felling cuts

[skyhuck]

No Dave, i dont see it that way.

 

Say, if felling a back leaner of 4 feet wide at the felling cut you set a gob 1/2 way into the stem instead of say 1/4 of the way in, you will have increased the leverage required by 1/3.

.

 

How so???????

[Andy Collins]

If you have the hinge in the first 1/4-1/3rd of the tree, the wedge/lever will have to go in further to lift and move the tree forward. The closer the hinge to the centre of the tree, the closer the wedge will be to the fulcrum, therefore you will gain more lift from wedge. Another advantage of the hinge being placed closer to the centre is the hinge is closest to the widest part of the tree, so should be stronger.

Edited February 13, 2010 by Andy Collins

[woodfaller]

I personally would go for a smaller more conventional gob on a back leaning tree , nearer to the heart you cut then more control you are giving to the back weight i m o.

[skyhuck]

I personally would go for a smaller more conventional gob on a back leaning tree , nearer to the heart you cut then more control you are giving to the back weight i m o.

 

I would say the opposite is true.

 

If a tree is a heavy back leaner (with most of the crow behind the hinge) I would want a high pulling line rather than wedges.

[woodfaller]

Then i must have been doing it wrong for an awful lot of years, thing is i am and always have been a production faller, and t b h would have got thrown off the job for taking half the tree in gob in prime butts.

[Andy Collins]

It may be cheating here, but if I was in doubt over a backleaner, I'd be putting in a pull-line to assist anyway, get the back weight off first, and do everything to ensure it would go where intended (maybe!!), and in a woodland environment you are certainly more spoiled for choice than in a domestic garden.

[skyhuck]

Then i must have been doing it wrong for an awful lot of years, thing is i am and always have been a production faller, and t b h would have got thrown off the job for taking half the tree in gob in prime butts.

 

If you read my earlier post I stated that small gobs were about saving timber, not safety.

 

We a discussing felling to get the tree down here, not to produce timber.

[Andy Collins]

Then i must have been doing it wrong for an awful lot of years, thing is i am and always have been a production faller, and t b h would have got thrown off the job for taking half the tree in gob in prime butts.

 

This has been a discussion I've had with pro-fallers in the past. In arb, many of us waste good wood (timber) with our gobs, many rarely even dress out the timber neatly. Our priority, (in arb) is to get said tree down in Mrs Smiths garden with the minimal amount of damage to ground and property, and perhaps the attention to felling techniques takes a back seat to successful removal. Having been in the woods on larch for timber for a couple of weeks, I've had to go back to basics and practice my techniques to get the best from the timber. Good fun, and hard work.

[josharb87]

i agree with huck, IMO on big diameters, a deeper set hinge assists felling as center of gravity, although in the same place, the COG is nearer the hinge, therefore requires less wedging to move the COG past the hinge, into the gob, and down she goes

[woodfaller]

I hear what youre saying about the garden situation , but the boundary trees in woodland situations poses similar situations .