Table of Contents

February 2010 Classifieds

Download the Southern Loggin' Times February 2010 IronWorks classifieds here!

Our best leisure reading from our not-so-sharp minds

A police officer, though scheduled for all-night duty at the station, was relieved of duty early and arrived home, four hours ahead of schedule, at 2 a.m.

Not wanting to wake his wife, he undressed in the dark, crept into the bedroom, and started to climb into bed. She sleepily sat up and said, “Mike, dearest, would you go down to the all-night drug store on the next block and get me some aspirin? I’ve got a splitting headache.”

Fuel Control

Kenworth Truck Co. has a history of using technology to improve fuel economy. This Kenworth White Paper on Fuel Economy will examine Kenworth’s range of activities and offer information designed to assist truckers and fleets in achieving the best fuel economy in their applications.

Kenworth invests significant resources and conducts extensive on-the-road and in-the-lab testing in pursuit of advances in fuel economy. Its engineers and dealers also work closely with customers in the interest of better fuel economy.

Getting Involved by David Abbott

Brothers Billy, 59, and Ricky McKinney, 56, own McKinney Bros. Logging Inc., a member of the South Carolina Timber Producers Assn. Billy has served on the board of directors for the last five years. The SCTPA meets about nine times a year, and Billy is careful never to miss a meeting. He is also closely involved with the American Loggers Council, attending all fall and spring meetings, and has gone to Washington, DC with the ALC several times to meet with legislators on behalf of the logging industry. Billy received the SCTPA 2009 Gene Co­llins Logger Activist Award for his ef­forts and devotion to industry issues.

“Our legislation has been pretty good lately, and it seems like they are willing to work with us,” he reports. “We don’t get everything we want passed, but we get a lot accomplished.” He cites a recent clean water act that, had it been passed as originally worded, would have severely restricted loggers in so much as crossing mud puddles in the woods. By lobbying la

Soaked In Success by May Donnell

Normally, Arkansas logger Jimmy Mashburn, Jr., better known as Jimbo, can be found in the woods. The 49-year-old owner of Mashburn Logging Inc. generally works two crews of men nine hours each weekday and six hours on Saturday. Sunday is set aside as the sole day of full rest. The outfit operates within a 100 mile radius of home, often dipping down into the forests of northern Louisiana.

These have not, however, been normal times on the plains of south central Arkansas. These have been record-bursting, ground soaking, river swelling days of more rain than anyone’s ever seen. Drenching rain of biblical proportion. Noah’s own weather, some call it. When SLT contacted Mashburn Logging in late December, 85 inches had fallen in 2009, and that was before the onslaught of a year-ending rain and sleet storm.

Current Industry News

Parnell, Inc., a five-crew Alabama logging company whose equipment lineup includes some 20 trucks and dozens of trailers and chip vans, recently began an experiment with lighter weight trucks and trailers. The package includes three Kenworth T800 tractors and several ultra lightweight Magnolia non-folding pole trailers. With a full fuel tank and driver aboard, the sets weigh around 25,400 lbs., allowing the company to legally haul about 31.3 tons, three tons more than Parnell’s 2009 average. A 10% raw forest products tolerance provision in Alabama provides for a legal weight of 88,000 lbs. The KW’s have aluminum cross members on the frame, Allison automatic transmissions, single 120 gallon fuel tanks, under-hood air breathers, single exhausts, 46,000 lb. rear ends, air ride suspensions, lightweight brakes and drums, aluminum rims and bumper and 450 HP Cummins engines. The trailers weigh around 6,600 lbs. and have lightweight brakes and drums, 455 X 22.5 super single tires with aluminum

New Product Information

Caterpillar Forest Products has upgraded the hydraulic system and made other enhancements to improve performance of the 173 HP Prentice 2470, the 190 HP Prentice 2570 and the 220 HP Prentice 2670 wheel feller-bunchers. The company also recently made enhancements to the Prentice SH-50 bunching saw and is introducing the Prentice SC-57, a new center post saw.

The saw pump flow capacity in the feller-bunchers has been increased, resulting in a 15% improvement in saw recovery time on the Prentice 2570 and a 6% improvement in the Prentice 2670. Multi-functioning, an advantage of Prentice wheel feller bunchers, has been enhanced with improvements to the front control valve. Additional adjustments provide better acceleration and faster ground speed. Operators will notice more power on hills, wet ground and rough terrain. Visit prenticeforestry.com

Book accentuates a lifestyle that lingers in the memories of remaining former residents and their of

During the early 1920s, the national spread of the “invisible empire” of the Ku Klux Klan brought the KKK into company towns, where the Klan seemed to have focused its attentions on social irregularities associated with the quarters-domino halls, “barrel houses,” illegal alcohol, gambling houses, prostitutes and Anglo-American seekers after these diversions. Companies were wary of the Klan, especially at first, but they resisted any organization that sought to compromise their social control of their towns, and they feared the KKK’s impact on black labor.

Looking Back by David Abbott

“That was the biggest mistake of my life,” William Lemuel (Bill) Abbott says of his logging career. “The second biggest was sticking with it.”

Born in 1942, Abbott didn’t grow up in logging, but on a farm in Cabot, Ark. His father, John Floyd, born 1904, was a farmer, barber, and politician, serv­ing as the Lonoke County clerk. John had only one leg, the other lost to infection at age 11. This didn’t stop him from riding horses, swimming, and building with his own hands the home in which Bill grew up, and a small lake adjacent. A neighborhood has now been built around the lake, near Highways 89 and 67.