Valtra Tractors are ideally suited to a mix of tasks both in agriculture and forestry due to their design features such as:
- Protected & guarded systems minimize damage in woodland
- The seat turns with reasonable legroom for ergonomic crane control
- Optional reverse drive for mulching/forwarding applications
- Compact dimensions, good visibility & tight turning circle.
- Quality SISU engines and reliability
In the mid-2000s, I was beginning my training career but was predominately involved in arboricultural contracting. This business had evolved from south east London multiple jobs to bigger multi-day rural jobs often with a forestry component. This led to a change in the machinery requirements such as a tracked timberwolf chipper for use on-site and a Zetor tractor with linkage based timber transport frame and then later a basic timber trailer sourced via woodlots. This crane had limited utility and worked best when the hydraulic oil was cool, but it did open our eyes to the capability of such a setup. We used it on coppice sites in the days when we cut firewood for sale.
We looked at a range of options including Mohida from Osbourne Forestry but ended up selecting a Valtra Tractor 6400 and Botex 5060 Timber Trailer for Wilson Machinery and had a memorable trip to Dalbeattie including test drive up the road.
This Valtra 6400 is still in use in our training business and is generally connected up to a replacement Botex 570 trailer and crane for timber extraction duties on the estate and other sites we use. Over last summer a burning clutch smell was noticeable, and we decided to replace the clutch at around 7500hours. We had a few options but in the end decided to get Wilsons to do the work, as they offered:
- clear price menu
- competitive hourly rate
- no drama about the job
- fast turnaround
All of the above offset the haulage costs, and the tractor was back on site eight days later and is back on timber extraction duties. Paul Whalen of Wilsons took a few photos of the work in progress.
