Choosing a small chipper

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squad143

Tree Guy
Joined
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Location
Toronto Canada area
I'm starting a small tree service company (mainly removals) in cottage country (Ontario Canada). Most, if not all customers want the wood, and if they don't, their neighbours do.

I looking a purchasing a small used chipper for several reasons;

1. Budget (want to spend between $5,000 - $6,000 usd).

2. Tow vehicle is a small SUV. (Chipper should not weigh more than 2200 lbs).
Some of the driveways I go into are tight and long.
Also, with a lighter chipper I could use my ATV to get it into tight spots.

3. I have no need to chip large material. All pieces 3" and larger I cut into firewood length for the customer, so I am only cutting material under 3".

4. Storage space in garage (security) is limited.

I've been looking at the Vermeer bc625a and more recently the Bandit 65.

I would like to know your opinions on these (or any) of the smaller chippers.

Thanks.
 
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I'm in the same boat and have been looking around for several weeks and have found a lot of info on this site. Go to the search and type in "Chipper question" and the thread discusses several different types of machines. I THINK i'm looking for the woodchuck WC-12. Another thead is drum vs disc.

Hope this helps.
 
i have the vermeer 625.

i like it.yeah big chippers are great but the cost big money to buy and repair.the 625 is simple to work on.it has a kohler engine which i can get parts for at almost any lawnmower dealer.it uses a lot less gas.i can get it almost anywhere(backyards).i can tow it with a 4 cyl toyota pick up easily.and if you get sucked into it,you aren't losing more than an arm.

sure it takes a little longer than a larger chipper and only does 6 inches but it does it well.anything bigger is firewood most of the time anyway.pros far outway the cons to me.
 
Honestly, I have found it is cheaper and faster to have a guy haul branches to the dump than pay them to run a 625. A 9" is an ok machine but 100x quicker than a 625. Just my thoughts. It's not than it cant chip them, infact it does make beautiful chips, it's the 6" opening. Sure you might not run bigger than 3" diameter wood, but if a branch or stick is kinda crooked, has a sharp bend or much of a Y (fork) then it will go through.

Just test one first but compare it to something. Sure a 12" might cost a bit more and it is heavy, but a 9" is good machine and not as big. Always test and compare equipment. I have seen too people buy something they regret because they didnt try it out.

Best of luck
 
Honestly, I have found it is cheaper and faster to have a guy haul branches to the dump than pay them to run a 625. A 9" is an ok machine but 100x quicker than a 625. Just my thoughts. It's not than it cant chip them, infact it does make beautiful chips, it's the 6" opening. Sure you might not run bigger than 3" diameter wood, but if a branch or stick is kinda crooked, has a sharp bend or much of a Y (fork) then it will go through.

Just test one first but compare it to something. Sure a 12" might cost a bit more and it is heavy, but a 9" is good machine and not as big. Always test and compare equipment. I have seen too people buy something they regret because they didnt try it out.

Best of luck

SilentElk has an excellent point. In several of the threads it was discussed about the importance of renting several machines to compair them.
 
Thanks for all the replys.

Trying first (from a rental company) is a great idea, however my local rental company only rents small (625) which I've already tried and large (too big for my vehicle to pull).

I wouldn't mind trying a brush bandit 65 to compare to the vermeer 625, but I don't know of anyone in the Toronto area that rents them. Anyone???

I realize that there is "no replacement for displacement", however even with a 9" chipper, I'll have to get a new (used) truck to haul it. -My company is not there yet.

I'm not paying employees to chip material, I'm a one man company (my wife is my grounds person -occasionally) so even though the smaller chippers take more time to chip than the big guns, I can wait.

Just want to know, out of the small machines, any problems or comments. I've read on the other posts about jamming concerns with the bandit 65. Is that with one particular year or all of them. I know that the bandit has a larger feeding chute, but they are much more difficult to find.

Thanks again.

"Nobody's called 911 because they did something right"
 
i keep the stihl 192 next to the chipper.

keep the limbs trimmed up and they go through fast.i never had it hold me up yet.
 
+1 Silent Elk,

A chainsaw chipper is more versatile, and affordable; buy a trailer and line the inside with plywood, then you can jump in and start hacking with the chainsaw if it gets filled up.

The thing about removals around here is that much of the time the wood is junk, so no one wants to burn it. If you have a trailer then disposal will be much easier than with a 6" chipper.

PM treemachine, i think he runs a 9" chipper, but for the same reasons you stated. He seems to have a good system and may offer some good advice.

Best of luck.
 
PM treemachine, i think he runs a 9" chipper, but for the same reasons you stated. He seems to have a good system and may offer some good advice.

Hi guys.

I did what others have suggested above, and that was to rent a number of chippers first.

I rented a 4" once, infuriating toy of a piece of crap, spit, spit, oh,.... heh heh, sorry.

Then 6", 9" 12" drum, disc, chuck n duck, gas, diesel. After and during all of this I was looking for features also, things like autofeed, vise stands, engine cover, clutch versions vs clutchless, how easy is it to change the oil, change the knives, sharpen the knives, where are the grease zerks and how many.

Getting a machine is sort of like getting married. You want something that's gonna work well with you, and you want to make th right choice the first time around.

It is all about your company profile. If you have a 4 or 5 man crew, a 6" is just not going to cut it. If it is just you, and you have the ability to get rid of the firewood, and you're considering towing into deep back yards with an ATV, then a 9" is too big.

For my business, which is one-man most of the time, I need the versatility to get in and out of tight areas. I need to be able to hook up the chipper by myself without having to have another person directing me to the coupling. I need to move , swing around and reposition the chipper by hand. Anything bigger than 6" is too heavy to do that. Here's some pics from a couple days ago, boiling an hour job into 12 minutes.
 
Interesting photo's for sure tree machine. But you got me curious, where are you taking the tree? Never seen someone haul a tree like that. If I saw that on the road you would get my attention!
 
LOL How did you get the tree on the Truck? Drop it there?

WAG but I'd wager since the first pic of the truck shows no chipper hooked to the truck he backed the truck to the tree raised the bed, few tie downs and "drop" the tree.

Of course I was wrong once before. :laugh:
 
LOL How did you get the tree on the Truck? Drop it there?

bushinspector said:
I know I am not the sharpest nail in the bag but why pull a chipper when you carry off the whole tree???

This was an isolated case, the second one in, like, 10 years. See, I had an employee that week and on Friday the boss buys lunch. I sent noobster to a market with $ and I went on to this condominium complex I work with.

I wanted to see if I could do the tree before he arrived with lunch. I shaved the tree up a bit and chipped the brush. That's when I got the bright idea to topple the tree onto the truck-- because we only had to go to the end of the lane we were on, a couple hundred meters away, chip site, firewood site and that day, lunch site.

I connected the chipper back on, with the pine tree on top just because I could. We were amusing ourselves.
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Tree, you bought a Dodge???
I wanted something with a tight turning radius. I could almost care less about anything else, but the Dodge has power windows but a radio that only gets AM. I can do tight U-turns, and back the chipper into really tight quarters. 4 WD is solid, a must for any tree guy.

The truck just happened to be painted blue, same color as the chipper. I like power windows. I've never had them on a work truck.


The chipper is nice. There's a myth that big chippers chip faster. I'll give them that they chip bigger, but if each's infeed wheel rate is set to 90 feet per minute, they are both eating brush at the same speed. With the 6" you only really want to be chipping stuff the diameter of your forearm, and not much bigger, but as long as you want to go.

For forky limbs, sometimes the sawman has to forsee a problem limb and create a couple relief cuts so the limb will collapse easily as its being pulled in.

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