loaders

[xlogger]

I get most of my logs by taking my GN trailer to job sites and log yards. But from time to time I get offers of tractor trailer loads. My bobcat will not go high enough to clear side of trailers and my forklift will but with no clamp and its slow that way. Just wondering how some you might do it, I know Robert got a pretty good size tractor, not sure it goes high enough.

[bandmiller2]

Logger, what if you used some timbers and fill, made a loading dock a trailer could pull along side. Frank C.

[ellmoe]

   Around here you can buy a decent front end loader with forks for about $20,000. Use it for several years and get most of your money back. Leasing is an option if cash is tight.

[xlogger]

Logger, what if you used some timbers and fill, made a loading dock a trailer could pull along side. Frank C.

That would be in the way where I would have to unload at after truck left.

   Around here you can buy a decent front end loader with forks for about $20,000. Use it for several years and get most of your money back. Leasing is an option if cash is tight.

I hate at my age to buy another piece of equipment, I probably could get a knuckle boom cheaper than that.

[ncsawyer]

I don't ever have to unload tractor trailer's, but have seen it done quite efficiently with an excavator with a thumb, or even better is an excavator with a log grapple.  I know you don't want to buy another piece of equipment, but I would think an excavator would have much better resale value than a knuckle boom since the excavator is a much less "specialized" piece of equipment.

[Dave Shepard]

If the log bunks are talk, it's hard to find a payloader that will reach high enough. The three yard loader I used to use would not. The Lull would, and they are so handy to have around a mill anyway.

[Dewey]

I bought my Pulp loader for $8500 Ford 800 with Prentice 110....  They are out there//

[Peter Drouin]

My Cat/Lull will be here next week if Milton Cat is done with it. ;)

[4x4American]

backhoe works, but wouldnt be ideal for big long heavy logs. 

[Banjo picker]

I got a Prentice 210 C .  it will unload a truck pretty quick.  Most loggers dont really like to have to wait very long to get unloaded.  That helped me get loggers to bring stuff in when i was cutting ties.  Take toi long to unload and they might mot come back.  I do think a sky track woul do well. Banjo

[YellowHammer]

I've not tried to unload a full height bunk log truck with mine.  It's certainly strong enough and there are very few logs I can't lift with it, but it weighs in at under 10,000 lbs so doesn't have a whole lot of ballast.  My max lift height is 11.25 ft, where a JD544 is 10.9 ft, so I have the height, but The 544 weighs 28,000 lbs. 

Most loggers here have one or two short standard trailer in their stable that are intended to be unloaded by equipment that doesn't have the reach, such as a skidsteer or smaller loader.

Loggers also fall back on dump trucks or dump flat bed trailers to get me the monsters.

I use my trailer with the shorter standards either short standard logging trailer, dump trucks or my own. 

I would say the optimum would be a 10,000 lb Telehandler, or what every big mill uses here, fleets of 544's.

[PA_Walnut]

Facing the same dilemma here. My Kubota L4060 isn't cutting it...poor thing sometimes looks like the loader is gonna snap off. :(
I like the telehandler idea. What might I expect to pay for a good/sound older model that can do 10,000?
Thx

[ButchC]

   Around here you can buy a decent front end loader with forks for about $20,000. Use it for several years and get most of your money back.

I agree with that line of thought ;)  If the primary need is loading then buy a loader, not something else that acts like a loader. An older but nice shape smaller articulated loader can be bought  less money than a skid steer or tractor/loader and will out reach and out perform either one tending a mill.  My W11B Case was $8,000.00 has quick attach forks and bucket, 4 cyl Cummins engine that runs for ever and 8 days on a tank of fuel. Nice thing about an articulated loader over a skid steer is they dont tear the dickens out of the work area. Deere 544 is a good machine, so are the small Cases and believe it of not the  Fiat Allis such as models 505 and even Ford A66 are very nice smaller loaders that are dependable performers.

[Percy]

Everyone's situation is different so results may vary...but about 10 years ago, I bought a used 966c for 35,000. I thought it was a frivilous purchase at the time as I could always just use/hire the self loading log trucks for my work. They were not as available as I would like and thats why I purchased the 966. Well within a couple of months, a ;logger wants to sell me around 20 loads of sitka spruce. I had room to store it but no job that big or need. He said, we are finished logging in that area and have to move the wood out now. We made a deal where all 20 loads would be brought to my mill at his expense, unloaded and scaled at my expense. I would then pay as I used the logs when needed. Result was being able to land a contract with a larger mining outfit cause I had resources available. The loader changed my business considerably. I have used this deal/scenario several times over the years. The machine is a nessessity now. I would replace in an instant if it died.

[mike_belben]

Ive been to many mills here.  There are only two machine styles between the lot of them. A big dollar self propelled barko at the big dollar corporate stave mill.  The rest used front end loaders with rigid welded forks and a top clamp that reached the tips, with a round spreader bar between the clamp times.  This allows fully curling forward and plucking just one log gently like a sorting grapple. Very precise, fast and controlled unlike my big articulated forklift that stabs and drops and fumbles everthing, and cant always curl forward enough to roll them off.

There are 3 newer volvos and a kawasaki at the big mills i frequent.   Little guys tend to have smaller hough, case, clark michigan older "farm" machines.

In my other life i was a junkyard/equipment exporter.  The safest bet on being able to get out of your dead loader purchase is 1973 and later cat 966 with the later version steering.  The export world wants them, dead or alive.  Whole or torched into a container.  Particularly egypt and guatemala more recently.  Basically a risk free machine.

[tmbrcruiser]

I recently purchase a JCB 506 C, works great unloading log trucks, loading the mill and moving lumber. It weighs about 22,000 lbs. and is rated to lift 6,000 lbs. Bought it used with 2,400 hours for $25,000.00. Some of the best money I've spent around the mill.

[JB Griffin]

Log length is very important,  if tree length a knuckleboom is the only efficient way to handle em and can be had around here for 10k+.
Shorter stuff is obviously easier to handle and cheaper equipment can be used.

[xlogger]

I'm thinking that no more tractor trailer loads I get I'll just use what I have. If they complain it taking too much time I'll just pay a little extra.

[PA_Walnut]

I saw someone post somewhere here to the effect, "Lumber is material handling on both ends, with a saw in the middle..." This is an epic truth that is a hard-learning lesson. I'm there. :(

[Ohio_Bill]

I saw someone post somewhere here to the effect, "Lumber is material handling on both ends, with a saw in the middle..." This is an epic truth that is a hard-learning lesson. I'm there. :(

very wise words

[longtime lurker]

As i think it was Percy said  if the job is unloading then you need a loader and everything else is a poor substitute. Same with general log handling around a mill.
And with loaders there is no substitute for sheer size.

But i also get that unless you mill for a living it can be hard to justify the expense.

You got a forklift. Somewhere I've got full dimensions for this.


 

With variations based on log size. Might take a while to find them but if you want ill dig them out.

Clamping covered, the other modification you can do to a forklift is change the lift ram from single action to double action cylinder. That may be as simple as a piston mod or may require spool valve changes too. That gives you down pressure instead of float, which vastly improves them for handling logs because the forks wont just flop when you try and run between two logs.

[PA_Walnut]

This drawing gives me food for thought, and or inquiry from those who have gone before...
My tractor is somewhere CLOSE to adequate but not quite. (I can lift around 2500 or so)....

I've discovered that my grapple, while works great with the hydraulics is big and heavy and adds twice the weight of my forks, so can't lift as much when I'm close to the edge. (every pound adds up).

Would love to see some working fork mods for ideas/info to send to my fabricator. My welding skills aren't adequate enough...yet.

Thx

[Brandon1986]

Reading through this thread makes me thankful that I am an excavator first and a sawyer second.. I have at my disposal 4 Hitachi 200's a 1 yard loader a 3 yard loader and a self loading log truck and a 5000# warehouse forklift..... With a $1500 (ish) Home made sawmill  :D :D... I am envious of you folks with legit woodmizers and such..