Straight talk is good! That's what I like! Blast away! I do have some pics. I just didn't post them because I figured I had taken up enough bandwidth already. But you asked for it, so here they are, and let the criticism rip. BTW, I did the dirty deed with my John Deere (Efco) CS52, 20" bar.
Here's the cut (click on pics to see larger view):
Hesitation marks. It started to lean, and I backed out, then it stopped moving so I went back in. A bit sloppy, I know. Could have used a bit more bar, perhaps.
Here's a side view of the cut:
As you can see from this, the hinge wood was reasonably strong.
(Please excuse that ugly thing off to the side there.)
And here's a good pic of the stump after the hanging log was removed. I just cut a bit of hinge wood and down it went.
I hope from that you can see how deep my notch was. I make it about 1/4. It worked, but was it optimal? Should I have gone shallower or deeper? I think it was good, but you tell me.
Also, when I made the upper notch cut, I didn't meet cleanly, so I had a dutchman to clean up. I DID clean it up - before AS I wouldn't have known to do that, so thank you all!
Final result: It went where I wanted it, and at no time did I feel anything was unsafe or out of control. I was surprised at how slowly it went down, and it did start sooner than I had expected.
What can I learn here?