I would say it all depends on what you do on a regular basis.
Look at your typical species and size and do some wood weight estimations
Look at the work you do and the setup areas you will need to work in.
Look at the charts of the cranes in your purchace range and then determin if this will fit in with what you do.
Boom length does help for getting to the work, length and angle decreases max loading.
Loadline scales are nice to get an idea what actual weights are and where you can go with chunk size.
I know a few companies with cranes and you really have to do a lot of big tree work to make it pay off.
The Guiffre model menioned in TCI Mag is 77K before any financing, so figure around 100k total.
So figure you will need 16.7k per annum just to pay the thing off. (WHat would a manintinace budget be on soemthing like that?)
16,700 / 200 workdays is 83.5 per day or if you use it once a week on average, figure a round $420 for the rig.
That is for a 6 year financing plan, without any maintinance figured in.
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