Trees you've cut

[cus_deluxe]

Ash from today. Winched it to the back of a little Case-International. End of the branches ended up three feet from the lip of the power box.
660 was out in full swing cutting it up. Felled it with 462 because I was cutting above my head on one side.

Farmer wasn't happy when I told him €350 at the end of the day. That was the price for 2 men felling and cutting tree, all our own gear and fuel including a tractor. Could have gone a lot harder on him, I know any climber would have. Bear in mind this tree was back leaning, nearly 4 foot by 3 foot wide and 70 feet tall. Also right beside a 3 bay slatted shed. We were six hours at it before I had to go to the day job.

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thats less than half of what that shouldve cost. id have told him to fukk himself.

 

[TheDarkLordChinChin]

Yes, you are our sister city.

We are not a city but a county, a county with no cities. Our highest population town is Roscommon town at 6,555.

 

[TheDarkLordChinChin]

thats less than half of what that shouldve cost. id have told him to fukk himself.

He is a good friend of mine so I was charging him "mate's rates". The lad I had with me wanted €70 for 6 hours work which I told him was insane, I paid him €120. So out of the €150 that the farmer did give me I only got €30. He had want to pay the rest when I come back the next day or the timber will end up in my own shed.

 

[JugHead27]

Cut this stump made up of 3 birches.
Made it on one chain even!
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Never seen a stump cut so flush lol

 

[Duce]

We are not a city but a county, a county with no cities. Our highest population town is Roscommon town at 6,555.

We are also Roscommon county. It is not a big city, more like a village. I live about 15 miles west, Lyon township in Roscommon county.

 

[TheDarkLordChinChin]

Ash from today. Winched it to the back of a little Case-International. End of the branches ended up three feet from the lip of the power box.
660 was out in full swing cutting it up. Felled it with 462 because I was cutting above my head on one side.

Farmer wasn't happy when I told him €350 at the end of the day. That was the price for 2 men felling and cutting tree, all our own gear and fuel including a tractor. Could have gone a lot harder on him, I know any climber would have. Bear in mind this tree was back leaning, nearly 4 foot by 3 foot wide and 70 feet tall. Also right beside a 3 bay slatted shed. We were six hours at it before I had to go to the day job.

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Some pics of the tree standing.

 

[davidwyby]

This is my plan. Is there anything else anyone can think of that I should be doing?


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Watch out for ending up with stronger hinge wood on one side than the other. Sample your way into the face with tall angled cuts. A deeper face than usual might be better for more support/control and to increase its tendency to go to the lay. I like a bar that is long enough for the whole tree or a little over half the dia…I don’t like almost but not quite long enough.

Make sure the tractor doesn’t pull faster than the winch. Don’t pull until it’s fully cut up and ready. @afleetcommand would recommend leaving a trigger to release. I’d go carefully and feel while cutting for the best wood and leave it to cut last.

If you have any way to adjust for limb weight do that.

@Woodpecker @chiselbit @Loony661 @Catbuster might have more.

 

[Catbuster]

Yeah… My first thought was that he’s probably overthinking it.

Two lines can put a twist in the tree and prematurely break the hinge wood and do exactly the same thing and having it go over sideways because of weak hinge wood. I don’t like pulling trees over to start, but if I do I only ever use one good steel or spectra line.

What I would do, again speaking in generalities, is set one line in the direction of pull, and face it in the direction of pull. I’d put the winch on the biggest deadman I could find, it may be Kevin’s tractor, another tree, building… Whatever. Bouncing on a line if you’re not smooth on the clutch of a tractor or it’s not powerful enough to pull it over can move the tree enough to break the hinge too. A winch is a good, constant tension that can always be backed up with wedges.

Cutting I would open up a nice, big face, probably a little under half, I like the bird’s mouth for pulling because it leaves a lot of travel before closing. I would place my back cut level with the middle of my face and cut it, backed up with wedges, until I had two to four inches or so of hinge, then pull it over.

That’s my take.

 

[TheDarkLordChinChin]

Watch out for ending up with stronger hinge wood on one side than the other. Sample your way into the face with tall angled cuts. A deeper face than usual might be better for more support/control and to increase its tendency to go to the lay. I like a bar that is long enough for the whole tree or a little over half the dia…I don’t like almost but not quite long enough.

Make sure the tractor doesn’t pull faster than the winch. Don’t pull until it’s fully cut up and ready. @afleetcommand would recommend leaving a trigger to release. I’d go carefully and feel while cutting for the best wood and leave it to cut last.

If you have any way to adjust for limb weight do that.

@Woodpecker @chiselbit @Loony661 @Catbuster might have more.

Yeah… My first thought was that he’s probably overthinking it.

Two lines can put a twist in the tree and prematurely break the hinge wood and do exactly the same thing and having it go over sideways because of weak hinge wood. I don’t like pulling trees over to start, but if I do I only ever use one good steel or spectra line.

What I would do, again speaking in generalities, is set one line in the direction of pull, and face it in the direction of pull. I’d put the winch on the biggest deadman I could find, it may be Kevin’s tractor, another tree, building… Whatever. Bouncing on a line if you’re not smooth on the clutch of a tractor or it’s not powerful enough to pull it over can move the tree enough to break the hinge too. A winch is a good, constant tension that can always be backed up with wedges.

Cutting I would open up a nice, big face, probably a little under half, I like the bird’s mouth for pulling because it leaves a lot of travel before closing. I would place my back cut level with the middle of my face and cut it, backed up with wedges, until I had two to four inches or so of hinge, then pull it over.

That’s my take.

I have never used two ropes to pull a tree before and I don't intend to start if I don't have to. The tree is 4 foot wide and rotten so I will leave a big hinge for sure. Ideally I will just use my winch and 3/8 steel rope anchored to the ash tree in front of the tree I'm cutting. Hopefully I can get the ESB to take down the power line running past the tree through the field, this will facilitate a much more straightforward felling process.
One rope, one pulling mechanism and a few wedges. The landowner wants to put an excavator on the road to push, but I am against this. I wouldn't mind if I could jump into the excavator and operate it myself but I have never done tree-work with any of the excavator operators around here so I don't want someone I don't really know or trust taking my life into their hands. If the bucket were to slip off the trunk of the tree while pushing it could generate so much violent movement throughout the tree that branches or even trunk segments could break off and knock me dead.

I plan to make a 60 degree conventional face cut between 1/3 and 1/2 the depth of the tree or shallower if the timber feels okay and leave a good 3-5 inches of hinge, I can always cut this more if I need to. Better to have more hinge and not need it than to need more hinge and not have it. I will be using a 30 inch bar, the only longer bar I have is on an 084 which I don't have much experience using and have never felled a tree with. I plan on using either my 462 or my 660.

A forwarder driver I know gave me a number of someone in the ESB who got lines taken down for him last year, I will ring him in the morning. If there are no wires running 10 foot parallel to my desired lay I will feel comfortable felling this tree with 1 potentially un-needed pulling rope and felling wedges.

As to Kevin and his tractor, Kevin is the landowner's son whose nephews ( one of them is the lad in the picture standing beside the tree) assure me Kevin is a "useless bollocks" and a "thick, ignorant cnut". I know Kevin and I fear they are right so if I can get him out of the picture altogether I will be even more relaxed. Kevin's tractor is 90 horse Same Explorer with a front loader. If any tractor is to be used this is the one I want because of the added weight of the front loader, if only it didn't have to be Kevin's tractor...

 

[Woodpecker]

I prefer to pull trees with just one line. If you need more pull set up a block and tackle (aka 4:1). The line doesn’t steer the fall though the hinge does. It’s why a well thought out and planned hinge is so important. If the hinge fails to command the fall the chances of bad things happening significantly increase.

 

[Catbuster]

I would prefer to have an excavator push a tree over rather than pull it, by far. Get up as high as possible and use the heel of the bucket. Most, key word is most, excavator operators are good enough to not push on something until you tell them it’s time.

The caveat, of course, is that I’d rather have 10,000 pound line pull 40’ up over trying to push a tree over with a 10,000 pound excavator. The small ones just don’t have the power and can’t reach high enough to gain sufficient leverage.

Also, the landowner hired you to do the work, so do it the way you think it needs to be done. They hired you for a reason, and it’s usually because they’re not good enough to do it themselves. You’re the subject matter expert, and it may be worthwhile to point that out.

 

[Ryan Browne]

Just a quick reminder that when you're pulling a tree over (especially if you can't get your rope quite as high as you'd like it) is one instance when you want your back cut to be BELOW your face cut. Like they do on the West Coast where they keep them higher to prevent the tree sliding backwards off the stump, making your back cut lower will prevent the winch from pulling the bottom out from under the top of the tree.

 

[davidwyby]

I think the most important is wood eval for hinge.

 

[TheDarkLordChinChin]

I would prefer to have an excavator push a tree over rather than pull it, by far. Get up as high as possible and use the heel of the bucket. Most, key word is most, excavator operators are good enough to not push on something until you tell them it’s time.

The caveat, of course, is that I’d rather have 10,000 pound line pull 40’ up over trying to push a tree over with a 10,000 pound excavator. The small ones just don’t have the power and can’t reach high enough to gain sufficient leverage.

Also, the landowner hired you to do the work, so do it the way you think it needs to be done. They hired you for a reason, and it’s usually because they’re not good enough to do it themselves. You’re the subject matter expert, and it may be worthwhile to point that out.

Thankyou to every one for all the advice, it is greatly appreciated. I rang someone at the ESB today but it was as though he was not happy to receive the call. He demanded to know who had given me his number before he would say any more. However, when I got him talking it sounded as though getting the line taken down won't be too difficult. I just have to send on the landowners ESB account number.

@Catbuster 's message makes a good point. I don't think the landowners know that I am well capable of cutting trees, not to mention fully qualified in felling large trees from the ground. To them I am just some young lad who cuts the odd tree. That said, he is very old and very concerned.

 

[TheDarkLordChinChin]

Some small ash trees from today.

This one I had to winch, it was leaning back over a shed.






This one was the opposite, it was not hanging around.







This one was literally growing sideways over a hedgerow at an angle of 45 degrees. I used a sizwell and left a big hinge.

 

[TheDarkLordChinChin]

Did I bring enough stuff?

 

[davidwyby]

Your trees sound interesting, we need before pics, or video

 

[Catfishclark89]

Here’s a specimen

 

[TreeLife]

Hard maple right around 38"...done kilt it wif the 572 back in the spring. Meant to post this before, been a busy boy

 

[HumBurner]

I prefer to pull trees with just one line. If you need more pull set up a block and tackle (aka 4:1). The line doesn’t steer the fall though the hinge does. It’s why a well thought out and planned hinge is so important. If the hinge fails to command the fall the chances of bad things happening significantly increase.

The line may not steer the fall, though the placement of the rope does affect how/from which angle the rope itself pulls on the tree. So in effect, one can dramatically aid or hinder the direction and final lay of the tree with "choker" placement.