The lads ‘heard a funny noise’ apparently!
The job it happened on has been a total disaster - 30m of lapsed hedgerow with a few bigger trees to fell/chip/log up. 2 man easy day, priced cheap as a bit of a favour to an old customer. They are desperate for it to be gone as are applying for planning on a listed building and have stated there are no trees on site (none of my business!)…
Sent a team one afternoon last week thinking they’d get it boxed off easily - their chipper stopped feeding so they only got half done (it turned out that particular machine’s rubber-damped crank pulley has started to break up and subsequently slip - the stress control reads the speed from the alternator output so the machine thought it wasn’t revving high enough therefore switched off the hydraulics).
Another team went yesterday and their chipper broke down with an apparent fuel issue before the job was finished. I spent a couple of frustrating hours talking them through fixes over the phone (including ‘put more diesel in it’) but no luck - the job still wasn’t finished last night and a chipper was abandoned on the customer’s property.
I was going home last night anyway so decided to sort it this morning as would be local (I was certain it would be an easy fix and the lads would be able to finish the job with the broken down chipper). I ended up replacing the online and spin-on fuel filters, chucking another 25l of diesel in it, sucking/blowing/drinking from fuel hoses etc etc and still couldn’t get the bugger running!
I sent the lads to grab this job’s 3rd chipper (which is the one that ate its blade!) while I pinched a lift pump and diesel stop solenoid off yet another machine to test on the broken down one, and whilst I was robbing parts I had the call about the blade….
I might have said some naughty words at that point (I definitely questioned my life choices!).
(It turns out the chipper with the fuel problem I struggled with this morning simply had a kinked diesel return hose ffs!!!!!!)