Anyone use a ATV Brush Grubber? How good do they work for pulling out and clearing brush and small trees? I found some videos online but want someone unbiased that has had actual good success. Any particular ones better than others?
It may work. But if you know how to use a chain they work the best and are real fast with 2 guys that know what they are doing.
They work great on a backhoe, but from my experience an ATV doesn't have the weight or traction to pull stuff out that is much larger than your wrist. The ATV will just spin, even with bigger mud tires.
I have a big heavy UTV Kawasaki Mule that weighs 1600 lbs. I know it pulls stuff better than a conventional ATV because of its weight and we proved that when I was farting around with a side by side comparison with a Yamaha Grizz 450. Good enough to do this effectively? Good question. Traction was my concern as well.
We pulled out literally hundreds of small trees on our farm three years ago to switch from pasture to tillable ground and the 60 horse Kubota didn't have enough traction to pull them without the hydraulic lift pulling strait up on the front. I agree with using a chain and choking the trees, that's what we did.
Also, the type of tree makes a heck of a difference as well, some root systems can be a pain. (Locust)
Brad, I thought about getting one of those when all I had was my Rhino. I found that a properly wrapped 1/4" chain would do the trick. It does go better with two people. Let the wife drive and you wrap the chain. Beware, it won't take much of certain types of trees to stop your mule. If it gets to be a bigger job than you thought, rent a skid steer or a tractor. Save wear on the mule. Some day you will get one of these :-) Sent from my Galaxy S3 and Tapatalk 2
Thanks Greg. Define properly wrapped. Just tight? It is there some tricks I need to know about? Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
It simply requires that you loop the chain around the tree twice, overlapping itself. It also depends on the "type" of tree as mentioned. Easy way to think about it is if the tree grows "straight up", such as a pine, hook it alittle high. This will bend the tree and use the root ball as leverage to pull the "straight down" tap root. If it grows out(such as a oak) the roots are growing out also and hooking very low seems to pull them out pretty easy. Cleared many acres with just a 40hp New Holland 4x4 and a good chain,...
We use a cable (winch cable) with a hook on it. Wrap the cable around the tree or brush a few times and hook it back onto itself, then pull. Works slick and never slips. Like others said, your biggest problem is going to be traction. Even though your machine is bigger than a normal atv, it still tends to slip in the clay up there. You'll be fine on small brush and saplings, but not anything that has much of a root system.
I am getting the feeling the grubber isn't worth the money since I have cables and logger chains already. Thanks guys we will give it a whirl in spring.
That would probably work decent on some of the little bit bigger stumps, but I would think using an atv and cable would be much faster. Plus, its already hooked up to the atv so all you have to do is drag it over to a pile and unhook it.
