Ownership and hire are a utilisation question before they are a preference. If your committed hours sit below the break-even, nothing further down this list changes the answer — and the honest response to uncertain hours is usually hire.
The four calculators
Machine cost calculator
Depreciation per productive hour, total hourly cost and cost per cubic metre, tonne, hectare or stump — with the utilisation and production sensitivity tables that show how fast those numbers move.
Production bottleneck analyser
Enter the sustained hourly capacity and capital of each stage in your chain. Returns the real system capacity, the constraint, and how much capital is running behind it.
Hydraulic power calculator
Theoretical and usable hydraulic power from flow and pressure, headroom against an attachment's stated requirement, and the nine specifications to obtain before committing to a match.
Buy versus hire comparison
Annual cost of ownership against hire at your utilisation, the break-even hours where owning starts to win, and the factors the arithmetic does not capture.
These four answer four different questions, in a rough order
Run out of order they still work, but each one is more useful once the previous answer exists.
A chain produces at the rate of its slowest stage. Before specifying anything, establish which stage is actually setting your output, because capacity added anywhere else changes your costs and not your production.
Convert capital, fixed costs and running costs into cost per cubic metre, tonne, hectare or stump — the unit you are actually paid in. This is the number a quoted rate has to clear.
For attachment-based fleets, the compatibility check that gets skipped. An underpowered circuit does not work slightly worse; it overheats and consumes wear parts, which surfaces as an attachment problem and is a carrier problem.
Where these models come from
None of these are proprietary formulas. Each applies a published method to your own figures, and the chapter behind it sets out the reasoning and the worked examples.
Total cost of ownership
The depreciation, fixed-cost and running-cost structure behind the machine cost calculator, including why the same $800,000 machine carries $40 per hour in depreciation at 2,500 productive hours and $80 at 1,250.
The bottleneck principle
Why a chain delivers at the rate of its slowest critical stage, and why the machine most worth upgrading is rarely the one a contractor arrives intending to upgrade.
Hydraulics and carrier matching
Flow, pressure, losses and the separate questions — cooling, return-line sizing, case drain, lift chart — that hydraulic power alone does not answer.
Cost guides by type of work
What drives the cost of mulching, harvesting, clearing and stump work, for when you want the cost structure of a job rather than of a machine.
Four numbers worth establishing honestly first
Every calculator here turns on inputs that are easy to assume and hard to verify. These are the four that move the answers furthest.
Productive hours per year
Not machine hours and not scheduled hours — hours in which the machine is producing saleable output. It excludes travel, setup, refuelling, breakdowns and waiting. It is the input buyers most consistently overestimate and the one that moves every result the most.
Expected resale value
Verified against what comparable machines of similar age and hours have recently sold for, not estimated from a depreciation curve. The market for purpose-built forestry machines is thin, and condition, hours and service history move price more than age.
Sustained production per hour
Averaged across enough time to include difficult ground, weather and minor stoppages. A rate quoted from a good hour has no margin in it, and the shortfall appears in every job afterwards.
Fully loaded operator cost
Wages plus on-costs, leave, superannuation and training — not the base hourly rate. The gap between the two is larger than most quotes assume, and it applies to every productive hour.