality is okay. Some things I've noticed about the box:
  • The box seems to have more flex than my southco boxes. It will flex and touch the Lpack a little bit.
  • The boxes for the lights are not fully sealed. The boxes have already filled with dust seeping in from the chip box.
  • Same with the ladder box. Lots of dust blows in.
  • The front bottom corners of the chip box leak water down the sides of the truck since they aren't fully sealed. Doesnt seem like a big deal except water dripping from a load of chips is colored and stains the side of the boxes.
  • If the chipper chute is angled too high it will throw random chips hard enough to break the 3 marker lights in the middle. This should have had a guard in place or use the small LED dot type lights.
  • Toolboxes are ok. The handles and hinges are much better construction than my last arbotech.
  • I am nervous about the smooth side construction long term. We throw logs in the back often. The smooth sides are made possible by using vertical supports in the box. I'd hate for the logs to damage these like they did on my last arbortech box.
Long story short, Southco was 8 weeks out on a build and was around 8k more. I needed one like yesterday so I bought one from Arbortech. Looking back I would have rather waited for what I wanted.
 
tc262 said:
Mind sharing the details of the problems you've had on your truck from Timberland? I've only heard good things about them and they would be on my list of places I'd purchase a complete truck from if I was going that route.
Click to expand...

We had timberland build us a hook truck with three bodies. There was countless hours spent on setting up the truck how we wanted it and I figured that for the $ we were spending it would be unsurpassed quality and service. They gave us a completion date that would be safe to arrange pickup and we bought plane tickets to fly down and drive the truck home. Days before our departure they said they couldn't hit the target date but they would reimburse travel. They set a date two weeks later. At that point airfare was ridiculous price wise, so for there best interest we rented a car and my brother and mechanic drive down. By this time it was the busiest part of the season so I couldn't leave. When they arrived the truck wasn't ready. They lost our insurance info we sent and wouldn't let them leave without it. 8 hours later my beat down guys left their shop. Two hours into the trip about 7 at night all the lights on the truck stopped working. They made my guys turn around and drive the truck back instead of going to them. Finally the guys drive home, did I mention that into the trip they figure out the fuel gauge doesn't work! They get home and we are happy to have the new truck. I send timberland the slip for the rental car and he basically laughs at me, says he would cover $200- at this point I let him know he's a clown in some other paraphrase words. Less than a week in the pto stops working. After digging through the wiring we find an old frayed wire that they tied into and failed instead of running new. Did I mention they did all of the wiring with scotch lock connectors? In the northeast we have something called salt, need I say more? We have had the truck about a year and a half now and have fixed pretty much everything that was not done right.
Final thoughts, they did a good job on the fabrication work and general build but rushed the details. I spent $90k on a truck and that clearly didn't matter to them. They offered no compensation for any of their screw ups and generally are difficult to even speak with ( I'm speaking about jack specifically as that's who I dealt with). I wouldn't go back that's for sure.
 
New doesn't mean no problems, unless warrantied, it just means it costs more to fix than older. Several occasions I've talked to guys that had computers causing all sorts of problems, that and huge cost of new is why I buy broken in trucks from other industries ( non tree, non concrete removal) and rework them for our needs. Stick with older equipment with great reputations for longevity and save 60-75% on purchase price
 
Well....there's new vehicle problems....and then there's, 'We don't care about you - we've already cashed your check anyway.'

One is annoying but can be understood, the other is just wrong and should be driven out of business by those that are willing to do right by their customers.
 
Well said Merle, there's been plenty of examples made of crooked dealers on here and other sites but one of my local buddies bought a freshly painted "refurbished" white bucket truck from a dealer in Ohio last month that has already had problems
 
This particular outfit is known for taking a under cdl box truck adding a boom and calling it good with the front axle being overloaded empty
 
The freightliner dealership quoted me $1200 to fix the wiring. Arbortech is picking up the tab on this one. I'm glad this got discovered 4 months into ownership and not years later. I would be one unhappy camper to have to foot that bill. Once again, probably not going to buy anything from Stahl/Arbortech in the future.
 
This past winter I decided to have a chip truck built with a platform behind the cab for my mini. I spoke to SouthCo and Arbortech. They both said that they were 8-10 weeks out and they were close on price. A friend of mine had Arbortech build him a truck and spoke very highly of the whole process (including end product). This swayed my decision and I shipped my cab and chassis to Ohio in late March for them to install the boxes (not build the platform). They said it would be done June 20th. I still do not have a truck and they have not even started it yet! Countless calls and emails all amounted to nothing more than a fart in the dark. I have now been told by Dave (my salesman) that it will be ready to ship at the end of this month. Thus far I have been VERY disappointed with their ability to deliver on promises made. I have not seen the end product yet so I can not speak to quality of build yet but thus far I would say that taking 1/3 of a year to install a dump body, hoist, toolboxes and lights seems excessive to me. Now I wonder how the quality of the end product will be. Assuming I ever end up seeing my truck I will post an update.
 
Yeah the arbortech light boxes are sealed like a vart in a vegas bunny ranch...we got screwed by stahl on an insurance claim on our new chip truck years back...our insurance got billed more for a new box and toolboxes than the entire upfit costed us...their wiring is simple for all the lights but should be more durable....also the tool box hinges are like $22 a piece and are p.o.s.. the "t" handles are like $117 each.
 
rugger01 said:
This past winter I decided to have a chip truck built with a platform behind the cab for my mini. I spoke to SouthCo and Arbortech. They both said that they were 8-10 weeks out and they were close on price. A friend of mine had Arbortech build him a truck and spoke very highly of the whole process (including end product). This swayed my decision and I shipped my cab and chassis to Ohio in late March for them to install the boxes (not build the platform). They said it would be done June 20th. I still do not have a truck and they have not even started it yet! Countless calls and emails all amounted to nothing more than a fart in the dark. I have now been told by Dave (my salesman) that it will be ready to ship at the end of this month. Thus far I have been VERY disappointed with their ability to deliver on promises made. I have not seen the end product yet so I can not speak to quality of build yet but thus far I would say that taking 1/3 of a year to install a dump body, hoist, toolboxes and lights seems excessive to me. Now I wonder how the quality of the end product will be. Assuming I ever end up seeing my truck I will post an update.
Click to expand...
Thanks for your reply @rugger01 . This is the type of user experience I know other people must be having. I spoke to the VP of sales for Stahl and he told me frankly that they are having difficulties at the factory on the production side. They took on a big account and can't keep up. Over-promise and under-deliver for too long and they will be sure to suffer.
 
If a person was looking for more negative user experience responses a google search of "problems with...." might turn up a bunch more listed here in past posts or elsewhere on the internet.

I always search that before committing to a big or important to me purchase.

Welcome to the new electronic age of responsibility companies. Ha, ha, ...fun laughing at those stupid customers you just got one over on huh? :) (Sarcasm)
 
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