Whether you have a small stump or many large stumps to get rid of there are a few different ways stump removal can be achieved. When stump removal is needed it’s not always clear which option is best to remove the stump. There usually isn’t a right or wrong option here. It comes down to which option is best for each person’s own circumstances. Keep reading below and I will go over each option you might choose in depth and include some of my recommendations.
Here are some why it would be a good idea to hire a professional for stump removal.
The overall job time will be accomplished faster and smoother with less hassle.
The risk of collateral damage during the stump grinding process like damage to houses or cars due to flying debris is minimized by hiring a professional. Professionals usually have a lot of experience on how to set up job site with the correct shields, stump grinding angle, wheel RPM and soil preparation around stump to virtually eliminate property damage risks. This only applies to experienced knowledgeable professionals that take pride in their work and are good at what they do.
Hiring a stump grinding professional can save you a tremendous amount of time, stress, and hassle. A job that may easily become a nightmare for an inexperienced homeowner could usually be done smoothly and quickly by a professional.
One might think a stump grinder is the only tool you need to remove a stump. This might not be true. If a stump needing removal is near a house, car, or other valuable property it will be nearly impossible to keep stump grinding debris from causing damage without the proper shields that a professional will have. If the stump is near utility lines, the stump grinding professional usually can set depth accurately on grinder and locate the exact depth with specialized tools such as a soil probe. Stump grinding requires manual labor and clean up tools for the chips such as a leaf blower, rake, and tine shovel.
If there is embedded rocks or metal in stump, which happens all the time the professional usually has the tools and equipment to chisel or grind the embedded material out. The stump grinding professional will also have a trained ear to know the subtle grinding noise change when running into embedded metal or rock while grinding.
It can take months of experience to learn to hear when the grinder is running into embedded material in stump. The reason a trained ear is beneficial is the grinding needs to stop immediately once metal or rock is hit. If the embedded rock or metal is not removed immediately it will inevitably render the grinder teeth worthless and grinder may not cut hardly at all if it is a 40 hp or below machine.
The most common unit rented by DIY’ers is the 20-40hp model stump grinders because of their affordability. If a homeowner runs into embedded rocks or metal a new set of teeth and another trip to rental facility is usually needed. If the rental facility claims 710you abused the teeth you will also have to pay for the new teeth if you want to finish the job. A new set of teeth can be more than the rental fee alone.
For stump removal jobs where there a just a few small to medium size stumps the cost to hire a stump grinding professional is similar to renting a grinder and doing it yourself. By the time the homeowner pays the fee for rental of the stump grinder, fills the stump grinding machine back up with gas after job, drives to and from the rental facility, takes the time to learn to operate machine efficiently, washes machine before return it, and pays for shielding (usually plywood sheet) protecting cars, houses or other structures it absolutely does not make any sense to do stump removal yourself.
The stump grinder rental process is not as trouble free as an unsuspecting customer might think. Rental businesses are notorious for severe delays and procrastination on machine maintenance especially with stump grinders. When it comes to other lower maintenance machines the rental facilities might do an OK job of keep up with the maintenance, but stump grinders require a lot more maintenance to keep running safely and efficiently.
The teeth on rentals machines are nearly always very dull and on the edge of hardly usable. Equipment rental business make their money by amount of time machine needs to be rented so what incentive do they have to keep their teeth sharp making the job a ton faster a smoother for the customer? You might find out the hard way that trying to grind a stump a machine 40hp of below with dull teeth not only takes longer, but it is a huge hassle. The machine usually overheats and stalls every time it starts to grind with any strain at all when the teeth are extremely dull.
The stump chip shields are normally worn out or are gone completely on stump rental machines. This can be unsafe for the operator, but why would the rental company care? You normally must sign a waiver to use their machines.
If you don’t wash the machine and return it with a full tank the rental company may charge you a very steep fee on top of rental cost. So, when you don’t have time to return the machine on the time because the stump removal job took you 4x times longer than it should have because of their dull, useless grinding teeth you are possibly going to have to pay for the fuel and machine cleaning fees for reasons that are not your fault in any way.
Most stump grinder rental facilities do not offer the protective debris shields for your car or house. They do not offer face shields that need to be worn while grinding and they don’t offer all the specialized equipment you need to locate depth of utility lines, grind out metal, or chisel embedded rock in the stump.
Here are a few reasons why you may want to rent a stump grinder and do it yourself.
If the stumps that need to be removed are well away from other structures such as a house, outbuilding or cars this removes a bit of hassle trying to protect those things while grinding.
If the stump removal job consists of several medium to large size stumps, such as a job where 6-20 stumps measuring 20” or larger than renting a large diesel stump grinder for half a day rate might be worth if you have a lot of time.
If the stump removal professional cannot schedule you in right away and you are in a time crunch it might make sense to rent a stump grinder.
If you have a ton more time than money renting a stump grinder that is checked over, has sharp teeth, and well maintained with debris guards might make sense.
If the jobs are small or involve a lot of large stumps the cost of renting a stump grinder is usually about the same as hiring a stump removal professional.
In conclusion, you can see why the choice to rent a stump grinder vs hiring a professional may not be as simple as one might think. Hopefully after reading this post your choice on which choice to take is clearer. What will you choose to do? Let us know.