Trees you've cut

[Hinerman]

@HumBurner yeah I thought about it and was going to come back and point that out. Coos is pretty much guaranteed no chair, but no directional control.

Why do you need to control a heavy leaner? You already know where it is going.

 

[Hinerman]

I think I got most of it but had to add to the description that it’s mainly for limbs and trees too small to bore/trigger. It’s also faster. GF Beranek has a story about felling a whole strip this way.

Your back cut was at a different angle than your side cuts. Is that a normal coos bay cut?

 

[davidwyby]

 

[davidwyby]

Your back cut was at a different angle than your side cuts. Is that a normal coos bay cut?

No, I screwed it all up

 

[HumBurner]

Why do you need to control a heavy leaner? You already know where it is going.

To not destroy or maim other trees. To know where your swampers/spotters should be.

If it's tall and/or with a wide canopy, the branches may significantly effect the fall, possibly hanging up putting you in a really sketchy place.


There's all kinds of reasons.

 

[TheDarkLordChinChin]

Our backyard logging site, look at the one that split on me. Face cut too narrow and she split when the log hit the ground before the hinge had broke.







I was getting BC Fallers vibes when this big log rolled down the hill after I cut it.

 

[davidwyby]

They are more time and hassle but I have started to really like gap faces. Faces don’t have to be as clean, more hinge time, less fiber pull, face doesn’t close as soon.

 

[davidwyby]

On a normal face, the front half of the hinge is compression and the rear tension, this pulls fibers. On a gap or 90° open face, the hinge bends forward until it breaks. You can see this in my eucalyptus felling vids from this last winter.

 

[davidwyby]

*combined with a back cut a bit high.

 

[TheDarkLordChinChin]

On a normal face, the front half of the hinge is compression and the rear tension, this pulls fibers. On a gap or 90° open face, the hinge bends forward until it breaks. You can see this in my eucalyptus felling vids from this last winter.

What about those old fashioned humboldt cuts where the face consists of two parallel cuts and then a "snipe" on the lower cut to let the butt of the log slide off the stump? Aren't they meant to expose more hingewood to allow the tree to hold on and not break off until the last minute to stop the log smashing itself on the ground? I wonder would something like that work here in my situation?

 

[Hinerman]

To not destroy or maim other trees. To know where your swampers/spotters should be.

If it's tall and/or with a wide canopy, the branches may significantly effect the fall, possibly hanging up putting you in a really sketchy place.


There's all kinds of reasons.

Thanks, makes sense. If I need to control a leaner, I am hiring somebody; I hope that makes sense too, lol

 

[HumBurner]

Thanks, makes sense. If I need to control a leaner, I am hiring somebody; I hope that makes sense too, lol

You betcha! We're all just trying to hone our skillsets, here, aren't we?

A specific example for us here are pepperwoods (CA Bay Laurel)

They can get huge, 5-6' dia at times, and can grow multiple, long tops that twist and intertwine. They often make decent arcs/bends at the trunk, with limbs reaching straight back up and all different directions. Sometimes they grow in large clusters. They're a hardwood, but pretty prone to chairing when leaners. Very prone to heart rot.


I've seen them get lost using a coos-bay (even though it was the safest cut) and travel in unexpected directions, especially if the limbs promote turning (I've seen them spin with no Dutchman or face-cut nipping) among the canopy.

Scary stuff.

 

[pavel408]

This is the CA pepperwood?

 

[HumBurner]

Looks like it, but I cant see the leaves too well.

 

[Ketchup]

Did some dangerous leaning willows on Monday. We were supposed to climb them but on inspection we said “no way.” The tension wood was rotten and the root structures were barely holding. I could have pushed that arched one over. Luckily we found enough wood to swing them onto a bed of brush. We wouldn’t want the lawn to get damaged. That last one was about 8’ in the air. Cut from the ground with the 36” saw.

 

[HumBurner]

That's a pretty decent and clean hinge for it being leaning willow of that size! Nice work!


Going back to the topic of leaners and what cut/face to use, there's an alternative method using a standard Humboldt face or a pie-face. It's common-sense in my mind, but I've seen lots of people not apply it.

If you have a moderate leaner, instead of putting a face in like you would on a straight trunk, which would be perpendicular to the angle of the lean, keep the face parallel with the lean. Using a pie is safer if you don't need the butt to leave the stump, but can also increase the chance of chairs, wood pull, and/or uprooting, species-dependent.

I've used it on smaller ( >12-16") heavy leaners as well, but it's riskier, and, as always, KNOW YOUR SPECIES AND ITS TENDENCIES.

 

[Ketchup]

For what we’re cutting I rarely go all the way parallel to the lean. As you say, it’s species and condition dependent, but I like 45 degrees off the lean. Much more than that and the hinge just tears. I’m a big fan of the open face cut.

 

[TheDarkLordChinChin]

All Sitka Spruce.
The last one was fun. A heavy back leaner on the edge of the wood. It was naturally leaning back and had all its branches on that side too. Hooked a 4 ton mini digger up to it with 4 ton straps u shackled together and u shackled to the tree as high as I could get the ladder. Got 2 wedges in as soon as I could, worked up to my hinge and went to hit the wedges in in further but the axe just bounced. At this point I told the man in the digger to pull, on every other tree on that job he barley had to pull at all but this one made all the hydraulics creak and moan. I was afraid something would give and the tree would sit back violently and snap its hinge. Luckily it went over. All the branches on it were very thick, with the ones nearest the butt being well over a foot in diameter and they all had big buttresses growing against the log itself, a nightmare to limb.

 

[HumBurner]

Did you make the backut first to set the wedges? Then proceed?

 

[TheDarkLordChinChin]

Did you make the backut first to set the wedges? Then proceed?

Nah, I knew there was no hope getting this tree down where I wanted it without mechanical assistance.