Frequently asked questions

What is the difference between a harvester and a feller buncher?

A harvester fells, delimbs, measures, bucks and sorts the stem into finished logs in one cycle, at the stump. It belongs to the cut-to-length system.

A feller buncher only cuts the tree and places it in a bunch. Processing happens later, at the landing, using a separate processor. It belongs to the full-tree system.

They are not alternatives for the same job — choosing between them means choosing a production system, and the rest of the fleet follows from that decision.

Cut-to-length vs full-tree →Harvesters →

Do I need a purpose-built forestry machine, or can I use an excavator?

It depends almost entirely on one number: how many paid forestry hours the machine will perform each year.

High annual forestry hours favour a purpose-built carrier, because poor duty-cycle capability — inadequate cooling, unsuitable boom geometry, insufficient guarding — compounds every shift. Low or uncertain hours favour an excavator, because its fixed cost spreads across civil, demolition and drainage work as well, and it resells into a far larger market.

A conventional excavator should not be assumed suitable for forest harvesting without assessing guarding and operator protection against the forest safety code applicable in your state.

Excavator vs purpose-built carrier →Forestry carriers →

Should I buy a chipper or a grinder?

This is decided by feedstock, not by throughput. A chipper produces a cleaner, more uniform product from clean forestry fibre, but its knives are sensitive to contamination. A horizontal grinder tolerates dirty, mixed, irregular, stump-heavy or demolition-derived material.

The correct sequence is to sign the offtake agreement first — chip specification, moisture, contamination limits, tonnes required, delivery point and transport requirement — and let the machine follow from it. An out-of-specification load is rejected, not discounted.

Chipper vs grinder →

What size excavator do I need for a mulcher or tree shear?

Tonnage class alone is not a sufficient answer, and "fits 20 tonne excavators" is not a specification.

Ask which exact models, at what boom configuration, with which coupler, what counterweight, and whether the lift chart has been checked with the attachment fitted. Then confirm the hydraulics: continuous flow, pressure at that flow, return pressure, case drain requirement, cooling capacity, hose size, coupler restriction and permitted continuous duty.

A mulcher in particular is a continuous-duty attachment. It draws close to maximum flow for hours, which is a fundamentally different demand from a bucket or a hammer.

Hydraulic power calculator →Hydraulics and carrier matching →

How do I calculate the real hourly cost of a forestry machine?

Take purchase price less expected resale, divided by the ownership period, to get annual depreciation. Add other annual fixed costs — finance, insurance, registration, telematics, administration. Divide the total by productive hours per year to get fixed cost per hour. Then add fuel, operator, service, repairs and consumables per hour.

The variable that dominates is utilisation. A machine depreciating $100,000 a year costs $40/hour at 2,500 productive hours and $80/hour at 1,250 — same machine, same purchase price, double the cost.

Machine cost calculator →Total cost of ownership →

How much does forestry mulching cost per hectare?

It is set by vegetation density, not by area, and the range is wide enough to decide whether a contract is profitable.

At a machine cost of $350 per hour, production of 0.75 hectares per hour gives $466.67 per hectare. The same machine in dense vegetation at 0.35 hectares per hour gives $1,000 per hectare.

This is why quoting forestry mulching from satellite imagery or total hectares alone is the most common way to lose money in this sector. Assess density on site, and quote against a defined treatment standard rather than a maximum tree diameter.

Forestry mulchers →

What is a good machine availability figure?

Mechanical availability is available scheduled hours divided by total scheduled hours, times 100. A machine scheduled for 200 hours that loses 20 to breakdown is at 90%.

Raising availability from 85% to 95% is frequently worth more than raising theoretical production by 5% — and it is usually cheaper to buy, because availability comes from dealer support, local parts stock and maintenance discipline rather than from capital.

Cost of ownership →

Should I buy or hire?

Buy when work is predictable, utilisation is high and contracted, the term is long, and a specialist operator expects a consistent machine. Hire when the project is temporary, the need is unusual, utilisation is uncertain, or you want to measure productivity before committing capital.

A strong middle strategy for medium contractors: own the carrier, own the high-utilisation attachments, and hire the rare-use attachments. That keeps the base asset earning across several industries without tying up capital in equipment used a few weeks a year.

Buy vs hire calculator →Buy versus hire →

What does DBH mean, and why does it matter so much?

DBH is diameter at breast height — stem diameter measured about 1.3 m above ground.

It matters because harvester head productivity is a curve against diameter, not a single figure. A head has an optimum production range, a recommended maximum regular DBH, and an absolute maximum cutting capacity. Those are three different numbers, and specifying against the largest one is the most common and expensive error in the market.

Optimum vs maximum diameter →

Why is maximum cutting diameter a poor way to choose a head or a shear?

Maximum capacity describes the largest stem a machine can sever occasionally. It says nothing about how quickly the machine handles the stems you actually cut all day.

The published figures make the point. The SP 661 LF cuts to 700 mm, with an optional system to about 810 mm — but SP states its highest-productivity DBH range as roughly 160-510 mm. A head rated to 815 mm does not make 815 mm timber economic.

For shears the same applies, with an added trap: published hardwood and softwood capacities often differ by 50 mm or more, and in Australian conditions the hardwood figure is usually the relevant one.

Harvester heads →

Why can't my grapple saw lift what it can cut?

Because cutting diameter and allowable piece weight are unrelated specifications.

What is available to lift timber is the carrier's lift chart at working radius, minus attachment weight, minus rotator weight, minus quick coupler weight. That remainder is the real limit, and for green Australian hardwood it frequently binds well before the saw does.

Manufacturers say so explicitly — GMT emphasises that the weight of the severed section must be evaluated against the crane or carrier's lifting capacity.

Grapple saws →

What is StanForD and do I need it?

StanForD is the standard data format for forestry machine production reporting.

You need it where machine-recorded production has to reconcile against mill measurement, where contracts are paid on measured volume, or where you intend to use production data for operator coaching and costing. If your business plans to move toward data-driven costing, specify StanForD compatibility in the tender rather than discovering its absence later.

Data and telematics →

How many hours is too many on a used forestry machine?

Hours alone are not a sufficient test. A used machine at 12,000 hours may have a rebuilt engine, rebuilt hydraulic pumps, rebuilt boom, new rotator and rebuilt head, while a 6,000-hour machine may have been badly maintained.

The real question is how much economic life remains in each major component group. Check ECM hours against idle hours, obtain oil analysis and service history, and establish head hours separately from machine hours — they are usually different numbers, and the head is where the money is.

Used machine inspection →

What should I test before buying a used harvester?

On the hydraulics: a pump flow test, pressure test, case-drain test, cylinder leakage test and operating-temperature test. A machine can move perfectly normally in the yard while having expensive pumps approaching failure — the case-drain test is what exposes that, and it is the one most often skipped.

Then process actual timber, in your species, at your stem size, and watch the measuring data reconcile against a manual measure. Do not buy a harvester solely from an idle demonstration.

If a seller will not allow the machine to be tested under load, that single refusal has answered every other question.

Used harvester inspection →

What should a dealer quote include?

Request separate prices for the base machine, attachment, rotator, coupler, hydraulic package, electrical controls, guarding, fire suppression, tracks or chains, telematics, delivery, commissioning, operator training, warranty, extended warranty, scheduled servicing, freight and finance.

Without that breakdown, two quotations can appear comparable when they are not. A headline price that excludes guarding, fire suppression, commissioning and training is not a lower price — it is an incomplete one.

Also obtain consumable prices before signing, and model annual expenditure. On a high-utilisation mulcher the annual tooth bill can rival the finance cost.

Dealer quote checklist →

What is the biggest mistake buyers make?

Buying capacity that the rest of the system cannot use.

A harvesting system produces only as much as its slowest critical stage. A chain with a 100 t/h feller buncher, an 80 t/h skidder, a 65 t/h processor and 55 t/h of truck supply delivers 55 t/h. A larger feller buncher adds capital, depreciation, fuel and transport cost, and not one additional tonne.

The second biggest is overestimating annual hours — because utilisation, more than any specification, decides what the machine actually costs per unit produced.

Bottleneck analyser →

How big is the Australian forestry machinery market?

Australia harvested approximately 22.9 million cubic metres of logs in 2024-25, with a gross value of approximately $2.24 billion. Commercial plantations accounted for roughly 20.4 million m³ of that — about 14.4 million m³ softwood and 6.0 million m³ hardwood — with native forest production contributing around 2.4 million m³.

The commercial plantation estate covered approximately 1.710 million hectares. In practice this is overwhelmingly a plantation equipment market: roughly nine-tenths of the national harvest.

Market overview →

Is demand for forestry machinery growing in Australia?

It depends which resource you are equipping for. ABARES projects softwood plantation log availability to rise from around 15 million m³ a year in 2025-29 to approximately 23 million m³ a year by 2050-54, driven by increasing sawlog availability.

Hardwood plantation log availability is projected to decline over the same period — from around 12 million m³ a year in 2025-29 to around 9 million m³ by 2040-44 — although hardwood sawlog availability may grow over a longer horizon.

For a buyer, capital committed to high-production softwood harvesting and haulage has a supportive long-term outlook. Capital committed to hardwood pulpwood volume alone does not.

Market overview →

Why does dealer support matter so much in forestry?

Because it has a directly measurable dollar value. Consider a head that loses a hydraulic motor: a one-day dealer repair versus a ten-day imported part lead time is nine extra lost days. For a machine earning $4,000 gross contribution per productive day, that is $36,000 — frequently more than the price difference between the attachments being compared.

When a supplier says "Australian support", ask three questions: where are the technicians, where are the parts, and what is actually held locally?

Brand directory →

What are Regional Forestry Hubs and why do they matter to equipment buyers?

They are eleven government-designated regions built around concentrations of forest resource, wood processing, transport infrastructure and future industry development.

For a machinery owner they determine available contract work, mill destinations, machine utilisation, haul distances, technician availability, parts supply, used-machine resale, specialist operator availability, mobilisation costs and the level of competition between contractors.

Two identical machines, one in the Green Triangle and one in a remote region, do not have identical commercial value — and none of that difference appears on the specification sheet.

Regional guide →