I've had this same unit for several years. Unfortunately, I'm going to classify this piece of equipment as Chineses junk. The metal fatigue from operations has caused the metal welds to crack & break on the axle & along the hopper connection to the intake. Worked great out of the box. I will say the engine seems to be better quality. You have to split the equipment to remove & sharpen the blades & the shredders. Be prepared to buy some metric tools you not have otherwise. I'm now looking at Patriot Products. American made. 3 times the price but will last for generations. Easy access to the blades & shredders. It generally took me 2 1/2 hrs to split the machine, sharpen the chipper & shredder blades& put it all back together on the TAZZ.
I have an old MTD wood chipper with a 5 HP Briggs & Stratton engine, basically the same configuration except one side of the hopper on top will let down for raking leaves into it. The top side is for leaves and sticks up to 1/2". The chute by the engine is for stuff up to 3". It does a decent job on green limbs, if it is seasoned hard wood, you are better off cutting anything over two inches for firewood. MAKE AND USE A PUSH STICK. it is way to easy to think "I'll just give that stick a nudge." We don't want to be calling anyone Stumpy.
Or maybe this, it might be rude to some but the truth hurts… when you hear someone laughing and can feel the evil from that shout to them they have an evil laughter. That will shut the whole neighborhood up.. I did this yesterday and eerie silence lasted for 3+ hours
I just bought a Champion brand that is the exact same configuration as yours. The only real complaint that I have is that the larger diameter sticks have to be really straight with nubs trimmed off or it gets stuck in the tube. I REALLY wanted one of those larger models, but the price difference going from a 3” to a 4”+ is thousands of dollars, and I couldn’t justify it for my use case.
I've had and used my Tazz for four years without a problem. Highly recommend it, but also highly recommend using over-the-ear hearing protection; this little beast is loud!
Beautiful piece of machinery. I must say your assembly and tools are excellent too! Do you think this wood chipper can also cut scrap pieces of vegetable tanned leather? I work with leather and I'm starting to collect a few of these. Not sure if a wood chipper can shred leather into confetti sized pieces so that it can decompose quicker. What do you think? Thanks
Wood chippers are great to have, I 'inherited" one that my mom couldn't keep running. It works great but they included a rubber chute with it that was chewed up rather quickly. If you didn't want it tearing up the ground, it looks like you could unbolt the chute and fabricate something to send the discharge in a different direction. I welded up a simple angle piece to bolt on which sends the discharge backward.
I had an SNL moment. Saw the cat run by after watching you shred a ton of wood and though cat goes in shredder. Then had to pause and really think on what on Earth I was thinking lol. Great vid. Was really helpful. Have similar branches out back and wasn't sure which type I truly needed.
There's other channels where I've seen people put hoses on (using clamps, an HVAC boot and some bolts) to collect the chips in a cart. One design change I'd think of to submit to their company would be switching out the rubber fingers for a 1/16" piece of aluminum since it may help leaves and other small debris enter the shredder hopper easier. Look forward to the progress update come April '24.
