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treeclimber101 said:
My father does demolition and drainage work and he had me clearing out a retention basin to replace and the inlet , and on the top of the slope was a monstrous ash , behind that was a 12 ft fence which backed up to the cherry hill mall , I set a 3/4 rope with the bucket to rip it over into the center of the basin , well when I started the backcut it leaned back on the saw well my father had the excavator about 120 ft away and was pulling so hard there was water squeezing outta the rope , I started cutting again and before I could get the backcut done the entire root plate gave way like a 20 ft root plate and it all went down into the basin , I have never seen a rope have the moisture squeezed out like a dishrag quite a scary experience for sure . But I knew the machine wasn't gonna give up they can curl almost 30 tons , the rope on the other hand may have blown out and now I always likewise run 2 at all times , or 2 part it .
Click to expand...

good story but BAD MOVE... don't take it as a personal criticism Ed, you know how much I care for ya ;)

pulling back leaners takes some finesse... pretension the line to keep the piece from setting back... UNTIL THE BACK CUT IS FINISHED and the hinge is set... Pull too early and you can BBchair, break the top or LIFT THE ROOT PLATE. Any one of them can kill ya.. ... the latter is a first... amazing the trunk and top held... musta been mighty wet ground..
 
It was a complete and total cluster#### from the start , I had to reach over parked cars to set a rope , then asking my dad to pull gently , and when I saw the ground pumping and breaking loose I was half tempted to start writing down license plates so I didn't have to fumble through the carnage to get them after the tree came down on them , I was just gonna walk into the mall and tell the front desk to say the owners of these cars need to find another way home , I have always been considerate like that ! I swear my dad was sent running that machine like a man possesed that day . Hindsight I shoulda just hooked up chains and let the OL man just uproot it and saved the gas I burnt in the saw and the puckered ass !
 
treeclimber101 said:
It was a complete and total cluster#### from the start , I had to reach over parked cars to set a rope , then asking my dad to pull gently , and when I saw the ground pumping and breaking loose I was half tempted to start writing down license plates so I didn't have to fumble through the carnage to get them after the tree came down on them , I was just gonna walk into the mall and tell the front desk to say the owners of these cars need to find another way home , I have always been considerate like that ! I swear my dad was sent running that machine like a man possesed that day . Hindsight I shoulda just hooked up chains and let the OL man just uproot it and saved the gas I burnt in the saw and the puckered ass !
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Har har Lol thats why on my winch I merely pull until i see the top shaking a bit then back cut until a good hinge is left then carefully walk out and around to the truck and start it and bring home the mail:) If Its back leaning severely I will have helper advance slack on the 3/4 line set up on big porty just in case cable snapped! However I have a good idea when the cable is about at limit as the bucket will start skidding across the dirt :hmm3grin2orange: To skid 23k on a tree just pulling it over has not occurred even the 60 inch dbh respond well to my winch I've found!
 
murphy4trees said:
I had a similar thing happen some 15-20 years ago.. I had preset two lines and was planning on using manpower @ 3:1 MA on each line... BIG MONSTER OAK...... Just two of us and that tree was going NOWHERE!!!.... Fortunately there was a construction crew working across the street and with 4 more men, we could ratchet it back, going back and forth from one line to the other and finally got it over.. God provides!.. it would have been a bad situation without the extra help... pretty good deal for beer money!

Ever since then I, I ALWAYS SET TWO LINES in a heavy backleaner, unless its so big, it need three!... Yesterday we were up on Valley Forge mountain, monster chestnut oak in a hard to reach location... Was able to get the bucket truck off the neighbor's drive and with the 75' altec maxed out, was still looking up at 40'+ of top... multiple leads.. NO WAY to lower... Pull line up the hill to customers drive, skid loader had no problem pulling the first few leads... NOTE:... I set the pull line with a 12' pole saw and then would drop down some for the cut so the line had decent leverage...

anywho.. the last lead was leaning back 15-20 degrees with a lot of big limbs coming straight back.. NFW was I gonna put just the little skid loader on that... skid loader just anchored the first line, with a nice bit of pre-tension which move the top a good bit... real pull was done with the dodge 250 cummins diesel in low range... OH YA! plenty of power... EVEN then I wouldn't have tried it, unless the piece had some side lean away from the bucket.. just not worth taking a even a 1% chance when your life is 75 up.. and you CANNOT TRUST the hinge on chestnut oak..

Piece came down perfectly.... I love it when I can hear my heart beat out loud after those kinda trees hit the ground!

Moral of the story... have make SURE you have plenty of power available for pulling back-leaners...
Click to expand...

Yup most times my bucket is in that same scenario, of course 60 footer so yours would be better but its funny how people think if you have a bucket trees are never a problem. They many times ask why did you climb out of the bucket and I always explain rigging 50 foot of top without a huge crane is looking to die lol.
Many still don't understand but they say oh yeah like they know what your saying :rolleyes: If there is room to bomb the top ok but usually there is not.
 
ropensaddle said:
Har har Lol thats why on my winch I merely pull until i see the top shaking a bit then back cut until a good hinge is left then carefully walk out and around to the truck and start it and bring home the mail:) If Its back leaning severely I will have helper advance slack on the 3/4 line set up on big porty just in case cable snapped! However I have a good idea when the cable is about at limit as the bucket will start skidding across the dirt :hmm3grin2orange: To skid 23k on a tree just pulling it over has not occurred even the 60 inch dbh respond well to my winch I've found!
Click to expand...

You making me drool a bit over that winch rope.... The chipper winch will drift, so it can't be trusted at all on backleaners, even with a man at the wheel.. Wheels are turning about how to get a winch on my bucket truck.. it has a little room weight wise...
 
murphy4trees said:
good story but BAD MOVE... don't take it as a personal criticism Ed, you know how much I care for ya ;)

pulling back leaners takes some finesse... pretension the line to keep the piece from setting back... UNTIL THE BACK CUT IS FINISHED and the hinge is set... Pull too early and you can BBchair, break the top or LIFT THE ROOT PLATE. Any one of them can kill ya.. ... the latter is a first... amazing the trunk and top held... musta been mighty wet ground..
Click to expand...

Murph, forgot to mention bore cut heavy back leaners as well!:msp_sleep:
 
Murph I was extremely impressed with the farmi winch paul has on his tractor , that thing pulls crazy hard ! I mean maybe they have one for a ASV , fecon makes one for a bobcat that goes on the back , and swings away to open the engine door . He was ripping trees outta a ravine whole and bound and all twisted in #### ! And if it didn't clear whatever it was fouled on came too !
 
If I do get a winch its going on the bucket truck... I like a 30K lb anchor anchor.. not 6K.. Especially if I get more into subcontracting... my best guy just pulled early on one of thoe chestnut tops and nearly BBchaired the 12" top... pissed me off.. i trust my life to that man all the time and get this in return????
 
murphy4trees said:
If I do get a winch its going on the bucket truck... I like a 30K lb anchor anchor.. not 6K.. Especially if I get more into subcontracting... my best guy just pulled early on one of thoe chestnut tops and nearly BBchaired the 12" top... pissed me off.. i trust my life to that man all the time and get this in return????
Click to expand...

Get rid of him there's a nice "pool" of help floating around maybe you'll make a good catch
 
ya maybe., but the point is if that can happen with someone I trust, what would it be like working with a bunch of yahoos... the winch could be trusted when the throttle or gas pedal couldn't
 
I dont like the rope to high on big trees,thats 17 ton breaking strain poly prop doubled up to a herc alloy chain/shackles.

This was an easy one only a house to the side of it and tree was limby but fairly evenly weighted,gets the job done fast.

It will get crazy/backleaning stuff where ever you want with the right operators in the excavator and saw.View attachment 258350

http://www.facebook.com/#!/photo.php?v=4458566146633
 
Last edited:
Nice work Lopa,
No fooling around there bro..

guess you gotta pick your weapon, big force on low pull line, or medium force on high pull line. I don't have a 34,000 lb rope nor, the hardware to go with it, so I like to go high... the only two real advantages I can see in that is that you can see the top starting to move with a high line, so its easier to judge the amount of pre-tensioning necessary, and also you can check the tauntness of the rope by hand and get a good feel for how much pressure is on the line.. for backleaners I like to keep a hand on the rope for feel, as I watch the tree for movement..

A buddy of mine that primarily runs a log truck was hired to fall a bunch of big oaks by a hospital.. he asked me to look at them with him... They were ig but straight with good balance to the tops, no side weight. I told him it was a drive by, no -brainer easy falls... Told him to shoot a pull line in the tops and pull with a pick up from the parking lot.. he wanted to set a 50,000 lb skidder cable from the bucket truck and pull with the skidder... I wasn't gonna argue too hard, but warned him that he could get in trouble with all that pull and it certainly wasn't needed with those straight trees..

Sure enough, he bbchaired one, told the skid operator to just tighten it up a little, but the guy just laid on it... Moral of the story... if you got that much power, keep it low on the tree...
 
258350d1350816710-002-jpg
 
Just checked the last bit of video we shot last week... It was a 26" diameter horizontal Norway Maple limb, over 40' to the dripline...

made the cut in 23 seconds.... that limb was as big as a tree....
 
murphy4trees said:
If I do get a winch its going on the bucket truck... I like a 30K lb anchor anchor.. not 6K.. Especially if I get more into subcontracting... my best guy just pulled early on one of thoe chestnut tops and nearly BBchaired the 12" top... pissed me off.. i trust my life to that man all the time and get this in return????
Click to expand...

I have a 5/8 cable winch mounted to the back of the 17 K pound winch truck. It will pull the rig with the outriggers down.

I have another 1/2 inch cable winch on the front to help anchor. You still have to be careful pulling, as things can move. I use this to pull out trees, rootball and all. Works fair. It is actually a bit slow to pull a tree over while cutting.

I used to have a 1/2 inch cable in the rear, broke it twice before I upgraded.
 

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