Cricket Bat Willow Felling

[silvafox]

Anyone harvested bat willows? How do you go about it?

 

Never harvested these before and its a bit of a pig. I'm having to forget about the usual fell techniques and most of the 25 we are downing have a major lean on the go to boot.

 

Any sort of a hinge or attachment is 'guaranteed' to cause unwanted splitting. The buyer only takes the precious first 6' to 20'.

 

I've had some success coming in low at the front, horizontally, no gob. Far enough in to knock in 2 or 3 wedges. Then continue straight out the back. When this works and doesn't trap the saw the timber is safe. No directional influence obviously.

 

However I nearly wrote off an 088 today. I released the powerhead from the bar as the tree was starting to fall! Mega close shave.

 

Once or twice I've opted to fell the top off first. Then craned the remaining stem with the telehandler. This is extra work and its not big bucks urban arb rates but the timber has to be kept sweet as poss.

[Steve Bullman]

never done it myself so i cant comment too much on felling techniques, one thing i can say for sure though is you need to take your depth guages right down on your chains....you'll be able to cut much quicker and that should reduce the splitting.

[nod]

Hi Silvafox

 

How about setting the depth of the hinge using a bore cut so that the tree is not falling whilst your still cuttiing the back of the hinge. I have experienced positive results with this method when felling leaning trees in the past.

 

G'luck

Nod .

[silvafox]

There can be no hinge to set.

[18 stoner]

Sounds to me like you are probably doing the best thing with the wedges silvafox.

 

If you cannot use a hinge of any sort, you aint going to have any directional control anyway, so provided you arent creating a danger from that, accept you might get a few hang ups. better that than tearing out the base.

 

The other thing is, try get more wedges(even a full row, side by side) in behind the saw to stop nipping, especially on bad leaners.

[Quickthorn]

I've got a short article on cricket bat willow. Part of it says..

 

"As the grain in this timber is especially long and the greatest value is nearest the ground, there must be no possibility of there being a split or tear during felling. this means that the tree must be felled with a single cut from front to back using wedges each side to prevent the saw from being trapped. The lack of a hinge to direct the fell necessitates the use of winch ropes, but nothing can be done to prevent the always possible kick back. "

 

That's all it says on felling..

[silvafox]

Thanks for all your feedback guys. I nearly called it a day on this contract when I damaged the 880 trapped in a falling tree (pics coming soon). All your comments are helpful.

 

Your bang on 18 stoner, more wedges the better. The saw traps when its almost out the back and the tree takes an unpredictable lean.

 

I also went back to more recognised felling techniques having realised the danger involved trying to pamper the timber. A very small open notch gob, then as Nod suggested setting the hinge with a boring cut, leaving attached at the back then coming in from the back.

 

Still risky. Hard to judge whatever strategy and I don't want to write off a good saw.

[Quickthorn]

Perhaps try making sapwood cuts into the hinge, so that the hinge is just heartwood. They only use the sapwood, so that might help protect it from splits or tears.

 

I'd be interested to see some pictures..

[RPA]

Just a thought-

1 Put in a horizontal cut (from the gob side) about 30% diam.

2 Cut out a gob (usd would save timber) 20-25% diam.

3 Start a felling cut from the back side 2-3 inch above gob level but only go through 20% so you still have 50% uncut.

4 Put in a wedge on each side where the hinge would normally be

5 Put in one or two HL wedges into your felling cut and **** hell out of them.

6 Go back into your horizontal cut (1) and cut back to 3.

 

The wedges where the hinge would be should stop the front nipping down (you could add more as you go) and the HL wedges at the back should stop the back nipping down. The reason for hitting hell out of the HL wedges is to create a postive force.

When cut 6 overlaps 3 it will give a step cut. If the tree does not fall then the HL wedges could be used as in a normal fell (with your saw out of the way!) with the wedges (4) hopefully acting as a pivot point.

 

Like I said it is just a thought but could be worth trying on something like the final cut of a top down where there is no risk and you could have an experiment.

 

Then again I might be a total :asshole2:

[swe#kipp]

Could this work ??