Equipment purchases - time to invest some money

[nickblaze466]

i'll be finishing up my MBA here in two months, afterwards i'd like to go full-bore into the wood stuff. Lately i've been getting a lot more work. Work with trees, work with land clearing, excavating, all kinds of goofy stuff. I have 3 splitters that i've put together over the years, couple decent trucks and two bobcats. One is a '96 450 gas and the other is an 89 443b diesel, both have 1500 or so hours on them and, knock on wood, run great. i've got the saws covered.

immediate problems are i have an '85 1ton ram i use to deliver wood, it has a dump bed conversion on it but its just a single cylinder and can't pick up that much weight. i am thinking heavily about investing in a nice 80''x16' dump trailer. already got one picked out, just debating on how soon i want to spend the money on it.

after that, i've been thinking about upgrading some equipment. originally i thought about hookin' up a kubota tractor with a loader and a digger on it. on the fence with that, as i don't think it'd move around too well in residential settings and a lot of my work is in those areas. also, i come across some big stuff on a regular basis. i built a vertical splitter to handle the big pieces, but a lot of them i can't move too well even on the ground. i hire a couple guys every year from the office but they always end up quitting after a couple months because the work is too stressfull...so the wife has been driving the bobcat for me and pushing the big pieces into the vertical until i can break them into manageable sizes. works well, except for i'm still relying on someone else and when she's pregnant she won't fit in the bobcat and i wouldn't really want her doing that kind of work pregnant anyways....so, been thinkin' about getting a nice bigger bobcat, 2k+ lift capacity and one of those walk behinds, mt-55 or so for loading the splitters and me working by myself. figure it'd be a lot easier just moving around one of those than getting in and out of the cab on my current setup. i'd then purchase a bobcat digger, so i'd have 3 machines. i guess the other option is a remote control setup on a bigger skidsteer but don't know what the added cost there is and not sure i'd trust loading logs with a remote control into a splitter i'm standing right next to.

after that my plan was to buy a towable manlift for aerial work, got those priced at about the 30k range, then a chipper, and then a stump grinder.

i have a chipper maybe lined up now, so that one isn't the biggest push on my list.

so, for those of you that have read this novel of mine and can offer some insight into what should be purchased and in what order to get me started on a larger scale in the tree business, i'd sure appreciate it.

most of my work is firewood, but i've been getting a lot more trees and a lot more land jobs as of late. i'm about 5'10'' 260, i've got a 54'' chest and bench press right about 340lbs, leg sled i can throw about 1400lbs. always been into weight lifting...pretty good ground guy but not so much for climbing - hence the lift.

i do not as of now have the work to support the purchase of all this equipment. a lot of this would be coming out of my own pocket until i got enough work rolling to keep it up on its own, and i'm not sure how far down the road that would be. a good chunk of this would be paid for cash, but a couple pieces i'd finance...

sorry for the exceptionally long post, and thanks for your input. :jawdrop:

Edit: i've bought used equipment before, but never new. i've seen the suggested retail prices on things at kubota but never at bobcat, i'm assuming there is quite a bit of wiggle room in new equipment purchases, especially if i'm going to walk out with three new machines - i'd like someone to confirm that as well, and maybe give me some examples of deals on purchases in their past.

 

[arbor pro]

I have a genie tz50 towable lift and like it a lot for getting into tight spaces where a truck can't go. However, to get it there, I use my mini skid steer. I would put that high on my list if I were you - maybe get rid of one of the larger skid steers and have one big one and one mini skid. They are worth their weight in gold for moving a towable lift into position, for forwarding debris out of back yards or for feeding a chipper. Many uses and worth every penny for a good one.

I'm selling my bandit 200+ chipper (12" disk). Probably going to sell my one-ton chip truck as well and get a bigger one to handle my 18" chipper. The truck has a 8' chip box on the back and room between it and the cab to haul my mini skid (loads from either side with 6' ramps). Check out the pics if interested...

Good luck with your ventures.

Scott

 

[Hoosier]

Do you guys find that insurance goes up or gets expensive with a lift? I am a landscaper, not a tree service, I dont climb and I dont leave the ground. With that said I have turned away my share of jobs because of it. If I get a lift for smaller tree removal should I expect insurance to go up a bunch?

 

[arbor pro]

Do you guys find that insurance goes up or gets expensive with a lift? I am a landscaper, not a tree service, I dont climb and I dont leave the ground. With that said I have turned away my share of jobs because of it. If I get a lift for smaller tree removal should I expect insurance to go up a bunch?

good question for your insurance company. Some companies will carry landscapers but not tree services who do aerial work. My carrier is picky about who they carry. For me, they put tree work and landscaping into the same category realizing that it is reasonable to expect some level of crossover between the two. It's great for me because I don't really pay any more for aerial work than I do for general ground work or landscaping. That said, it wasn't that way when I started out in business 20+ years ago. Back then, I paid 4 times more for tree work coverage than I did for landscaping.

If you have a good history with your current carrier, you may want to feel them out on the issue and ask around with other carriers. I've been with my current carrier for about 15 years now so they know what to expect from me in terms of annual claims. I really didn't have much for claims when they used to separate tree work from landscaping or ground tree work. that may be the reason they are now willing to lump the two into the same category.

But, like I said, they have told me that the only reason they are doing that for me is because I have been with them for so long. They won't just take someone off the street and give them the same rates. Experience and a work history matters to carriers.

Hope this helps.