Woodchipper guide
This guide for employers and workers provides information to assist in the control or elimination of certain risks associated with the operation of a trailer-mounted handfed wood-chipper.
Catalogue No. SW09408
To print out the entire guide, use the 'Print entire guide' button (yellow).
Chapters
1. Introduction
This guide for employers and workers provides information to assist in the control or elimination of certain risks associated with the operation of a trailer-mounted handfed wood-chipper.
Wood-chippers are used in tree trimming and removal work to reduce tree waste by converting tree limbs and branches into wood chip or mulch.
Although the design of individual wood-chippers may vary, they all use the same principle of a rotating disc or drum fitted with hardened steel blades to chip the wood.
It is easier to use wood-chippers at the location where the tree has been trimmed or felled than it is to transport whole branches elsewhere to be chipped.
The list below outlines some of the common wood-chipper hazards and risks1 that can cause fatal or serious injuries to wood-chipper operators:
- being drawn into the machine from in-feed rollers
- coming into contact with the blades
- becoming entangled in the branches or attached ropes and drawn into the wood-chipper
- being struck by ejected material
- being struck by in-feeding branches, limbs, or logs
- being struck by kicking wood
- crush injuries
- exposure to noise from the wood-chipper
- being struck by a passing vehicle when the wood-chipper is parked on the road
- manual handling injuries.1
There are many different types of wood-chippers used in the NSW tree industry. There are also a number of different types of in-feed rollers that are used in industrial wood-chippers that can have either horizontal or vertical configuration. A number of recent incidents involved these types of machines.