Shear Felling Head for the JD743 Tree Harvester

A new shear felling head concept was specified as part of the proposal for the John Deere designed and manufactured JD743 Tree Harvester. Specifications for the new shear felling head included cutting 460 mm diameter conifers, minimizing stem damage, cutting at ground level and eliminating snow plugging. Insight to the utilization of data from many research projects on shearing wood, evolution of new design concepts for shearing wood, and results from test programs which verify the felling head's capability to shear wood are covered in this paper.