When Brad Merwood first considered a Harvestline, he was a bit worried about it.“Moving from a big swing yarder to something like this, I’d never driven a Harvestline prior, and this new Mk4 is the only one I have driven, but I’m actually really impressed,” he says.
“It’s a new generation really, a lot faster than the first examples of yarders that I had heard about. We have been in some hard country, steep ground, and this much smaller machine did the same numbers as what our big swinger did in the same country. But now I am in the easy stuff, this is real easy.”
Brad quit school at 15 and went logging.
“My father, Brian, was a logger, so he got me into it. I used to go to work with him in the dark most mornings and we talked about how, if we were to set up our own crew, we would call it Morepork because they were calling when we were up and about getting the machines going. I started out pulling wire rope for a bulldozer, then went into dot cutting and breaking out, then tree falling and worked my way through it like that.
“I ended up in Northland and got used to all the mechanised side of things with Douglas Logging. I drove swing yarders up there for seven years. That exposed me to a bit of mechanised falling and processing etc.
“Brian and his business partner Sid Soulsby set this business up, and they have helped me buy into the business as well as things progressed. Brian has now retired and it’s just me and Sid. I do all the day-to-day running of the crew as well as running the Harvestline.
“We have two crews-worth of gear here, so we are all set up for ground-basing, but just running it as one crew currently.
“The Harvestline has made a big difference with how easy it is to move around. You can just put it where the wood is, and we have found it is a lot easier.”
Brad is 37 and has been logging for 22 years.
“That’s a long time in the bush, and most of it has been in swing yarders.”
The Harvestline build team at Rotorua’s EMS have done some good upgrades on this Mk4, with great machine stability without the need for any guy lines, three selectable operating modes, fully interlocked drums for uphill and downhill log extraction, and a skyline mode with improved skyline winch power and braking performance for those shotgun settings. There is also improved line speed for faster cycle times and some new swivelling mast sheaves for swinging wood and simple machine moves, reducing wear on the lines.
The Harvestline is sitting on a Sany SY415 Pro, so we throw open all the doors and Brad shows us the big auxiliary hydraulic oil cooler and a diesel pull-out reel hose for fuelling up the Hawkeye grapple carriage’s Kohler engine. There’s a decent sized tool box being put to good use. Up on top there is...
