Moving Logs with Tractor

[treeboy]

Thanks for the ideas guys, your all just full of info. I am planning on buying a tractor soon for haulin logs. Can't you just use choker cable though? The logs I'm after are less than 18" and I have old skider trails to use. We were just using a truck to move the smaller one a few weeks ago, so it seems doable.

[WH_Conley]

I have been using a hook on the drawbar, farm supply store, and two chokers at a time for years.

[beenthere]

Treeboy
Yep, that works if you don't mind all that rock, gravel, dirt, mud packed into the bark just waiting for a sharp tooth to try to get through it, be it a band saw tooth, a circle saw tooth, or a chain saw tooth.    A good debarker will knock all that off before sawing.  That along with the harder pull when the nose is in the dirt, and the conditon it leaves the skid trails in.
Just not the way I prefer to do it, but whatever works for you to get R dun..

[routestep]

Just for the record

My JD 990 has a front end loader with a bail. I wrap a chain around the log and the other end through the bail and drag the log. With a short chain the log will lift up a little.

[Lud]

Log too high too close to the tractor could be real trouble.  I solved the puzzle for short pulls by putting a mast  to hang my snatch block on the back end of the blade.  I can get lift with winch and with hydraulics but no tipback.
 

But dragging them thru the dirt isn't good either so I built this guy out of an old disc frame:
 

Which is great for the half mile run up to the mill, back it over and load right to the mill but I'm looking for the niche sled that I can slide it out of the woods easy out to where I can pick it up.  I'm thinking about a "sled" out of sheet metal so it would only pack the path and keep the log clean.

[wesdor]

As I read through this thread I kept thinking how I don't like the dirt in the logs and also how dragging them tears up the forest.

Lud - that is a great tool, unfortunately I'm not so talented as to be able to make something like that.

As I posted earlier (in another thread), I purchased a logging arch from Logrite (formerly Future Forestry).  Not only does it let me bring a log out with minimal damage to the ground, but it also is much safer than hooking to the 3pt. 

Be careful about hooking too big a log to your tractor and then pulling.  Bad things can happen.

[Weldrite]

wesdor- Glad to hear that you like your arch.  A LogRite arch is a very safe and efficient way to more logs from the woods with a tractor or ATV.  Not only are the trails left in great condition, the log is clean, and it is much easier on your equipment.  If you haven't seen our arches please check them out at LogRite.com. 

Just a few weeks ago at the TCI show in Hartford I was talking to a guy who's father was killed while skidding logs out of the woods with a  tractor.  He said his dad had been doing it every since he could remember, the log got hung up and the tractor went right up and over. 

I had a tractor blow a rear tire and roll on a little side hill.  Pitched me right off.  Lucky it didn't keep rolling as I landed just down hill from it.  Just makes you think about things a little more before you just jump into it.  No matter what you do out there just keep it safe and have fun.

[WILDSAWMILL]

i used to skid logs w 8 n ford w 250lb balast on front i still road wheeles most the time on big logs what a thrill
glad i have up graded to 800 case

[pineywoods]

Around here, up until the introduction of fellers and big skidders, the 8N ford was the skidder of choice.  it's likely that more logs have been skidded with an 8n ford than all others combined. I still occasionally use an old massey 135 that's pretty much the same tractor.  There was a local company that made a set of steel tracks and bogey wheels that would bolt on an 8N. DanG things would go where it was too soft and boggy to walk.

[shinnlinger]

Hi,

I have pulled many many logs with my 34 horse kubota, some over 30 ft long and over 25" in diameter.

What I use is a homemade ballast box of an old 55 gallon drum cut in half and loaded with concerete.  To the top of this I welded a short stout boom pole.  I lower the 3pt to the ground at the butt end of the log and back right into it and then bind a choker chain to the boom pole and lift away.  If it doesnt want to lift I will roll the bucket from the FEL down and raise the front a bit and then raise the weight/log as much as possible and then raise the bucket of the FEL and hopfully the front end will come down and away we go. 


I hear the concern about choking above the axle, but with my deal, the butt of the log is no lower than the counter weight so it cant really get hung up if the tractor itself can get through.

The weight may diminish the size log I can lift, but it helps stabilize things when working in the woods or when I get to the mill when I use the forks in the FEL to put the logs on the rails/piles.

If I have a lot of logs in one area I will take my excavator down and load an old flatbed trailer that I drag with the tractor (I have a reciever mounted on my counterweight) to keep the logs clean.