How'd it go today?

They are great. I moved some big assed wood with my mine today. I really need to make a mount on the chipper for the rake and forks. That would be sweet!

Good luck, drive safe!
 
Have a safe trip Adrian!

Just taking it easy today.

No pain from tooth removal since I woke up so it's a wonderful day so far. Getting some needed Banjo practice in also;)
 
Moved some serious wood through the processor today. Got a call that my buddy went through a pallet chipper. Not a phone call I was expecting.
 
We weren't close at all. More an acquaintance. Sorry, I shouldn't have worded it the way I did. It was still sickening to hear about, ya know?
 
My job just did not go my way today and I basically worked a full day for a Drop and Walk rate. Stupid gray pine:X Tried to fell it up hill... Lean and weight was favouring the side lay or a down hill lay as well... 40" DBH about 80 plus high. Sat back on my wedges and pushed them down into the wood. 5-1 set up with come-a-long hardly even budged it. Set a second rope and more mechanicals. Found my limit to the set up and broke the pull rope at the running bowline. Soooooooo.... Rather than try to set a line again (really not a good scene with a large tree sitting on a couple wedges and a 10% hinge). Asked HO if I can squish some trees.. That got ok'd as we are thinning the place anyway. Go to cut a different face for some control, bind saw (066 and 36 bar) in the kerf. Take off 066 power head as tree it creaking and cracking from the wind that has now come up. Get out 036 and start nipping the hinge to let it drop at the neighbour's critter fence and some oaks we were trying to save. POW! My boring the hinge and curf cuts at the sides of the hinge worked(..... Fence not too bad... (turns out the neighbour's crew broke it up the hill so I had some slack :lol: ) Most of the good oaks minimal breakage. No one got killed. Took most the morning as I had to return to the house for more rigging (I needed a drive anyway after I found out no capture on a 5-1 system so there was no way to just "tie it off" on a porty).
I apologised to the customer for our failure of pulling it off in a reasonable amount of time (had agreed to a day rate for some thinning that never happened today) and discounted the bill. There were some yahoos working next door, horrible slanted back cuts... I felt like a yahoo after all this went down in front of them.
Some times the bear gets ya. I'll shrug it off tomorrow.
The limits of that particular set up has been found. I am going to have to scrutinise every bit of rigging done from now on. Have to buy some new rope... Several lessons here. Yet using the lessons I have learned kept it all under containment.
Clean up is going to suck and now I have rounds that I am going to have to secure as I cut to keep from taking out a beauty of a white fence and mechanised gate :|: Oh well... Good place to test your gear though.. away from a house out in some woods with no potential critical targets.
Could have been worse.

Did I mention I really really hate (other than the fact they make me money) grey pines :X

Next one like that gets a D8 and some cable :lol:
 
Climbed all day in the rain. Sucked !!!! removing skinny little Black Oaks that were like a bunch of tooth picks end to end. No stability..
 
Here you go Burnam. And for anyone else Curious about the ORCA.
Sorry about the on the fly quality... Still trying to figure out the dang focus on this thing.:|:
<iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/wC2Nl7fSRHA" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
 
Way to go on the raise, Terrie! You are a valued employee!!

If it is any consolation, Stephen, I enjoyed reading your story about the Pine. I have had my fair share of revolting developments with trees. What are you going to do to increase your pulling capacity, or.....?
 
congrats on the raise, always a good feeling. pallet chipper? not so much. sorry to hear it.

stephen, the grcs saved my butt when i got myself in the same situation. i dont know what i would have done without it.

started working on my next rocket stove today. this one is solely for heating a hot tub. it will be a bit more complicated to make than the last one, but the payoff should be worth it;).
 
Contemplating that Jay. On a tree that weight and size, probably add a D6 or D8 on a 2-1 with cable. Or climb and bomb it. Change the weight in my favour. All depends on the job. How much gear you can get in etc.. If it were near any significant targets, I would have just climbed it and pieced it down. We were really just trying to make our job easier for clean up and save a couple of trees. I doubt we could have pulled that tree over with 5/8ths Stable Braid on a 5-1 system reflecting on it now. Just too much weight over all. If the tree had been dead, maybe. Last grey pine I did was rather dry even though much alive. Less weight. This one had a REALLY GOOD water source. It was a good experiment to test our limits of our gear. Different species I could have got more from the wedges. That would have helped. This tree just squished around them and closed the kerf of the back cut. Literally ate the wedges. Gray pine when it is really well watered gets kind of mushy... And if they set back like that, driving a wedge is like trying to push them through a brick wall. It ain't gonna happen. 2 - 12" long hard heads 6 or 8 inches in and the kerf closed on them. I was lucky to get the saw out.
Could I have added even more mechanical advantage... Yes... I broke a 13,000 rated pull line at the knot however.... So this is why I say a CAT would have been a better way to attack it. Setting up how much mechanical advantage you have to hike in vs a piece of equipment that can run right in and pull it over. Time involved....... CAT D6 or D8 would have made sense. Or... climb it and bomb it out.
 
Isn't it the case that a 13,000 lb rating is really the nominal breaking strength? The safe working load would be approximately one fifth of that. In other words, the rope should be five times stronger than what you are pulling. Obviously it is a conservative safety guideline of more or lesser value, but perhaps something to keep in mind. Nominal breaking strength, if that is the 13,000 lb. rating, is under ideal conditions, I believe a straight slowly increasing in amount pull. Perhaps Dave can advise on it.
 
woodworkingboy said:
Nominal breaking strength, if that is the 13,000 lb. rating, is under ideal conditions, I believe a straight slowly increasing in amount pull. Perhaps Dave can advise on it.
Click to expand...

Well the knot took some of the strength out... But a straight, slowly increasing amount of pull was exactly what was going on. No shock load Jay. I would like to hear Dave's, Burnam's or Gerry's take on it. Wire rope would have been a better choice. I doubt anyone would have wanted to haul up enough of it for a 5-1 system on a 200' pull and hope it moved the tree.
 
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