[This article originally appeared in Earthmovers & Excavators February 2024]
Land clearing and mulching contractors can expect maximum efficiency with Diamond
Mowers’ new disc mulcher attachment, now available from Colbrook Industries
Eagerly anticipated by customers. Australian distributor Colbrook Industries sold units of the new Diamond Mowers SK Disc Mulcher Belt Dnve Pro X before they had even reached Australian shores.
Launched last year at the ConExpo trade exhibition in Las Vegas, Colbrook Industries managing director Rob Plageman says the new belt drive disc mulcher attachment provides a range of key features that are improvements on the previous disc mulcher attachments from Diamond Mowers.
“One of the most exciting features of the new belt drive disc mulcher is its ability to be tuned to its specific carrier” Plageman says. “This disc mulcher can be run on a variety of high now carriers such as Cat 299. ASV 135 and Lamtrac 6160Ta, and to get the absolute optimum performance from every machine, we can tune the head to suit each machine’s flow and hydraulic horsepower”. “This is the only disc mulcher in the world with this ability”.
Motor options and differences
The new SK Disc Mulcher Belt Drive Pro X ls available With three motor options- gear. piston and the new belt drive. “The reason we have different motors is to suit different carriers, the mulcher can be attuned to
different carriers or machines: Plageman says. “Most of the time these disc mulchers go on compact track loaders. Every compact track loader has different specs and they perform differently.” A piston motor such as the Pl25 has higher performance than the base model and can provide a quicker recovery time. “To put this in perspective”. Plageman says, “the disc operates like a fly wheel. The hydraulic flow and motor build inertia in the disc, which means its spinning at 117000 foot per minute (310km/h) when its put into material, but momentum is lost as it mulches, requiring recovery time tor the disc to be brought back up to speed”.
A gear motor might take 20 seconds from a dead stop to recover, while a P125 piston motor might take 40 seconds.”Plageman says. Recovery time is further reduced to an impressive 13 seconds with the new belt drive attachment, making it more than twice as fast as the PJ25 piston motor. “The belt drive is phenomenal when it comes to its recovery”, Plageman says. “it’s by far the most efficient motor style on the market”.
For operators mulching a tree, naturally the disc will lose momentum, but the belt drive disc attachment will be able to recover quickly enough to seamlessly move from one tree to the next without recovery time, boosting overall efficiency. “The recovery time is so quick that by the time we get to the next tree we’re fully recovered ready to mulch again.” Plageman says.
Disc mulcher fit
In a world where operators are probably more familiar with the traditional drum mulchers, how does the disc mulcher fit into the mulching scene? Plageman says the disc mulchers ‘sweet spot’ in the market is standing timber, of between three inches (approximately 75mm) up to six inches (approximately 150mm) in diameter. Working with these sizes of material, speed becomes a great asset of the attachment as the disc can mulch up to three times as fast as the traditional drum”, according to Plageman. “The reason it can do that is because it can do multiple processes such as a cut and if feed, basically it can cut a tree at its base, tilt back and just suck that whole tree in and turn it into mulch in one go”, he says. “In the blink of an eye, that tree is completely gone, whereas your traditional drum mulcher has to reach up and start from the top, comedown on that tree to mulch it and that process can be three times as long as the process would be with the disc mulcher”. Efficiency is maximised when using the disc mulcher attachment, allowing the operator to be quicker with the disc compared to the drum, depending on what size material is being worked on. Land clearing and mulching contractors have been the most common buyers for the SK Disc Mulcher Belt Drive Pro X, with the higher price tag, Plageman expects landowners to focus on some of its more economical mulching options Colbrook Industries stocks, with this new mulcher aimed at a higher volume commercial market “The belt drive has really been manufactured and designed for the operators who need maximum efficiency,” he says. The new attachment is perfect for plantation work and land clearing, especially when it comes to fire mitigation work on track sites, or regrowth where the trees are approximately six inches in diameter”. Plageman sees the Diamond Mowers belt drive disc attachment as a real advantage for contractors, due to its selective nature when compared to the traditional drum attachment.
“A l.8m wide drum mulcher would have difficulties trying to mulch a singular tree or invasive plants like blackberry amongst dense growth of trees, so you would have to mulch all the trees around it”, Plageman explains.
“With the disc mulcher, it comes out to a point, like the end of the disc. This means that the operator can actually reach in between trees and you can be very selective in which trees are being removed,” he says.
“Operators have the ability to specifically mulch a singular tree amongst a group of well-established trees that you don’t want to touch, he says. The selectiveness that this attachment provides is making the product a hot commodity at Colbrook Industries”.
Diamond Mowers
Diamond Mowers is one of the founding developers of the Disc Mulcher and has been a leading innovator in the vegetation management industry for over 20years. One of Diamond Mowers’ key points is that its machines can handle the harsh Australian environment. “When mulching hardwood trees such as red gum, Diamond Mowers attachments are one of only a few worldwide that can handle that kind of material consistently”, Plageman says. “A lot of the other heads we see on the market. out of Spain, or Italy, or even some here in Australia and the US, have not been engineered to handle the kind of hard material we have in Australia”, he says. The construction of the decks, discs, spindles, motors, bearings etc. from Diamond Mowers are all designed to handle Australian timber