Like a kid waiting for Christmas morning... FX85 coming from Canada

[Jim Timber]

Those are for hanging the brake and pull lines on. Green cord is the brake dog, white is the clutch engagement.

They have a choker chain rail and pocket on the sides of the fx90, but when they downsized this tier to the fx85 they removed them. The fx110 has them, but it's $4200.

I actually like that the fx85 is missing this stuff because it's a blank slate instead of having to work around or cut things off to fit my ideas. My comment was ironic to that position, because if you didn't like modifying stuff, or say, have 10 people coming over tomorrow to see it work in person (like I do), not having a way to keep your chokers organized is a real setback.

Another thing I discovered late last night is that the new keyhole chocker skidding bar won't clear a hook on the non-choking end of the chain. They only made it big enough for bare chain to pass through. My choker chains are all set up with hooks and sliders so I can extend them or hook them to my root grapple (as it turns out is quite handy).

 

[farmer steve]

Got it all installed/working and set out to figure out a quick way to handle chokers. There's nothing on this thing for un-hooked rigging. It's like they expect you to miracle yourself from the shed to the downed trees.

Aside from that somewhat significant oversight, and the fact the back cover (black vented stamped steel) isn't rigid enough to not vibrate and rattles; this sucker is very well made.

I have a design in my head for ammo cans on the sides with integral saw scabbards. Should be cake to build and will solve part of the storage issues.

In the mean time, I'm using some spring clips hooked through the safety screen. We'll see how it works over the weekend and go from there.

I also debadged the giant vinyl bush pilot sticker and replaced it with a much more prudent SMV sticker. I'd probably be fine without it in my neighborhood, but it's one less technicality for my ex-cop neighbors to whine about.

lookin good there Jim. glad to see the SMV sticker(s). see to many things going up and down the road here without them. now waiting on the video of that baby in action.

 

[Jim Timber]

I swapped out the chain sliders for midgets last night, but it's too wet to be dragging trees. We had .6" overnight yesterday, and it was soggy Friday before that...

I was all excited to drop trees this weekend, but it's just not a good idea. So I mixed up some 10% gly spray and nuked a couple thistle patches instead. Then I took some measurements off the winch and came up with an idea how to get my ammo cans and a couple saws slung off this thing. Time to head back to the shop and get welding.

 

[Jim Timber]

It's a work in progress, but this is coming along nicely.

28" bar will be no problem. This is a 16" but the chain guard on it sticks down a bit further.

 

[Jim Timber]

Had to make a trip up today for various reasons, but I got these mounts figured out. I'll have to make a bracket to bridge the gap between the middle of the winch chassis and the uprights on the scabbards and then they'll be ready for the UHMW inserts. There's a local place that might have the plastic I need and there's an ebayer that does have what I need for an acceptable price. So I'll see if the local outfit is worth dealing with and go from there.

 

[dancan]

I like the scabbard Jim , all I did for mine was to make it out of plywood from a roadsign and bolt it to the tractor fender .
It will hold 2 saws .

 

[Jim Timber]

There's two scabbards. I just haven't taken a pic of both of them (they're identical mirrors of each other). I did get my UHMW plastic locally and started cutting it up today. I'll have a few 24" plastic sleeves available for sale in the next day or so too (had to buy a whole 4x8 sheet to get the price reasonable), so those will probably show up in classifieds shortly.

 

[flashhole]

Great thread, thanks for sharing.