<font color="blue">why do you folks burn?</font color>
I guess brush piles come in different sizes. As long as I was just picking up fallen debris, my pile was controllable in the manner you describe. But now that I've gotten serious about clearing fire trails and removing the growth that's gotten too close to the house, my brush pile is so big that it is more of a fire hazard than the areas I was clearing. [img]/forums/images/icons/crazy.gif[/img]
Probably also depends on what kinda stuff you're putting on the pile. If I'm just clearing brush, the pile stays reasonable. Now that I'm cuttin' down trees here and there, it's just piling up too fast. One small oak tree makes for a powerful heap o' limbs and leaves, not counting the good firewood that comes with it.
Personally, I'd rather run it all through a chipper, but so far it doesn't look like I'll be able to arrange that due to finances and schedules 'n' stuff. [img]/forums/images/icons/wink.gif[/img]
<font color="blue">Would it be possible, and prudent, to run a rotary cutter over the pile</font color>
Funny you should ask. [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] I had the same idea and even mentioned it over on TBN recently. I think it was RobertN who said he had tried it himself, and although it shreds the brush, it throws it all over the place and just generally makes a mess.
Had to find out for myself, though, didn't I? [img]/forums/images/icons/wink.gif[/img] To control the mess, I decided to dig a shallow trough barely wider than the rotary cutter and do all my shredding in the trough.
I had planned on running a pictoral report over on TBN, but never got around to it. Since this is more about brush piles than it is about tractors, and since you came right out and asked the question, Mike, I'll do it here.
The attached pictures show the preparation of the trough itself.
The pictures attached here are kind of a before-and-after of several runs with the rotary cutter.
I found that I could only do a little bit at a time 'cuz it gets hard to get the cutter on top of the pile, plus the amount of work the cutter is doing at one time gets to be considerable (not to mention noisy [img]/forums/images/icons/crazy.gif[/img] ) I wore my chainsaw helmet with ear protection the whole time.
The bottom picture shows what was left after running over about a half dozen small piles as shown in the top picture. Have to admit I was amazed at how little was left each time. Just shows to go ya that a lot of our brush is mostly air.
Note -- not clearly shown in that last picture is the larger stuff I retrieved from the trough when the cutter was done. It generally wound up laying too flat in the dirt for the cutter to get ahold of it, and was typically 2 inches or more in diameter. Not bad for small firewood, actually.
My final opinion? It's a lot o' work (hand-filling the trough, jumping on and off the tractor, etc.), hard on the ol' rotary cutter, and unfortunately kinda slow going. After an entire afternoon of this process, I had made a noticeable dent in the original brush pile, but that was about all. Would probably take me a week to finish it (or in my case, a couple of months of visits).
Since this episode, I have cleared more trees and limbs and the pile is considerably bigger than when I took these pictures. Unless I can get access to a man-sized chipper soon, my next attempt will be a burn. [img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img]
Interesting pictures. I was thinking you could just back up into the pile, i.e., don't use the trench and the steps needed to move the brush to it. But you're right, it's a slow and very noisy process and probably kind of rough on the cutter.
We rarely have any trees left over as my in-laws burn wood for heat. They take all burnable wood and I am left with only the branches and stuff under 2 inches or so. Also, we don't have much of a fire hazard here, although we are in a drought right now. I'm more worried about my forest burning down if I would attempt to burn. When I was a kid my father set the yard on fire while burning leaves. The fire department came at the last minute and probably saved the house. My mother complained because the fire pull box(remember those) was all the way at the end of the block. The next week the fire chief was there as a crew installed a pull box on a telephone pole at the end of our driveway. I'm told the fire chief made some comment about idiots and leaf fires as he drove away. My mother was mortified in front of the neighbors [img]/forums/images/icons/laugh.gif[/img]
Wait till wet/damp weather comes...put a couple tire casings in the brush,go back out AFTER DARK and take about 5 gallons of diesel fuel ,spread on brush pile generously,light that sucker .....stand back and enjoy [img]/forums/images/icons/crazy.gif[/img] .Those old tires sure make some interesting sounds when they are hot and burning well. [img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img]
<font color="blue">I was thinking you could just back up into the pile</font color>
Sounds better than I think the reality would be. Since your cutter will get there before the tires, it would probably just push into the pile without doing as much cutting as you would want. And if that wasn't a problem, you'd find out just how much brush your cutter could digest at once before it choked. [img]/forums/images/icons/crazy.gif[/img]
I was also getting concerned about tire punctures as I drove over the small piles in the trough. Seems like it would be just a matter of time before a pointy stick came up at just the right angle and did me in. [img]/forums/images/icons/frown.gif[/img]
Just wanted to say "hi". I've burned several piles and currently have three piles waiting for later in the fall when there is snow cover. My first burns were from cleanup of the lot and covered 30'x30'x 10'. The second was from clearing a space to build my house - about a 50' radius and 10' high. I just made sure I always had full water buckets (6-8 five gallon buckets) all around the pile and access to quick resupply from the stream. Re: burn barrels - I also use a 55 gallon drum. They tend to keep embers hot a long time. Several times, I have had a good fire going on Sunday and let it go, then come back the next SATURDAY, stir up the ashes, add some paper and it'll flare right up. Ashes are still pretty warm so getting the fire going is pretty easy. I just aways make sure to put the lid on when I'm not there.
Reply With Quote
