Too much for wedges and rope?

[MOD]

I have a handful of trees to take out on an empty lot I'm getting ready to build on. Most are pretty manageable, but the largest pine (24") has me wondering if a rope puller and felling wedges will be enough to get it over properly. The trunk is ~15' from an overhead utility line and most all of the branch weight will be working against me.

Here's the up-trunk shot:



The trees obstructing the fall will be gone by the time this one drops. As you can see, all the branches are on the wrong side of the tree, even though the trunk starts out leaning in the right direction.

An here's a shot from back a bit:



Mostly I'm concerned because I don't have a lot of experience with these tall southern pines. I've dropped a lot of maples and oaks with wedges and occasionally a rope, but this will be new. The trunk sounds solid and there's no evidence of bugs in this tree. I have a rope puller from wespur and 200' of good 1/2" rope, along with 4 or 5 wedges of various sizes. I figure I'll get the top moving with the rope and back it up with wedges as soon as I can, going slowly with a second person on the rope puller. This all seems do-able as long as the hinge holds up. So I'm wondering - How good are these southern pines at holding a hinge during wedging? Anybody think the back weight will be too much for it?

 

[sac-climber]

Set up a 3:1 with progress capture and you should have no issue. Open face notch with a big hinge.

 

[woodchuck357]

Get a rope in the top third, about where the crooked limb is, and it will be an easy pull. Get the others down first and you will see just how much better they hinge than the hardwoods you are used to.

 

[Robin Wood]

If you can spur climb them its better to remove the limbs thats against the desired felling direction, if you have pickup winch and snatch blocks it would be much easier IMO.

 

[MasterBlaster]

If you're using a 3/4" line with a big bobcat pulling, there should be no problem. Less than that and I'd be worried. In that case I'd hire a climber to take those back limbs off.

 

[TheJollyLogger]

You'll be fine. Those pines have great holding wood. It'll crank right on over.

 

[MOD]

Interesting mix of responses. I was thinking the weak point isn't so much the rope but the rope puller/come along. I have the continuous puller from this page:

http://www.wesspur.com/pullers/rope-cable-pullers.html

which says 1500 lb capacity 10:1. The rope itself and everything else is several times that.

I'd love to get the branches off the back side, but I have no spurs and care would need to be taken to keep them from landing on the power lines. So I'd probably have to hire a climber to rope them down, which might be the best option.

Thanks folks.

 

[TheJollyLogger]

Keep in mind that's 1500 lbs of force. Applied 40' up that's a lot of leverage. All you are doing is shifting the center of gravity.Your call, but that's an easy tree.

 

[Zale]

The weak point in this system is the guy trying to drop this tree around utility lines. If you are not 100% confident you can do this, then don't. Dropping a tree on the lines and blowing the transformer makes for a great fireworks show. Know your limitations and hire a professional to remove this tree.

 

[Griff93]

I've pulled trees of this size over and depending on the size and amount of back lean 1500 lbs of pull force isn't going to be nearly enough. I've stalled my puller rated at 8K lbs before trying to do this. Keep in mind all of the weight of the wood hanging over the back of the hinge point will have to be pulled upright and over the pivot point. Having a good 3:1 would get you up to 4500 lbs of pull force. Having the rope in the top 1/3 of the tree does make a huge difference. A transformer costs over $2K in this area.

 

[ArtB]

amount of back lean 1500 lbs of pull force isn't going to be nearly enough

Good point, +1. OP mentioned that he is clearing to build. If OP drops the pine with a CS, how is he going to get the stumps out? Takes a pretty good sized machine to root out a 24" pine. If OP is going to have a BIG track hoe on site to dig his foundation hole, that would work. Developers here often have a couple of 20T track hoes on site for even 5 acres, have even seen a D10 an a 2 acre site (classic case of overkill)

Pulling the whole tree over with wire rope (don't even think bout andy kind of regular rope) get the stump out of the ground where a small dozer (small is < 8 tons) can move it to slash/burn pile. Dozer blade high for anything under about 9".

Once cleared 500 ft by 60 ft of DFir most of which were about 24" with an old D2 cat (5 tons). Generally backed up to tree, set a 20 ft ladder on top of FOPS, hooked on 5/8" choker about 30 ft up, and pulled them over. Anything over 24" often had to put a snatch block on the choker to get about 10 tons of pulling force = 600,000 ft-#!! Thus, I'd guess at 40 ft up you will need up to 15,000 pound pull, OP's little rope puller is not sufficient. Of course, depends on soil type, etc. for how hard it is to pull over tree at any given location.

Have pulled up to 48" DBH - 70 foot up attach point of looped (doubled) 5/8" wire rope, double blocks (4:1), and final pull via 10,000# winch on 3/8" wire rope with winch vehicle chained to a 4 ft dia stump. 2.8 MILLION foot pounds, and the winch was almost at stall.

 

[yarightdawg]

amount of back lean 1500 lbs of pull force isn't going to be nearly enough

Good point, +1. OP mentioned that he is clearing to build. If OP drops the pine with a CS, how is he going to get the stumps out? Takes a pretty good sized machine to root out a 24" pine. If OP is going to have a BIG track hoe on site to dig his foundation hole, that would work. Developers here often have a couple of 20T track hoes on site for even 5 acres, have even seen a D10 an a 2 acre site (classic case of overkill)

Pulling the whole tree over with wire rope (don't even think bout andy kind of regular rope) get the stump out of the ground where a small dozer (small is < 8 tons) can move it to slash/burn pile. Dozer blade high for anything under about 9".

Once cleared 500 ft by 60 ft of DFir most of which were about 24" with an old D2 cat (5 tons). Generally backed up to tree, set a 20 ft ladder on top of FOPS, hooked on 5/8" choker about 30 ft up, and pulled them over. Anything over 24" often had to put a snatch block on the choker to get about 10 tons of pulling force = 600,000 ft-#!! Thus, I'd guess at 40 ft up you will need up to 15,000 pound pull, OP's little rope puller is not sufficient. Of course, depends on soil type, etc. for how hard it is to pull over tree at any given location.

Have pulled up to 48" DBH - 70 foot up attach point of looped (doubled) 5/8" wire rope, double blocks (4:1), and final pull via 10,000# winch on 3/8" wire rope with winch vehicle chained to a 4 ft dia stump. 2.8 MILLION foot pounds, and the winch was almost at stall.

nylon is stronger and safer then steel

 

[woodchuck357]

Having dropped thousands of trees like this one, I can tell you a good nylon rope placed in the top third, tied off and pre tensioned with a small truck or even a truckers hitch attached to a tree or a stump so that the angle formed by the rope and the ground is around 30 degrees coupled with a wide (90 degree) and deep notch (50% of the trees diameter) will be plenty to overcome the limb weight. There is not enough lean in that tree to worry about. If the pretension doesn't bring it over by it's self one person pulling sideways on the rope will finish the job. With those trees a inch and a half of hinge is plenty to keep it attached all the way to the ground.
Taking the other trees down will give him enough experience with the way pines fall. After the trees are cut then grind the stumps.
If pulling the trees, stump and all, is desired putting a 5/8 cable 30 feet up then dig the roots on all sides except the way you want it to go with a backhoe a small cat or large tractor can pull them over. Placing a good sized short log close to the trunk will lever the roots on the pulling side right out when the tree goes over.

 

[woodchuck357]

Having dropped thousands of trees like those, I can tell you a good nylon rope placed 2/3 of the way up the tree and pretensioned with a pickup or even a trucker's hitch http://www.arboristsite.com/community/threads/strange-midline-knot-for-pulling.247011/ will overcome the weight of the limbs. There isn't enough lean in that tree to worry about. A wide( 90 degree) deep (50 percent of the diameter) notch, to under cut the center of gravity, will likely let the pretension pull the tree alone. If it doesn't one man pulling sideways on the rope will. An inch and a half hinge will be plenty to guide the tree to the ground. If quite a bit of tension is put on the rope the tree will fall more in the direction of the pull rather than the direction of the notch. Experience gained by falling the other trees first will be enough to learn how these southern pines are to cut. The OP is not an inexperienced faller, just new to these trees.
If the aim is to pull the trees, roots and all, put a 5/8 cable 30 feet or so up the trunk then dig the roots on all sides except the side of the intended fall, with a backhoe, then a small cat or large tractor can pull them over. A short fat log laying next to the trunk on the fall side will lever the rest of the roots out.
Sorry about the double post, after finding the link to the trucker's hitch thread the original one had not appeared so I thought I had messed it up.

 

[yarightdawg]

They use wedges to fell ginormous trees on West coast

In an open field wedges + pull line
There shouldn't be a tree you can't pull over. ...unless there was serious compromise to wood , decay.

 

[HuskStihl]

Will the power company move the lines while you work? Is that a street or private drive behind the lines? The belly lean is more important in pine as they don't have as much limb weight, and as jolly said, the hinge wood is great on theses yellow/loblolly pines. This will sound terrible, but that looks like an easy tree to wedge over with a rope for insurance. Good luck if you haven't already done it

 

[hseII]

Will the power company move the lines while you work? Is that a street or private drive behind the lines? The belly lean is more important in pine as they don't have as much limb weight, and as jolly said, the hinge wood is great on theses yellow/loblolly pines. This will sound terrible, but that looks like an easy tree to wedge over with a rope for insurance. Good luck if you haven't already done it

Get all your gear ready
Call the Power Company, and tell them you've got a bad tree that's coming down and you sure would hate for the limbs to get tangled up in the lines; is there anything they can do?

It works here

 

[isaacvent]

Interesting mix of responses. I was thinking the weak point isn't so much the rope but the rope puller/come along. I have the continuous puller from this page:

http://www.wesspur.com/pullers/rope-cable-pullers.html

which says 1500 lb capacity 10:1. The rope itself and everything else is several times that.

I'd love to get the branches off the back side, but I have no spurs and care would need to be taken to keep them from landing on the power lines. So I'd probably have to hire a climber to rope them down, which might be the best option.

Thanks folks.

I have a couple of these power pullers. They work great! As stated, get the rope as high as you can up the trunk. Put tension on it. Make your face cut, then hit the back cut. If you put as much tension as you can with that puller before you start your back cut you won't need wedges. It will go right over. I have pulled some huge trees leaning the wrong way with my pullers. In most cases I like it more then a truck because a truck has the power to break the tree/rope. The puller definitely won't break that rope if it's in good shape.

 

[yarightdawg]

I have a couple of these power pullers. They work great! As stated, get the rope as high as you can up the trunk. Put tension on it. Make your face cut, then hit the back cut. If you put as much tension as you can with that puller before you start your back cut you won't need wedges. It will go right over. I have pulled some huge trees leaning the wrong way with my pullers. In most cases I like it more then a truck because a truck has the power to break the tree/rope. The puller definitely won't break that rope if it's in good shape.

They wedge over giant trees on West coast

 

[isaacvent]

They wedge over giant trees on West coast

yes, but we aren't talking about felling a tree in the woods. We're talking about felling a tree in a particular direction with a back lean. There are back leans that wedges can not overcome. Ropes will pull them over without a problem however.