Not sure why I bumped into this thread... I have an older Bearcat 70050 chipper/shredder. Came with a 5HP B&S engine. I hated that engine and hated the pulley/belt power transfer. Every time I let the engine sit for a few months unused it took a major effort to start it again. Yeah, should have run it bone dry first, etc., etc. Eventually I unmounted it and got a quality 3HP 220V Leeson electric motor and a chain and some sprockets to go from the 3600 electric motor RPM to ~1900 flywheel RPM. You'd think 5HP vs 3HP means it's gonna suck. Well, turns out the opposite is true. Electric torque vs. gas lack of torque specially at low speeds makes the electric win every single time! With the gas engine it took a good 10 seconds to baby the flywheel from standstill to full speed. Electric: under one second! I'm really not making that up. When I'd jam some thick wood into the knives with the gas engine and bog it down I'd have to wait several seconds for the gas engine to open the throttle and come back up to speed. With the electric it's a fraction of a second. Overall, the 3HP electric motor has turned my chipper from an underpowered machine to a scary beast. The motor power is not any limitation on what I can chip. The knives get hot and the grease in the bearings starts to smoke before the motor limits anything I do. From a safety point of view I don't recommend this mod to anyone! I just wish there were good electric chipper/shredders to buy like there are in europe. Yes, I did have to run some good 10ga copper 200v circuit to my chipping spot, but for me, that was much more pleasurable than cleaning carburators to no end. Of course, everyone's tradeoffs are different...

Hi Dooley, From what I've read on the link I provided, people like it. I hesitate to buy any electric outdoor products because of portability issues. If you have 4 acres, you need to run cords(which is not recommended. The further out you get, the bigger the cord you need and the hotter the cord gets. I wouldn't buy a cord longer than 50 feet that is less than 12 gauge) or bring the stuff to be chipped closer to the house. A couple of the reviews talked about it plugging on wet or large stuff. If you're shredding bark in your wood area, I'll bet you won't have too much trouble. A Troy Bilt Super Tomahawk would be within your $250-400 budget, if you're willing to buy used and would accept a gas engine. I had a mid 80's TB ST for a year or so and was well pleased with it. The only reason I sold it was because I upgraded to a BCS chipper for my 715. The shredder with the proper size screen would be just the ticket for shredding bark. It also has a chipper for branches up to 3 inches. If you're really lucky, maybe you could find a Mackissic used, but they're a little less common and tend to bring a little higher price. Good luck with your decision. Here is a link that might be useful: reviews of the electric chipper

Better protect yer eyes and face too! Those machines can throw some sharp things at ya, at speed! Rustyj.

Based on experience, I'd say that small shredders are only good for dry autumn leaves because twigs, sticks, even tough tomato vine stems or whatever, are too much for them. Unless you're only using them to shred leaves, they're a waste of money. I just rake up any debris I want to chop up and run over it with a lawn mower, catching it in the lawn mower's grasscatcher. Most debris just goes onto a compost pile or into the chicken pen for the chickens to eat. (It still ends up in the compost, eventually, when we clean out the chicken coop and dump the straw bedding on the compost pile.) We have a really large, powerful chipper/shredder probably about the same size as the one Diane had. It is a lot of trouble to operate, needs maintenance constantly, etc. Had we purchased it, I'd say we wasted our money. However, it was a hand-me-down given to us by some friends of ours. They used it for a couple of years to shred up old stored hay just before they put the new fresh hay into the barn for storage. Eventually, they stopped shredding the hay and started giving it to us to use as mulch in our garden. Then, since they had no use for the shredder, they gave it to us. I certainly appreciate greatly their kindness in giving it to us, but we don't use it very often. It is more or less just sitting in the garage gathering dust, although every year I say I'm going to drag it out of the garage and put it to work in winter when doing clean-up chores, but I never really get around to using it. It is too much trouble. Dawn