Static Line Felling 2X?

[RopeArmour]

Curious to what you call it when you are felling a tree with a rope and and instead of pulling you
hard tie to an anchor so it is fixed length and at an angle and distance from the tree that it direct or more appropriatelly pivots it to the lay?

This would be similar to in crown rigging when you direct the horizontal swing to the left or right from an obstacle to get it to fall in the landing zone.

Aside from that any one tie off a short log and use that as a pseudo-grapple to pull over a tree when
isolating the tip is almost impossible or just to reduce the amount of rope needed or reduce the stretch or to add more rope to the MA pulley system or clear back and away from the fall zone?

What do you all call these techniques?:what:

 

[MasterBlaster]

Uhhhhhhhh...

 

[RopeArmour]

Canuhhhhhkian MB?

 

[gf beranek]

New technique maybe. Or lost in translation.

 

[Burnham]

The first is a restraint line, I think. I dunno about the other two.

 

[CurSedVoyce]

Sounds like using a guy to swing the tree off the lean and into a more desired lay to me. A restraint line as you called it B.

 

[Burnham]

I've only used it to keep a tree from following side lean, but I guess if you were good enough at calculating distances and angles, you could swing it some.

 

[canadiantreeman]

Whooaaa nellly. First one sounds like a guy line...second one I have no clue.

 

[SkwerI]

any one tie off a short log and use that as a pseudo-grapple to pull over a tree

I just saw a picture on the forum last week where somebody had done that. Can't remember who posted it but I thought it was ingenious.

 

[Husabud]

Me too. Carl?

No, Jack. Or maybe not. Damn.

 

[sotc]

I would call the first a guy line. Pseudo grapple? Huh?

 

[pantheraba]

Short log tree puller had to do with keeping a constant pull on the line longer than you can by hand...someone had been using vehicles to provide the pull on the tree and the suspended log/weight took the place of the accelerating vehicle.

 

[RopeArmour]

Ist time I tried this I asked a client Prof. Mathematics at Mc Master U for some help. He declined.
It can be alot of math weight force levers pythagorean theorem.
In the end a scale model was easier with a bit of the math. Ruler, graph/drafting table, some throwline and tape and extra set of hands .
I was able to lay down a 100' pine with a heavy lean, hollow with a crack 8' long to the base and you could see the light of day thru and over a condo with a good landing zone parallel to the condos. I used 2 ropes and 1/2" steel cable as the swing one for a directional pull and the other as back up
It was suppose to be a two crane removal.
It did exactly as predicted. At the end of it all was a big stress headache, a fist full o dollars and season after season of good work on this propery.

The one sqwerl refering to is the balast technique to gain or maintain momentum on a fell? Agreed genius!

 

[Husabud]

This was Jacks post in the felling thread. Sorry i am still working out thebugs with this ipad. I think like post 137 ? Ill get this yet!


We've discussed this before, B, about a trick an old-timer taught me. Sometimes, that is SOMETIMES, you can keep ahead of the acceleration of the tree without a pulling machine by putting a weight in the pull line. And, as you pointed out extreme care must be taken!!! Last winter, in the pic below, I felt I could NOT trust the hinge wood in a failing poplar to a narrow DZ. So, I limbed it up 60'; put in an open face & bore cut; rigged & tensioned a heavy round mid-line; then tripped the back strap. It kept tension in the redirected pull line until the round hit the ground ... went dead to the intended lay.
Again, as you said then, it's not to be taken lightly but it's a useful trick, for special cases, sometimes.

 

[sotc]

Pics or video of this? And the pseudo grapple?

 

[CurSedVoyce]

This one was felled 90 degrees off the favor with a guy and some wedges. I just pretensioned the guy and the wedges did the rest. At about 50 secs you can see the guy go slack. It was anchored just a tad in front of the stump back up in some oaks. Once the tree committed, the hinge took over.
<iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/zAPhM_547r4" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

 

[Husabud]

Stephen is there a day that goes by that you don't see smoke? if I had all the fire you have available here I wouldn't need a chipper.
Nice work.

 

[CurSedVoyce]

Not burning now, they would have my arse But yeah, the chipper gets time off.

 

[RopeArmour]

Thanks gentleman and CurSedVoyce for the vid .

Psuedo grapple is runnin bowline to a log 2'x2' or whatever you think it will take to jam up then pulled back up into the crown where you hope it wedges tight against a crotch
oh the other thing I like about this is the rope is hopefully not pinned under the spar. Hate cutting my rope trying to find it undr a mess of debris

With regard to the static guy/restraint angle can be done with any number of tools more recently I have been using two lengths of polesaws and having my men sight approximately 45 degrees to the top and then take measurements and then apply to the proposed fall with the intended restraint/guy.
Its definitely helps lining things up when you are in the top of the tree and point out the appropriate angle with the appropriate anchor and then confirm again on the ground. Seems to me tensioning this system can be easier at times than applying MA or pulling.

Should start an offical name that technique!
Restraint fell
Guy fell
Pivot fell

Pseudograpple well you could use most anything as long as it can bear a load.
Pseudograpple meaning false grapple.
Cheers

 

[SkwerI]

Willard Holmen uses a guy rope often (or at least he mentions it often). And I think the picture of using a log as a weight to tension a pull rope may have been posted by Jack.

 

[pantheraba]

I just figured it out...it isn't that Stephen is so good...he is just LAZY!! He wanted that tree to land right beside the fire so he wouldn't have to carry it so far.

That was a slick fall...in my bag of "lazy" tricks now.

Thanks.

 

[CurSedVoyce]

Ya got me figured out Gary

 

[SouthSoundTree]

AKA retainer line.

 

[Jack]

This was Jacks post in the felling thread. Sorry i am still working out thebugs with this ipad. I think like post 137 ? Ill get this yet!


We've discussed this before, B, about a trick an old-timer taught me. Sometimes, that is SOMETIMES, you can keep ahead of the acceleration of the tree without a pulling machine by putting a weight in the pull line. And, as you pointed out extreme care must be taken!!! Last winter, in the pic below, I felt I could NOT trust the hinge wood in a failing poplar to a narrow DZ. So, I limbed it up 60'; put in an open face & bore cut; rigged & tensioned a heavy round mid-line; then tripped the back strap. It kept tension in the redirected pull line until the round hit the ground ... went dead to the intended lay.
Again, as you said then, it's not to be taken lightly but it's a useful trick, for special cases, sometimes.

Willard Holmen uses a guy rope often (or at least he mentions it often). And I think the picture of using a log as a weight to tension a pull rope may have been posted by Jack.

Yup -

 

[Jack]

Curious to what you call it when you are felling a tree with a rope and and instead of pulling you
hard tie to an anchor so it is fixed length and at an angle and distance from the tree that it direct or more appropriatelly pivots it to the lay?

...

The first is a restraint line, I think. I dunno about the other two.

Jeff Jepson calls it a "Holding Line" {To Fell A Tree, p93}

I always simplified it to; "Hold Line".