Forest Talk – News

Brightwater breathes new life into BE70 yarder

Brightwater Services in Nelson recently completed a full rebuild of a BE70 trailer-mounted yarder for Wayne Schroder’s Lifestyle Logging crew based in Marlborough.

Originally constructed in 1993, with a 70ft telescoping tower, three-speed Allison transmission and a 350hp Cummins NTA855 engine, the BE70 was the fourth trailer-mounted yarder ever to be manufactured by Brightwater. The machine spent over a decade logging in the Hawkes Bay before relocating to the West Coast eight years ago, returning to the Brightwater Services workshop in Nelson at the beginning of Spring for the rebuild.

The Brightwater Services team had a window of six weeks to complete the work, which included a full cab rebuild, repairing the brakes and the clutch, replacing the top section of the tower, full engine and transmission service, repairing the air system and tidying up the guarding package. The machine also had its suspenion system replaced with three-axle, twin-tyre air suspension, which makes it fully road legal as a towed vehicle, allowing it to travel on the roads with a single tractor unit. In all, a total of 1400 hours were spent getting it back to
tip-top working order.

Get the full story...subscribe here