Homemade Equipment for Logging

Removing overgrown brush and trees from your property is a time consuming and physically demanding job. Many times a chainsaw will cut down most of the trees, but moving them is another matter. The equipment used to move logs is expensive, but you can make your own logging equipment. You must have some mechanical and welding skills to make some of these homemade logging devices.

Once you have felled the tree and removed all the limbs off the trunk, you must be able to move the log. Since logs are so heavy, you will need a log skidder to move the heavy log to the desired location. You can make a homemade log skidder by cutting a metal barrel in half and drilling a hole in the top of the barrel. Use a chain to connect to the log and thread the other end of the chain through the hole in the barrel. Attach the chain to the back of a tractor and pull until the chain is taut. Pull the log into the barrel opening and you have made a log skidder. Now you can drag the log to the desired location without the log digging into the ground.

A log tong is used to lift logs. The tongs have a swivel point that allows the tongs to open the teeth and then tighten back down on the log. You can make homemade tongs out of two pieces of steel, one bolt, a nut and washers. Use a long piece of flat steel, about 6 feet long. Cut the steel in half so you have two 3-foot pieces. Cut out a "V" shape on the end of each 3-foot piece. Drill a hole approximately 12 inches from the end of the uncut sides of the two pieces. Align the holes, then place a bolt through the holes. Tighten down the bolt with the nut and washer. As you tighten down the nut and bolt, secure the bolt enough to where you can keep the steel pieces together, but can swivel the cut ends open and closed.

The toughest part of working with logs is splitting them into pieces. Most log splitters can cost in excess of $1,000, but with the right plans, you can make your own for much less. You want to design your log splitter so it sits close to the ground so you do not have to lift the log too high. Use a wedge that is wide enough and durable enough to take the pressure from the hydraulic drive. Use at least a 5 horsepower motor for the drive shaft. You can get a design plan and parts list online at Mother Earth News.

A winch is a device composed of a drum, crank and chain or wire rope. The logging device allows you to pull out a felled log from the surrounding debris. Take a mechanical winch and attach it to your tractor's PTO drive. As you operate the PTO, the winch will pull the log out into the open so you can load the log onto a skidder or cut the log into smaller pieces for splitting. You only need to fabricate a part that attaches to the tractor's PTO drive and the crank on the winch.