KOMATSU Forestry Equipment Upcoming Auctions

About Komatsu

Like the rest of Komatsu, Komatsu Forest Machines AB (SE) is a fully owned subsidiary of a Japanese conglomerate—but the forestry equipment division has its head office in Umeå, Sweden. Parts of the company have been making forestry machinery in Scandinavia since just after World War II.

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Komatsu 901XC 8WD Harvester

Komatsu Forest History

Umeå Mekaniska was founded in 1961 to make heavy machinery for Swedish industry. By 1965, it had developed a mechanized forest harvesting machine dubbed “Skruven,” or The Screw. The unique unit took its name from the helical screws at the bottom of its bed, which processed entire bunches of trees at a time. Skruven’s high efficiency only improved after 1972 trials spurred refinement of the design. A later single-stem machine, called “Tviggen,” achieved instant popularity with its chain-driven saw.

Volvo BM acquired Umeå Mekaniska in 1976, and three years later started a collaboration on tractors with Valmet in Tampere, Finland. After World War II, the erstwhile Finnish artillery manufacturer had begun to build log lifts, bandsaws, and log-bundling equipment as part of the war reparations effort.

Umeå Mekaniska made history in 1984 with a new harvester design that became the standard for sustainable logging productivity. The company released the seminal Valmet 901, which could fell, delimb, and buck a tree with a single grip instead of two. The 901 also had a fully rotating, levelling cab. The new paradigm it ushered in induced Valmet to acquire Umeå Mekaniska in 1986.

The firm became known as Valmet Logging AB in 1989, then SISU Logging in 1994, and Partek Forest in 1998 during various shifts in ownership. Early in the 1990s, the manufacturer developed a special harvester head attachment to be run by an excavator. Designed for use on South American forest plantations, the concept of an excavator-based logging machine has become ubiquitous around the world.

In 2004, after a four-year informal collaboration, Komatsu bought out Partek Forest and renamed it “Komatsu Forest.” The following year, the newly Japanese manufacturer unveiled a kit that made it easy to convert an excavator into a timber harvester. The forest equipment kept the Valmet brand until 2011, however, and are now sold as Komatsu-brand units.

Komatsu Forest acquired the head manufacturer Log Max in 2012. It launched the eight-wheeled 931XC harvester in 2016 and the 901XC thinner in 2017. The articulated-chassis machines use a rear swing axle and have a bogie on the single axle. Both models can tilt their cabs and cranes, and feature Komatsu's load-sensing stabilization feature.

In 2018, Komatsu acquired forestry attachment operations from Quadco and Southstar, as well as heavy-vehicle simulator developer Oryx Simulations.

Komatsu Today

Komatsu’s current product line includes wheeled and tracked harvesters, forwarders, harvesting heads, felling heads, tracked feller bunchers, yarders, track log loaders, delimbers, forestry excavators, and excavator mulchers, plus related systems and services.

Komatsu’s MaxiVision service puts a digital overhead map display in the forest machine cab, showing each operator their colleagues’ locations and production as well as the ground conditions at the current time. It can help crews communicate to one another, mark work zones “complete,” and make decisions about where to work, such as where their machines will make the least impact on the forest floor due to ground conditions that day. Other technological developments from Komatsu Forest include its MaxiFleet management system and its MaxiXT control and information system. Komatsu has made strides in environmental sustainability, as well, including the use of Stage V/Tier 4 Final emissions-compliant engines that also use low-sulphur engine oil and biodegradable hydraulic oil.

Find The Right Komatsu

Come to ForestryTrader.com to browse new and used Komatsu forestry equipment for sale. Popular models on the site include XT430 and XT445 track feller bunchers and others.