...and lunch? Donettos? Coffee?you forgot another and.
What kind of skidder? My little D21 dozer at a whopping 40HP burns 1 1/4 gallons an hour. My 90hp backhoe burns 2 gallons an hour.jeebus 51 gallons, the most I've ever burned is 7 gallons in a 12 hour day of nothing but skidding, long drags too
What kind of skidder? My little D21 dozer at a whopping 40HP burns 1 1/4 gallons an hour. My 90hp backhoe burns 2 gallons an hour.
That's not my only equipment, that was just an example of my two smaller diesels I own. I was wondering what Northman was running to only burn 7 gallons in 12 hours. I've worked with a 440c and a Cat 518 and never put less than 20 gallons a day in them. I guess the "C" models burn a bunch more. The D6N and 320 hoe at 6gal/hr start to really hurt when we are really moving dirt. I don't own those two, just lease the big stuff when I need it.That's great fuel economy. Our Cat skidders, especially on steep ground and heavy loads, won't ever sip fuel like that. I wish they would but that's not our main consideration. We want machinery that pulls...not something that's about one step above a riding lawnmower.
You guys that work on relatively flat ground and small timber can use the smaller and more fuel efficient machinery but we can't get away with it. I wish we could.
If I'm hand falling on steep ground and the timber is scattered at all I'll use a grapple Cat to stage the logs for the rubber tired machines. He usually works right behind the fallers and a day or two ahead of the skidders. They're all grapples too and having the logs bunched a ways down toward the landing saves a lot of monkey motion. That's another fuel expense but it nets out better because I get more logs to the landing in a given amount of time. Monkey motion eats fuel to no good purpose.
We try to work our skidding so that everything is downhill to the landing but that's not always possible. When we start a side where the skidders are coming up out of a hole on a long drag the first thing I like to do is see how much fuel I have on hand...'cause my fuel usage is about to increase. Again.
LOL...everybody says "well, fuel is just an expense and you can write it off at the end of the year". That's true...but I still have to come up with the fuel bill money every month in the meantime. The fuel company is fussy about that.
That's not my only equipment, that was just an example of my two smaller diesels I own. I was wondering what Northman was running to only burn 7 gallons in 12 hours. I've worked with a 440c and a Cat 518 and never put less than 20 gallons a day in them. I guess the "C" models burn a bunch more. The D6N and 320 hoe at 6gal/hr start to really hurt when we are really moving dirt. I don't own those two, just lease the big stuff when I need it.
I'm not a logger, but I do own many pieces of equipment and trucks. I totally understand how the fuel bill effects the bottom line.
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