The 'beginning of the beginning'

[turnkey4099]

The "End of the Beginning" (apologies to Sir Winston Churchill).

Out today to fall another one. Not to be. Fairly good breeze going and every tree clear for falling would call for pitching brush into the wind. That never works.

Turned to on clearing the sucker brush and general clearance. 3 1/2 hours of using only the MS210 to cut things no more than a few inches through and had it all cleared out. Able to walk through it now and unobstructed vision. Still climbing over logs though.

Those trees at DBH are huge. I don't think any one of the 5 is much under 24". Also a couple real problems.

Two stems remaining of an original 3 stemmer. Each of those is a tree in itself. That catface goes way back to near the center of the one stem and looks a bit rotten. I suspect there will be no "holding wood" to amount to anything. Leans away from teh catface though so I should be able to get a good undercut. It may "go" almost as soon as I start the backcut.

The other stem looks solid and shouldn't be a problem.

One stem of original 2 stemmer. Cat face is about 1/2 the depth. Tree has a drastic lean about 30 degrees away from the catface. Gonna be ticklish putting an undercut in there.

Did pick up another 'found rick' of rounds - pays for the gas. Left another small rick as I was too tired at the end to boost it over some obstructions.

That is it for the next 4 or 5 days. No way am I going out there in hi 80s/low 90s temps. Besides this old body can use a good rest after humping wood 4 of the last 5 days.

Harry K

 

[turnkey4099]

Weather now 'reasonable' Not supposed to reach 80 today so I went out to "do" another tree. Wind in my favor for stacking brush.

That was the second 'cat face' tree. "ticklish" was a gross understatement. It was downright 'pants filling'. Bad lean to the directly to the left so the cat face void was not in my favor. DBH right at 24"

Chopped away some of the splintered trash from the 'face', undercut about 1/3 depth of stem. Began back cut and just as bar was buried, stem started a barberchair! Jumped back but the barber chair stopped after a crack opened aobut an inch.

Now what? I can't leave a widow maker like that. Back and cut some more? Bend down and kiss a$$ goodby first? Finally, after waiting for developments 5 minutes decided best was to "Gun it as fast as I could cut and pray". Worked. The barber chair held. Next time I will puill my head out of the nether regions. In that 5 minutes, not once did I think to throw a chain around the thing.

Anyhow. 4 hours later, load made, 90% of brush gone, 13' of the butt log still to be done.

Figure to finish it up tomorrow then cable up so I can 'pull' a tree up in the junkyard that leans slightly toward the power line. May do both remaining ones, time permitting. Just put them down and work them up later.

Harry K

 

[Marc]

Barber chairs suck, especially when you see them happen in slow motion and there's nothing you can do. Only happened to me a couple times and both were lessons. I chain heavy leaners now and if it's a species prone to splitting cleanly (red oak has always been worst in that regard for me) I usually do a bore and holding strap.

Is locust normally prone to chairing? I've never cut that species, there isn't any around here.

 

[turnkey4099]

Barber chairs suck, especially when you see them happen in slow motion and there's nothing you can do. Only happened to me a couple times and both were lessons. I chain heavy leaners now and if it's a species prone to splitting cleanly (red oak has always been worst in that regard for me) I usually do a bore and holding strap.

Is locust normally prone to chairing? I've never cut that species, there isn't any around here.

This was the first one I ran into but the problem was caused by faults. B. Locust of this size usually has voids, cracks and fused 'stems' near the ground. I examined my stump today and for the life of me I can't see what stopped the 'chair. When Icut the last round off the butt, that section just fell off - the crack extened throught the first 4' of the log.

I still don't know why I didn't chain it. When cutting leaning Willow, I always chain them. They are very prone to 'chairing.

Harry K