Childer Wood Heavy Horses
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Elvis at rest with the timber arch bulkhead on the front end of the Combi Forwarder and a stack of thinnings behind.
Elvis at work with the timber arch bulkhead on the front end of the Combi Forwarder
A story from the Hebridean Isle of South Uist
Not everyone wants to buy the whole Combi Forwarder.
Beatrix Wood who crofts on South Uist and is involved with a community woodland has been working her small cob 'Elvis'
She wanted a timber arch with the larger 'flotation' tyres of the Combi Forwarder to cope with the very soft and (very suddenly) rocky terrain so that she could work Elvis extracting timber from the community woodland.
She also wanted a towing bulkhead so Elvis could work with a variety of different equipment and do a wide range of jobs.
The Combi Forwarder is designed as a small horse drawn forwarder (8'6" x 5'6" outside measurements, overall length with shafts 17') to be pulled by one horse. Shafts are made for Scandinavian harness.
It has a single low impact pair of wheels on the shafts for greater manoueverability and a double pair on walking beam axles on the trailer.
It converts quickly and easily into several other pieces of equipment; timber arch, towing shafts with conventional ball (or ball and pin) hitch, and separate forwarding trailer.
Front bulkhead is removable and reversible. Bolsters and walking beam axle adustable for different loads.
Elvis, driven by Bea's son, Cador, extracting hand cut peat for the winter fires.
She wrote; "This was your arch being put to good use with Elvis in the summer up on the peat bogs. We brought several hundred bags of peat home this way which is now keeping us warm. Elvis and the arch made light work of it, despite the soft ground and 2 miles of stony tracks. The versatility of the arch with the little trailer was great for turning in tight spaces and also for quick release when the ground suddenly gave way up to Elvis's shoulders. No quad bike could have done this. We used the same set-up for collecting sheaves during harvest but Elvis got grumpy because it was too light work for him."
Elvis bringing in the harvest.
to contact Doug Joiner:
by phone or fax: (+44) 01531 640 236 or on his mobile: (+44) 07773 900 751
or by post: Heavy Horses, Hill Farm, Stanley Hill, Bosbury, LEDBURY, HR8 1HE
Herefordshire