Turbo Twister

@Fishfiles I have a wooden box on the front of the bike, I was thinking of getting a 40/50ah battery to power the winch, would it be an idea to charge one battery off the other, e.g. charge the big battery off the quad battery, but when the big battery discharges, it doesn't take from the quad battery too? I know you can get a wiring system for this as I've seen them in jeeps with Winches and dual batteries before.

I just received a winch mount for my quad, and after measuring the mounting holes, proceeded to buy a Warrior 2000lb winch with synthetic rope. My question is, due to the quad battery being so small, I want to avoid using it for the winch. What setup have you guys with Winches got and what battery setup do you recommend? I got stuck in a drain 2 weeks ago and if I had the winch, I would have been able to get out solo in a few minutes as I was surrounded by trees. Picture is the winch I bought. I don't have any time for steel cables, synthetic all the way from a safety point of view.

I have used a Dewalt flexvolt chainsaw a few times with 6 and 9ah batteries for comparison. It's a decent little saw for cross cutting rings up to about 12 inches, I found anything bigger was simply a struggle. I compared it to my MS201T top handle saw as it was the closest thing I had size wise. For small stuff, both saws cut well but if you put the pressure on the Dewalt saw, it struggled as expected. Run time wise, I spent about 3 hours using the battery saw as my friend used the 201, in the same time that he used 6 tanks of fuel, I used 3x 9ah and 2x 6ah batteries, 2 of which were on charge at any one time. So after that test, I figured the Dewalt saw is fine if you have power close by to charge batteries or have plenty of batteries to hand, but I will continue with my gas saws for the foreseeable future as the battery saws need to improve with battery run time to make it worth spending money on. I'd love to see a battery saw that can out cut my MS661!

Something like these, although after watching a video on this particular one I'm not impressed with the performance of it. I reckon my own mower cuts neater! If you look at the second picture, these steps very rare in Ireland, probably due to lack of knowing they are available but they would work quite well with our hilly land here in Ireland. I was cutting through over 6ft high brambles on Saturday with my own setup, the quad would flatten them down and the mower munched it all up just fine. I'll see if dad has a few snaps to share.

We have something similar to this yes, but you have to walk behind it, it's not a sit on machine. I'll see if I can dig out a few pics..

We topped the first tree about 20ft down from the top (the boom wouldn't reach any higher). Unfortunately for us it spun on the stump before brushing off us and almost crushing my wrist, my friend got away with a minor cut. Reaping the pain of it today! So we got permission to just drop the second tree in one cut at the butt, a much safer and quicker way to get it down!

Not very secret if there's a sign post for it is it!😂

Yesterday, my dad, my best friend and I helped another friend with removing 2 large beech trees overhanging the road. We had to remove much of the canopy using the telescopic boom before gaining permission from the neighbour across the road to drop the second tree into his field. 17 helpers in total and a tele handler made quick and easy work of clearing the road beneath us. We also topped a load of leylandi cypress trees but the 2 of us were so busy with driving and cutting that we didn't get any photos. One little helper brought his own saw (Bosch!) to give us a dig out!

This is what I was doing, engaging the drums when the engine was ticking over. I would have thought you'd get s lot of burning of belts if attempting to engage the belt at high rpm's.. But the engine also seems to start easier when the belt is already engaged so I'm just going to make a belt cover to protect every moving part.

It's a possibility I guess, I would just have to put a smaller pulley on the driving drum shaft, the only issue I have is getting a 1inch bore pulley with 2 internal notches within the bore, the pulley I'm currently using only has 1 key and isn't the proper pulley for it, but it works for now.

Yes, I have an adjustable shimmed bolt that can be undone to start the engine without rotating the drums, although we have found out after chewing through 2 V belts, that it seems better go start the engine with the drums engaged. I deliberately built the engine on a sliding frame so it can be removed with 4 bolts undone and lifted off for direct maintenance to the underside of the deck or go the lower timing belt.

3300 rpm according to the book

I plan to make up my own custom jockey wheel, keep it compact and rotatable on the hitch. I also plan to change the angle of the hitch so that the front linkage is a little higher off the ground, the front frame that the toplink bolts to likes to dig down into the ground the rare time so a mod in hitch angles should fix the problem there.

It was admittedly too fast at times yes, but I have found that travelling a little faster and then going back over it the opposite direction at same speed or slower takes it down nicely. It still needs a few tweaks here and there but its taking shape.

Yep, to buy a 4ft flail mower new here would cost me over €2500 and weigh about 300kg which is too heavy for the 300 in my opinion. I've spent around €1100 total (not including my labour) but it's now built to my own preference. I will probably add some sort of jockey wheel to it down the line to aid with moving it around by hand. I reckon this one weighs about 120-140kg gross.

I wouldn't be able to lift anything heavier, it's hard enough to physically move the mower as is. I'll have to check the specs for engine speed, but the quad does indeed have a cooling fan that works!

I had to make up something similar but I had to use a bolt and the belt itself as a tensioner. (I had to use whatever I I to hand). I think it works fine, when the bolt is tightened up, the tension keeps it tight and it cannot slackened off due to the belt tension pulling at it.

I have a video, I just have to post it on YouTube and will drop a link here. On to the next challenge, I fit 4 more blades and spent the last hour timing it so no 2 blades clash! I think it will help reduce some pressure on the engine when cutting. Dad and I are going down the country tomorrow with it to clear a few paths through game crops and roadways for one of our pheasant shoots.

As long as it's not yellow again it doesn't bother me what colour is it😂 Yeah I'll try get my friend to video it later on, I have a 3 hour drive to get to his place and its currently gale force wind and rain here, hopefully tomorrows weather will be better 🤞

Funny enough, I quite like the grey, it looks galvanised from a distance! I will have guards over the pulleys, but where the tensioner is, I will leave it bare so I can see if the lower belt is slipping or not. The rear wheels also need a front mud guard to stop dirt flicking onto the deck when travelling to or from a field

Its done! Bar a few mods I need to finish like pulley guards and mud guards on both quad and mower. We brought it for a test run but the grass is very wet so it wasn't the best test, but it still cut fine. More to come in a day or 2, I have to go back to my friend tomorrow and finish the field I started😁

Ah ok, yeah I dont have enough room to get a zerk fitting on as the greased area is between both sides of the deck. I gave them a good greasing before refitting the shafts last night, I also got a nice blow of a hammer to one finger (never trust a relative)😂 The 2 drums are now installed again and I have 4 triangles to weld in to throw any grass out from under the deck first thing. I am going to pack up and move everything to another farm as the power here keeps tripping due to low Amp fuses for the welder.

I've had a slow but productive day! The two brackets for the rear wheels were quite time consuming to make up, but I'm glad I kept at them and got them finished. I'm about to spray the underside of the deck before refitting the drums and bearing housings (I will dismantle it all after a test run and paint the whole thing once it's all working). What's a "Zerk"? You mean grease nipple?😂

Heavy😂 So far, from what you can see of it, it's about 40kg. I reckon it will we well over 120kg when it's done, but the big wheels should help with moving it around (my friend says it will look like something from Mad Max with the big wheels)! The only drawback is I have to keep the wheels behind the deck as if I put them to one side, it won't fit in the trailer or van. So they will end up being quite far back behind the deck due to the big tyres, I may have to buy longer top links to compensate for the distance.

I'm back to square one with my welding skills, I think the welder I'm using it too "light duty" for what I want to weld. Some welds come out great, but most of them are bubbly and it's annoying me.. The plate was ready this afternoon for the deck top, but I had a second glance at the hole alignment and the metal worker took the wrong measurements off my drawing so they had to cut the sheet and holes again! Luckily this time, they also cut the sheet to exact measurements, which was ideal as I had started welding up the frame before I went to collect it. I now have the main frame welded together for the base of the engine bracket and the pulley and drum bearing housings to sit in. I also got the curtains cut for all 4 sides and 2 of them tacked on, but I ran out of energy so will plough on again tomorrow and Thursday.