question about back cuts (Moved from homeowner forum)

[Johny Utah]

When you back cut how important is the height relating to your face cut? If you leave a hinge say 4" tall as apposed to a 2" tall hinge. Sometimes my 2" turns into a 4" by mistake or a sloppy cut. Is this dangerous or does it not really matter as long as you have a hinge that is a proper depth into the tree? My main concern is safety not how good my hinge looks afterwards. Thanks in advance guys.:msp_smile:

 

[GASoline71]

1" to 2" is ideal, and 4" isn't gonn hurt nothin'.

Gonna move this to the Loggin' forum to ask the cats in there. Some guys there have forgot more than I will ever know.

Gary

 

[madhatte]

General rule the USFS teaches fireline fallers in S-212 is about 1" of stump shot per 10" of diameter. If you're cutting conventional faces, it should be pretty hard to get yourself in trouble following that.

 

[slowp]

General rule the USFS teaches fireline fallers in S-212 is about 1" of stump shot per 10" of diameter. If you're cutting conventional faces, it should be pretty hard to get yourself in trouble following that.

That's what the GOL guy said too. Only he used 10%.

 

[forestryworks]

If you're falling trees into the open, no need for a raised back cut, IMO.

Falling through standing timber, a raised back cut is a good safety measure; especially if you know the tree you are falling will brush into another and bounce a second or two before rolling out.

However, you get that backcut too high, it will make some trees harder to wedge over.

 

[Jacob J.]

If you're using the Humboldt undercut, the closing face acts as your stump shot. USFS teaches stump shot on the Humboldt undercut simply because they don't know any better.

 

[bitzer]

Take the time to line up your cuts and you shouldn't have a problem with an 1" or less. I shoot for even. My guess is you are not in any hurry to get the tree on the ground.

I've yet to have a tree come back over the stump because of the hinge height and what the top is pushing through. Now lack of hinge, that might have something to do with it.

 

[RandyMac]

 

[HILLBILLYREDNEC]

It depends on which style of face cut being used. Common 2-3 inches is ok. Humbolt 3-4 inches is ok. The most critical thing is to have a level back cut.

 

[paccity]

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[madhatte]

If you're using the Humboldt undercut, the closing face acts as your stump shot. USFS teaches stump shot on the Humboldt undercut simply because they don't know any better.

I think they do know better; they just don't want to try to teach nuance. It's the difference between "production" fallers and production "fallers".

 

[Billy_Bob]

..."production" fallers and production "fallers".

Talk about nuance, the above is quite a clever little nuance if I might say so!

I read a LOT of books and don't recall seeing quotes being used in that way before. You learn something new everyday!

 

[madhatte]

Thank yez, thank yez. Words are fun!

 

[Jacob J.]

I think they do know better; they just don't want to try to teach nuance. It's the difference between "production" fallers and production "fallers".

Some do, most don't. I spent 7 years in AG, and met maybe three skookum cutters out of hundreds of agency guys. Fortunately the agency put the non-skookum guys where they'll do the least harm- made them managers and specialists.

I met a falling boss once on a fire that had never fell a tree and had never even taken S-212.

 

[madhatte]

I met a falling boss once on a fire that had never fell a tree and had never even taken S-212.

WHAAT? That's WACK, yo.

 

[logging22]

Whats a falling boss?

 

[Jacob J.]

Whats a falling boss?

On the large fires it's a single resource boss-qualified individual that supervises falling teams bringing down the hazard trees.

The purpose of the position in ICS terms (Incident Command System) is to provide a layer of supervision for field workers to mitigate span-of-control issues. A qualified falling boss is supposed to have some knowledge of falling operations and hazard tree size-up so they can provide somewhat educated instruction to falling teams. They also need to be a skookum firefighter type so they can work with fire crews, line officers, etc. to provide for safety in falling operations on the line.

In this instance it was an individual (a timber sale admin) who was good friends with an FMO (fire management officer) who pencil-whipped his qualifications.

 

[logging22]

On the large fires it's a single resource boss-qualified individual that supervises falling teams bringing down the hazard trees.

The purpose of the position in ICS terms (Incident Command System) is to provide a layer of supervision for field workers to mitigate span-of-control issues. A qualified falling boss is supposed to have some knowledge of falling operations and hazard tree size-up so they can provide somewhat educated instruction to falling teams. They also need to be a skookum firefighter type so they can work with fire crews, line officers, etc. to provide for safety in falling operations on the line.

In this instance it was an individual (a timber sale admin) who was good friends with an FMO (fire management officer) who pencil-whipped his qualifications.

Holy hell JJ. Thanks for the info. We dont have anything like that here. Just some part time fire fighters and wanna B's.

 

[madhatte]

How did that not get caught in ICQS? I know guys who have had their taskbooks destroyed because there were too few people's signatures in them.

 

[Jacob J.]

Holy hell JJ. Thanks for the info. We dont have anything like that here. Just some part time fire fighters and wanna B's.

Yeah out here the big fires in tall timber can get pretty complex. Imagine if you will, a 22,000 acre fire in big timber and all of the snags and potential hazard trees have to be felled 500' inside the line and 200' outside the line all the way around the fire. I've seen as many as 16 falling teams in action at once, with 6 or 7 falling bosses. I spent 47 days as a faller on a 116,000 acre fire near Entiat, Wa. in '94. We even did "contour falling" on that fire which is where you fall rows of trees sidehill along the steep slopes to control erosion when the rain and snow comes. I heard later it didn't do a lot of good.