Loading trailer/truck with heavy pieces?

Looking to the group to find out your ways of loading scrounged wood that’s a bit heavy or awkward.

I had scored a pile of about 4 ft long and 12-18” diameter ash that was hard on me to load by myself.
They didn’t want to let me cut it up on their property. But I could get the trailer up next to the pile.

I have a dump trailer and a winch on a receiver mount that I use to drag logs in the back. But that doesn’t work very effectively for the little logs before running winch batteries dead for a big score.

Some thoughts are

Bunch up some at a time and run the winch with bigger loads. This is my best idea so far.

Use a dolly and roll it close to the back and “flip” them in.

Quit cryin and keep dragging.

This was prob a cord of ash so it was worth working for.

How are you professional scroungers snagging big loads?


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Make/get a set of long jumper cables to run from your truck to the trailer batteries and charge em as you load.

 

I was thinking the trailer batteries should be charged by the truck as well.

 

Put the trailer ramps out & roll them up? Save the winch for the big ones.

 

I roll them up the ramp on my trailer and I also use a heavy duty dolly that has a lip platform that can be extended down to make the carrying platform larger to accept bigger rounds.

 

Use a dolly and ramps for my trailer but it’s not tall like a dump trailer. It’s an equipment type trailer with a dovetail so pretty low.

A steel conveyor with rollers might work good for your situation.

 

Going to be doing enough of this to yield ROI on a gas engine capstan winch ?

Electric Winch batteries, overloads, short working times can be a PITA.

 

Yeah, I’ve got the wants for a gas engine hydraulic unit. But whew! They are high. I don’t have enough of these situations or need that much wood so can’t justify that.
Been drooling over forestry trailers with grapples lately. Wow!



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Any body elses overalls get a little tighter looking at that trailer?

 

Have you been able to find any prices for these?

 

Trucks with a 7 pin rv style plug should have wiring in place that can charge trailer batteries through a hot wire in the plug. You may just need to add a fuse in the fuse block under the hood.

 

You have to be careful with that. The dump (or a winch) can try to pull a load through that wire blowing the fuse protecting it if the dump battery is low. Then no charging.

The best way is to install a relay that disconnects the truck charging wire when the load is energized.
Or redneck way (which I do now) is to disconnect the trailer cable when operating the dump.


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My last 4 trucks have used the hot wire to charge dump trailers, tilt trailers and the camper. No problems so far but none of those use much power.
Thanks for the tip

 

I have done the old roll and flip many times, or simply used a ramp. Mechanical advantage.... When I was really scrounging I was 27, 6’ and 140 lbs. I had to work smarter not harder. Id take any firewood- big small ugly. I have the hf ramps and personally like putting plywood over it to slide big rounds up. Easier for me.

 

The best connection for winch to use the truck batteries is a seperate plug mounted on truck similar to the plugs put on tow trucks for jumper cables they are rated for high draw and you can leave the truck running to keep all batteries up JB

 

I was thinking of this thread while at work today setting a new truck up to go into service. Cables go up to the vehicle batteries. The separator keeps the external load from killing the truck.

 

Does anyone use a winch powered by a garden tractor? I was wondering if the electrical system on a garden tractor would be beefy enough to handle the load.

 

Maybe if it were a small winch, and was only used for a short time very occasionally...long/heavy pulls with a big winch, very likely a no go...the exception might be the old garden tractors that have a real alternator (generator usually) on it...and engine would need to be revved up to try to keep up with the electrical load...

 

I use a winch on my trailer and carry a spare battery with me. I have pulled some really big stuff using that.
Or I roll the rounds up the ramp on the trailer.