Plastic wedge “repair”

[friedrich]

lots

12in long, about an inch and a half thick at the head. Lotsa lift! Stippled surface so they don't spit too bad.

Bit of a learning curve when I first went to them. Lots of "side stacking", where you parralel the bar in the kerf, from both sides so the points of the wedges overlap. I'll go whip a kerf into something and snap a pic for illustration.

They'll rip a hinge right out of the stump if you're not careful on the smaller trees.

You start stacking these babies, the shits already gotten real.

lot‘s of lift but less lifting power.

 

[Kaveman]

lots

lot‘s of lift but less lifting power.

Hit it with your purse.

 

[Kaveman]

Wedge Renewal

Here is the small Oregon busted up plastic wedge I use. Its about 20 years old.

opeforum.com

That thread is a perfect example of folks pissing time away chasing pennies. I a broke MFer, and a cheap bastard to boot, but you gotta draw a line somewhere!

I've got all the fancy files a phuker could want, from home-made hoof files, to super fine jeweler's files. I'm not taking any of them to a wedge that cost me $2-$8. It'll cost me that much, in time, to properly clean the files out when I'm done.

Like Burnham said, my time is worth something, rather than file on a wedge, I could be harassing my daughters or playing with the dogs. Hell, even tripping trees.

But what do I know, I was recently told I've wasted my life working on trees that don't exist! Phukin ignorant flatlanders, think the whole world looks like their back yard or some shit...

 

[Tree09]

I would assume that a rasp would be the tool of choice if you're gonna file it by hand, or maybe a draw knife or even an angle grinder (cutoff wheel, just slice off the mushroom, all of 5 seconds, a grinding wheel will clog so you gotta clean it after by dressing). I don't often beat wedges in like I'm logging since i pull and use the wedges as backup, so i don't need to touch them up much, and I'm far more likely to nick them with the saw before they really need it anyways. But as a general rule for me mushrooms aren't allowed on anything, great way to lose an eye. Nothing wrong with taking care of your tools no matter what they cost, being particular about your tools shows that you're particular about your work.

 

[Kaveman]

great way to lose an eye.

That's a valid point, and one I won't argue.

 

[davidwyby]

@Kaveman I can’t go to the store and buy them I have to order…so I came up with the fastest way I could. The chainsaw. Took me only a few mins to do all of mine. I prefer to dress the shroom off the sides vs. cutting the whole back off and making it shorter though.

@Tree09 what would be real good is one of those wood grinding wheels

Or a super super aggressive belt sander

 

[lxskllr]

I don't see a problem repairing wedges if you enjoy the work, or are bored and want something to do. If it's not enjoyable, then the effort's dubious. Getting rid of mushrooms is easy. Point work is where it becomes a time sink.

 

[SeanKroll]

No grinding or filing.

A chainsaw or a bandsaw.

 

[Tree09]

Very true, but i usually have a 6" grinder with a cutoff wheel ready to go in the toolbox all the time right next a pipeliner hood with the selstrom flip, and I'm surgical with one so I'm often reaching for it for all sorts of various tasks. Part of being a welder at heart, I'm most comfy with one of my most powerful and often used tools at my disposal, ready to go with all the ppe and gear stacked right there. I'm so bad that i was thinking about making a sawbuck for dicing some firewood, til i just walked over and started using the chain vise i leave setup there instead

I agree that a bandsaw would be ideal @SeanKroll, but i surprisingly don't have one of either type since my crappy harbor freight one died and i got my cold cut chop saw so i don't really miss it much. One of those would also be a good choice if it's handy, just use another wedge so it'll clamp good (also used as the short plate trick when clamping stuff). That thing is amazing btw, mine does up to 4" pipe and it's a game changer around the shop, even use it for cutting the saddles when using pipe to build stuf. It really cuts (cough, get it ) the time consuming prep work of cutting stuff up and prepping the ends when doing saddles way down so you can get welding. I've used the big abrasive ones a bunch too, and would take the cold cut any day.

Yeah i have one of those chainsaw grinding wheel things but i don't think I've ever used it. I have used some pretty unbelievable sanding disks on them, 3m makes a 24 ceramic grit sanding pad that runs on a rubber disk wheel with a built in arbor and it cuts like a laser. One on a 9" can cut steel down it's like it's foam with almost no vibration, one of those would work great until it clogged. I bet you could likely turn something up with rasp bits cut with a chisel or a press, something like that would be ideal i think for grinding in softer materials that will likely clog stuff, but alas I've never seen something like that. You could even get a facemill or annular cutter that's messed up and bore and tap it to fit a grinder, and probably use a 9" so it could turn slow enough, a 9" is around 6000 rpms and a 6" is around 14k rpms i belive, but i don't have a clue what facemills and stuff can take as far as spindle speeds.

 

[SeanKroll]

My old boss at St Parks would use a belt grinder in the back of the shop with the front door open... Holy Hell of a lot of fumes.

 

[flushcut]

Hardhead wedges don’t require as much maintenance as all plastic wedges do.

 

[Burnham]

True dat. Of course, they cost more as well. No free lunch .

 

[CurSedVoyce]

But soooooooo worth it.

 

[Burnham]

No argument here.

 

[davidwyby]

I tried one once and didn't like the vibes.

 

[Kaveman]

Kaveman not could find hard heads. Elusive critter, like snipe bird.

When I do, I inevitably use one inappropriately, resulting in unhappy chain 🙄

 

[SeanKroll]

On the note of them being consumable, they are, and they can have a long, long life with a bit of fast maintenance.

I haven't bought wedges in a long while.

The stacking plates, a la @stig , make lesser numbers of wedges do as much work!

 

[lxskllr]

Every time they popup here, I make a note to keep an eye out for some at the thriftshop, but by the time I get to the shop, I forget about it, and plastic cutting boards aren't something I generally notice. I'm anti plastic for cutting board use, so it doesn't trigger a subconscious alert for me.

 

[Tree09]

I love em, get the biggest that'll fit the dishwasher and you will too, and if no dishwasher get the biggest you wanna wrestle in the sink. More sterile if you do raw meats and stuff, so there's that, a bigger deal for some than others but that's why most commercial kitchens and processors use them. I had such a nice one i carry in the truck for cooking when on the road that the wife made me turn it into a house one I've also seen countertops of it for cleaning fish, even right there on the dock complete with a sink with a pump for running water for rinsing and washing. Most are just sheets of hdpe, so you can use them on projects and stuff too.

 

[lxskllr]

Plastic's less sterile than wood. Bacteria gets in the cuts and grows, while the cuts protect it from being washed. Wood doesn't promote growth, and some woods are actively antimicrobial.

 

[Burnham]

Maybe we should cut up some bamboo cutting boards, use them for stacking.

 

[lxskllr]

I thought of it. I was at the $1.25 store a couple weeks ago, and they had small bamboo boards. I actually did remember the stigs ( :^P ), but didn't buy them cause it's wasteful. I'd rather get a piece of used shitty plastic so I can make something out of nothing, and not create more waste.

 

[CurSedVoyce]

I by from a restaurant store. When you measure out the plates, pending on size, the per unit cost is pretty damn affordable.

 

[davidwyby]

Germs love plastic

 

[flushcut]

So do you anti plastic guys not cook your food or just eat it raw off of the cutting board? Lol