Tree-processing machine: video

[Beartracks]

OMG, I had no idea there was this kind of machine: it can fell, strip, and cut into lengths a decent-sized tree in a matter of seconds:

http://www.funlol.com/12700/Amazing_tree_destroyer.html

Sorry if this is old news, but I always imagined loggers using chainsaws, and then utilizing heavy equipment to haul, strip, cut, etc. once it all got to the top of a mountainside or something. But this things is like a tree-eating machine. Wow.

[ConcernedCanuk]

1. We call them fellow-bunchers up here

.
.
.

been around for decades

expensive, huge, and dangerous

most of them have large printing on them advising to stay 300 feet away

[XemaSab]

3. Don't you mean feller-bunchers?

;)

[ConcernedCanuk]

5. ummm - yup

.
.
.

[Nihil]

7. Depends on how many people fail to stay 300' away ...

> expensive, huge, and dangerous
> most of them have large printing on them advising to stay 300 feet away

Bunch, munch, burp!

:P

[lumberjack_jeff]

2. They suck for a couple of reasons;

1) they put people out of work. It's far cheaper to run one of these than to run a team of a half dozen loggers. The spotted owl didn't put people out of work, mechanization did.
2) because of their limitations, they require plantations to be run on a very short rotation (20 years or less). In my area, trees add the most volume between 30 and 50 years, and coincidentally provide more habitat for a greater variety of critters. A 50 year old tree is far too big to be manipulated by a feller/buncher. Weyerhaeuser says they harvest on a 40 or 50 year rotation, but from what I can see that is not true, they harvest mostly 30 year old 8" dia poles.

[XemaSab]

4. All in all

it's probably better to extract some timber from small-diameter plantations than to clearcut large trees.

I know it's hard to log smaller trees, and it isn't always cost-effective, but that machine looks very efficient.

[Fledermaus]

6. Timberjack Walking Machine

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CD2V8GFqk_Y