How'd it go today?

[Mellow]

Went up to Philly for a few days to visit my daughter. She bought a house last year and is in the process of renovating. Did some hiking at Wissahickon Valley Park and saw this poor old tree:



The Great Beech is not looking so great.

 

[stig]

Amazing.
They usually last 200-250 years.
Wonder what went wrong with that one.

 

[Mellow]

I saw lots of Hypoxylon canker on the dead leads and some old lightning protection in the upper canopy but nothing near the ground; just frayed cables hanging in midair. I suspect it was damaged by lightning and went south from there.

Lots of other beech in that area looked bad.

 

[lxskllr]

Today sucked. 87°, and 80% humidity. A/C's broken in the truck. I pulled my back yesterday trying to free a limb trapped under a log. It was pretty sore, but nothing that couldn't be managed. It got worse and worse today til it was an effort just to stand. It seemed like people on the job kept wanting "one more thing", and I'd never get out of there. Going home now, and finding something for lunch.

edit:
Day picked up a little. Got home, and got a package from TreeStuff, and my order of pretzels from Martins of Lancaster. TreeStuff gave me a Notch pocket wedge as a freebie, which is pretty cool. I've kinda wanted one for awhile, but just have a hard time coming up with $7 for a little piece of plastic. I'm most excited about my Silky file. I actually got it to sharpen my Stanley shortcut saw. It used to fly through wood. but I lent it to a friend once, and he did something to it, and it quit sawing good.

My pretzels have FRAGILE HANDLE WITH CARE stickers all over the box as usual, but it looks like it was dragged behind the truck. I haven't opened it to check yet. Don't want to be too greedy, and get extra things to piss me off. Gotta stretch it out so there's something at least every day. I don't usually have a problem with that, but there might not be anything to piss me off tomorrow, and I can check then. I have a few more days before my old pretzels are gone.

 

[Fiddler]

Started a couple hours late due to rain, but the course was closed and I had a great 5 hrs getting things done until people started showing up. good day...

 

[BeerGeek]

Well, my day sucked. The oddball I hired pulled a strange f-u today. and walked off the job without doing much. I ended up having to do multiple runs with trucks, because he refused to drive the smaller truck and trailer for a BS reason. Didn't finish the first job, and there is still another to tackle 2 doors down from where we were (20 miles from home). Now have to reschedule a bunch of work for next week, as I need at least 3 to do them all. At least I did get paid or the solo work I did w/friends the past 2 weeks down in that area, so the bills will get paid.

 

[Tree09]

That is weird... glad it worked out on getting paid tho. I had to run to the hardware store, my well pump is running very low pressure (long term issue that's finally bad enough ) so i had to get some stuff for when i tear into that tomorrow after work. Pretty sure it's just the control switch, quick swap, replace filters, new gauge if needed, and check the expansion tank and i should be good as new, if not I'll have to pull the pump and all that fun. At least everything seems to be playing nice enough to break when I'm finally better enough to fix them!

 

[Burnham]

Another short day today. Home by 11:00. And....Roscoe, being the good dog that he is, had dragged me up an early Father’s Day gift....as in, literally, he found this pistol case with a near new .22 revolver in it. My son-in-law said, “Somewhere, someone’s crying!”

View attachment 111339

Wow...where do you think Roscoe might have found it?

 

[CurSedVoyce]

Well, my day sucked. The oddball I hired pulled a strange f-u today. and walked off the job without doing much. I ended up having to do multiple runs with trucks, because he refused to drive the smaller truck and trailer for a BS reason. Didn't finish the first job, and there is still another to tackle 2 doors down from where we were (20 miles from home). Now have to reschedule a bunch of work for next week, as I need at least 3 to do them all. At least I did get paid or the solo work I did w/friends the past 2 weeks down in that area, so the bills will get paid.

I feel your pain Mang.

 

[SeanKroll]

Well, my day sucked. The oddball I hired pulled a strange f-u today. and walked off the job without doing much. I ended up having to do multiple runs with trucks, because he refused to drive the smaller truck and trailer for a BS reason. Didn't finish the first job, and there is still another to tackle 2 doors down from where we were (20 miles from home). Now have to reschedule a bunch of work for next week, as I need at least 3 to do them all. At least I did get paid or the solo work I did w/friends the past 2 weeks down in that area, so the bills will get paid.

Nobody hurt. Nothing broken. Headache- of-an-employee gone fast.
Money in hand.
Work in the queue.

 

[Nutball]

Not much going on, so I made a saw video of my 026 pro. It blew through a pile of oak very well, but this big dryish hard maple was a little much. (old post, video deleted to make room for new videos) I cut some white pine next, huge difference of course. Really this little saw has no business cutting big logs when I've got bigger saws. This one has no high speed adjustment, so I run 30:1 oil to lean it out. It was idling for a few minutes to warm up before that first cut.

 

[lxskllr]

What chain are you using there?

Got my rope ends from wesspur today. 96' of ⅝" treemaster, and 69' of ⅝" atlas. I wonder how they come up with the rope diameters? The treemaster measures about right, but the atlas is ¾". It's yellow like ⅝" is supposed to be... Seems like rope makers guesstimate the sizes. All my original climbline is supposed to be ½", but they're clearly a little different from each other. Doesn't really matter, but it would be cool if the stated sizes were true.

 

[Tree09]

Get some weight on it a bit and then see what it is

 

[lxskllr]

Side note... What I like about treemaster is what I hate about treemaster. It's stout and durable like steel line, but it's stout and durable like steel line. I'm outside trying to get it coiled nice(tried inside first), and it kinks, and won't release it. I'm whipping the rope around trying to get it straight, and rope says "LoL, frig you". Me RAAAAGE!!! :^D

 

[Tree09]

You have to coil it clockwise since it's right hand lay rope. Same with using it on a portawrap or bollard. Ever wonder why capstans only go clockwise?

 

[lxskllr]

I coil clockwise, but the half twist puts a kink in the line that doesn't want to come out. Shake the shit out of it, and it just sits there.

 

[Tree09]

String it out completely straight, then start coiling, pulling it to you as you coil. You will put a half twist in with your wrist on every coil, which helps it lay perfectly round with the rest of the coil. If a coil isn't lying perfectly, fix it before going to the next one, either adding or removing twist, backing up to keep pulling it straight. By having it straight the end can rotate, which keeps everything in order. With practice it becomes second nature and is super fast. Do the exact same with extension cords, welding lead, anything with right hand lay, because doing so tightens the lay keeping it from kinking, which is caused by the lay opening up. Fold braided line back and forth on a butterfly coil which imparts zero twist in it, because of the braided construction. This is seriously my biggest pet peeve out there, I've almost gotten in fights over this on jobsites before Welding lead will hockle if this isn't done religiously, and then will snag on everything in the universe when you are trying to string it out. I've literally hung them over a railing 100 feet up getting the lay back.

 

[Nutball]

What chain are you using there?

An old Stihl .325 yellow chain with about 30% left on the teeth.

 

[SeanKroll]

Rope bag!

 

[Nutball]

I just realized that if my 026 is running too rich, I can lean it out with methanol at the very least if not some nitromethane instead of more oil. I've done it before; mixed a few percent of nitro fuel into gas. I'd keep it in an oil quart bottle to fresh mix before use since it is possible for nitro to separate out of the gas.

 

[lxskllr]

Wouldn't that eat up the rubber in the fuel system?

 

[Nutball]

I don't know, I've occasionally run around 2.5% nitro & 5.5% methanol without problems, but a noticeable little boost in power. As long as it is used quickly and rinsed with normal gas it should be fine.

 

[Burnham]

String it out completely straight, then start coiling, pulling it to you as you coil. You will put a half twist in with your wrist on every coil, which helps it lay perfectly round with the rest of the coil. If a coil isn't lying perfectly, fix it before going to the next one, either adding or removing twist, backing up to keep pulling it straight. By having it straight the end can rotate, which keeps everything in order. With practice it becomes second nature and is super fast. Do the exact same with extension cords, welding lead, anything with right hand lay, because doing so tightens the lay keeping it from kinking, which is caused by the lay opening up. Fold braided line back and forth on a butterfly coil which imparts zero twist in it, because of the braided construction. This is seriously my biggest pet peeve out there, I've almost gotten in fights over this on jobsites before Welding lead will hockle if this isn't done religiously, and then will snag on everything in the universe when you are trying to string it out. I've literally hung them over a railing 100 feet up getting the lay back.

Orrrr...just flake the bastid into a big bag or bucket or rope tarp. Coiling is for chumps . It bites the big azz, both coiling it up and even more so, deploying it. Be a real tree guy...flake that rope .

 

[Tree09]

I might try it one day, but since i learned to do it right i don't have problems with it. But trusting your wisdom i might try a tarp for my 3 strand bull rope. I learned the butterfly coil which is also used by @kevin bingham so i know I've done dumber things in life. I actually do the cross thing in front of me, I'll see if i can find it later, very similar tho. I would be more likely to simply do a double chain sennit tho before that, which is how i manage the tails of my big loopie found slings and anchor rode for my sailboat, because it completely ensures perfect deployment.



Here's the way i do it, single part line tho.

 

[cory]

Very nice presentation, 09.

I just got a rock rope for gym climbing, still getting used to dealing with it.

I tried KB's way and it deployed poorly, I probably wasn't doing it right. It is currently stuffed into a tree stuff bag.

But the butterfly coil looks good, gotta try it.