# Sutter 500 in town!



## prooperator (Jan 31, 2007)

We just received a sutter 500 on rental from California. Just Delivered here in Chattanooga ready for two major trail projects were working on! I will post some pics as soon as we hit the ground running on some trail work. I'm anxious to see this machine in action and really ready to operate it and see if it lives up to the hype.:thumbsup:


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## scottybinwv (Jun 29, 2010)

Dang, that critter has got some BALLS! Went to the website and watched the video.

http://sutterequipment.com/


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## prooperator (Jan 31, 2007)

*Sure Does!*



scottybinwv said:


> Dang, that critter has got some BALLS! Went to the website and watched the video.
> 
> http://sutterequipment.com/


I ran the sutter for 4 hours and cut half a mile in. We completed 1.5 miles in a day and a half. This thing will blow your mind if you now how to operate it. I'll post some pics asap.


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## brianhann (Mar 1, 2007)

post up some pics of the tread after the final pass on the machine to get an idea of the amount of hand finishing needed (if any). 

bhann.


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## scottybinwv (Jun 29, 2010)

Destruction video, bring it on!


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## ebxtreme (Jan 6, 2004)

prooperator said:


> I ran the sutter for 4 hours and cut half a mile in. We completed 1.5 miles in a day and a half. This thing will blow your mind if you now how to operate it. I'll post some pics asap.


Please do!!

BTW, I assume you've got some hand finishing after the machine has thing cut in?

EB


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## prooperator (Jan 31, 2007)

*Some!*



ebxtreme said:


> Please do!!
> 
> BTW, I assume you've got some hand finishing after the machine has thing cut in?
> 
> EB


Yeah, there is some handwork(root cutting and some raking), but we aslo make a pass with a min-ex for fine tuning and laying back the back slope. Machine work is way more efficient than handwork, Doesnt matter how good the operator is, always some hand work left. Relying on volunteer work is hard to do when you have a tight time frame to build trails...so we have relied on mainly machines to do the work. I will post some pics of the machine cut treads this weekend.


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## juice (Feb 8, 2004)

When building with this dozer, how do you guys manage the sidecast? Do you go in and remove it out of the prism with the mini ex? Seems like the bench could fracture after a few years if the sidecast becomes part of the tread and has a layer of organic under part of it.


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## prooperator (Jan 31, 2007)

juice said:


> When building with this dozer, how do you guys manage the sidecast? Do you go in and remove it out of the prism with the mini ex? Seems like the bench could fracture after a few years if the sidecast becomes part of the tread and has a layer of organic under part of it.


The duff layer is pushed out into the woods and spread out. Most of the soil is used in the trail for the tread or grade dips or reversals. Any extra material is spread on the outslope with the mini-ex. Hope that answers your questions.


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## Fattirewilly (Dec 10, 2001)

prooperator said:


> The duff layer is pushed out into the woods and spread out. Most of the soil is used in the trail for the tread or grade dips or reversals. Any extra material is spread on the outslope with the mini-ex. Hope that answers your questions.


Can you compare/contrast the productivity of this with an SK 650 (or similar). At 3 times the price, can you build trail 3 times as fast?

Does it enable you to do more in steeper, rockier topo or do you find that if the SK is limited the Sutter is as well?

Any idea why Sutter is distancing themselves from the Sweco name?


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## prooperator (Jan 31, 2007)

*No comparison!*



Fattirewilly said:


> Can you compare/contrast the productivity of this with an SK 650 (or similar). At 3 times the price, can you build trail 3 times as fast?
> 
> Does it enable you to do more in steeper, rockier topo or do you find that if the SK is limited the Sutter is as well?
> 
> Any idea why Sutter is distancing themselves from the Sweco name?


We can cut at least .5 miles a day in steep side slopes up hill or down. There is no comparison between the sk650 and the sutter. The sutter has 83 hp and weighs in at 9000lbs. In moderate side slope, we can get mile/day. The sutter is an awesome resource for layiing down new tread. If you ever get your hands on one, you will park the sk650. To answer your last question, the original designer took his designs and started his own company I believe. I'll post some pics up this weekend while I'm working on trails.


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## juice (Feb 8, 2004)

prooperator said:


> The duff layer is pushed out into the woods and spread out. Most of the soil is used in the trail for the tread or grade dips or reversals. Any extra material is spread on the outslope with the mini-ex. Hope that answers your questions.


I'm thinking about it in the context of our local trails, and it's hard to compare build techniques in different environments. We've never used dozers (Washington State) because of the deep organics in places, huge roots that you can't cut, and lots of rock in some areas. It still seems like you'd have to come in and do a lot of subsequent work with a mini-ex to get rid of the organics. I like to think about new methods of building (for us) and challenge our existing assumptions, which is why I'm asking these questions. Right now, it still looks like we're better sticking with excavators around here.

In an area with limited organics and not as many huge roots, then I can see how a dozer could be an effective tool. Now a narrow mini-ex with a six-way blade and decent horsepower, I'd LOVE to run something like that. I've been salivating about the one they make in Oregon, but it's $60k and there's no convenient way to rent.


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## prooperator (Jan 31, 2007)

*Finishing touches*



juice said:


> I'm thinking about it in the context of our local trails, and it's hard to compare build techniques in different environments. We've never used dozers (Washington State) because of the deep organics in places, huge roots that you can't cut, and lots of rock in some areas. If you have to come in and do a lot of subsequent work with a mini-ex, it doesn't really seem like a dozer lowers your over-all cost in the sites I'm thinking about.
> 
> In an area with limited organics and not as many huge roots, then I can see how a dozer could be an effective tool. Now a narrow mini-ex with a six-way blade and decent horsepower, I'd LOVE to run something like that. I've been salivating about the one they make in Oregon, but it's $60k and there's no convenient way to rent.


The mini-ex is used for the finishing touches because it is quicker than hand work (volunteers are hard to come by sometimes). We use the min-x to just tidy up back slope...when you have a 40-70% side slope, you cant possibly lay that back by hand quickly so we use the min-x for that and some other finish work(pushing trees further out in the woods and cutting swtichbacks, the outslope detail). For our application two machines compliment eachother and when you have a tight schedule and budget, the sutter and a min-x are the way to go.:yesnod:


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## dburatti (Feb 14, 2004)

juice said:


> I'm thinking about it in the context of our local trails, and it's hard to compare build techniques in different environments. We've never used dozers (Washington State) because of the deep organics in places, huge roots that you can't cut, and lots of rock in some areas. It still seems like you'd have to come in and do a lot of subsequent work with a mini-ex to get rid of the organics.


Building trail for the Paradise Royale Trail System in the King Range of northern CA, I ran an excavator building turns and features while a skilled operator ran a SWECO 480 cutting bench and doing a road to trail conversion. The 480 handled the the organic and loamy soil well in this situation. I didn't run the machine and am making an outside observation. Even with my ex nearby, we didn't have to do much finish work _in this situation_ with my machine. There was some hand finishing to do, though, and that was handled by skilled volunteers.

Dewayne


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## HypNoTic (Jan 30, 2007)

Do you think a Sutter/Sweco would be a good machine in big hard wood roots like we have north of the 45th?

Does it cope well with colder weather or is it a machine designed for the south, like the Ditch Witch?


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## juice (Feb 8, 2004)

What I'm trying to understand is what you do with the material you pushed to the side, which then sits on top of organics.


In this picture, the section in red is excavator (or hand) built trail. The sidecast is distributed down slope.

The blue section is the sidecast that is pushed by the dozer. Just thinking about this and never having done it, it seems that this would go on top of the existing organics, and become a partial bench trail, unless you go back over it and remove the sidecast with an excavator or hand crew. Similar to the same problem with novice trial builders on hand crews, how they don't always fully bench the trail and often bury the adjacent organic layer.

Is this something you guys just don't worry about? When you go back and finish with the ex do you remove the sidecast? Or maybe the dozer actually pushes the material further downslope and this isn't an issue.

Thanks for the input, I really can't seem to get my head around it for areas with significant layers or organics or dense plants such as thick ferns, salal, etc.

Justin Vander Pol


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## dburatti (Feb 14, 2004)

juice said:


> What I'm trying to understand is what you do with the material you pushed to the side, which then sits on top of organics.


In all three cases where I've worked in tandem with a SWECO, the operator aggregated the soil _in_ the tread to either make rollers or larger features like table top jumps or hip jumps. Broadcasting down slope was kept to a minimum.

D


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