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Skid Steer-Mounted Log Splitter Doubles As A Tree Trimmer
After spending an entire day wrestling 300 to 450-lb. logs onto a conventional log splitter, David Lawrie of Wichita, Kansas, decided to find an easier way to do the back-breaking work. He built an "inverted log splitter" that attaches to his skid steer loader.
"It can pick up, move, and split heavy logs without
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Skid Steer-Mounted Log Splitter Doubles As A Tree Trimmer WOODLOT EQUIPMENT Wood Splitters 25-5-13 After spending an entire day wrestling 300 to 450-lb. logs onto a conventional log splitter, David Lawrie of Wichita, Kansas, decided to find an easier way to do the back-breaking work. He built an "inverted log splitter" that attaches to his skid steer loader.
"It can pick up, move, and split heavy logs without the operator ever having to touch the log," says Lawrie. "It handles logs up to 30 in. long regardless of their diameter. It also works great for trimming overhanging branches along roads and fencelines."
The patent pending machine is equipped with a quick-tach universal mounting plate and operates off loader hydraulics. A heavy duty 7-ft., 8-in. long steel sq. tube is welded to a 1/2 by 8-in. slide plate and has a wedge at one end. A 5-in. dia. hydraulic cylinder attaches to a steel block that's used to push the log into the wedge. To pick up a log, the operator simply squeezes it between the block and wedge and then raises the skid loader's arms.
"It lets me pick up a 500-lb. log, move it anywhere I want, and then split it," says Lawrie. "If the log is really big I can split it in two, then keep splitting to a diameter as small as 5 in. I used it last year on my Bobcat 742 skid loader and now use it on a Bobcat 863 model. The unit is small enough that I can haul it in the back of my pickup.
"A big surprise is how well it works for trimming overhanging branches along roadways and fences. I just lift the unit up in the air and drop the wedge down over the branch to cut it. It'll snap off 3 or 4-in. thick hedge branches with no problem, and the wedge extends out far enough that there's no danger of the branch falling onto the operator. It's a lot safer and faster than standing on the bed of a dump truck with a chain saw, which I had been doing. What used to take me all day to trim, I can now do in only 45 minutes to an hour."
Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, David Lawrie, 129 N. Grove, Wichita Kansas 67214 (ph 316 267-6063).
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