MattyF

When I was at merrist wood as a teenager desperate to get in the industry I failed my climbing nptcs and my felling once , I genuinely felt like I was being made an example of and picked on in front of the rest of my tutor group being the youngest , also I was probably one of the only ones with previous experience and bad habits already , I did have a problem with this.... the tutor glen who was an ex marine and rumoured ex SbS took me to one side after he passed me and said out of the whole year only a very small percentage of people here would go on and make it in the industry and in his view I had what it takes , also in his view I needed bringing down a peg or two and have it drummed in to me the correct and safe way of doing things as if I carried on so cock sure I would probably hurt myself... I walked away from that feeling pissed off but 28 years later after never falling or cutting myself out a tree and having done some trees in situations I don't think many could of done , being able to pass this information on to give a good base to any one I have brought on in to the industry I owe the guy , and so do they !! But I have seen and worked with folk though who in my opinion should have never of been passed ever in the first place... NPTCS have become far to lax.

When have any of us disrespected American veterans? Dear god.... Does remind me of an old boy telling me a story about his wife in the pub years back as she was chewing his ear off. " you know I used to fight the yanks over her when we where courting , wish I'd let them take her" I found out something the other day I thought was relatively interesting another time the America government had our pants down for its benefit before joining in Destroyers-for-bases deal - Wikipedia EN.M.WIKIPEDIA.ORG

There must of been guys doing that.. but of what I'm aware the first serious sit harnesses I remember seeing where troll rock climbing ones.

WTF are you on? We stood alone against the Germans and Russians whilst you where selling them fuel for there panzers and sitting on the fence still, the fact your country still had apartheid for its own citizens until the the mid 60's should tell you how much you regard human life.. to be honest though I'm out, I refuse to argue with some one who thinks tying a large mature tree to a skid steer and making a single cut until it barbers chairs is an acceptable felling solution....... good bye and stay safe [emoji106]

Only idiot is you Daniel , I've watched some truly utter dangerous and stupid videos from yourself over the years. In this country we have a highly regulated , trained and equipment checked industry ,loler, nptc's are required all on all sites, along with the safe practice and guidance inline with current regs .. whilst I might not agree with a lot of it I have always felt it gives a lot of British arbs a an edge and why are death toll is know where near your levels.

No sorry , I have not watched any for years but one popped up one day , some kind of conifer , over a house , fence etc no crane access , the sort of bread and butter of UK felling we get and just wow, every rigged limb getting hung up , no tag lines and for some reason two climbers when the whole job would of gone smoothly in my view if they had one climber on SRT and the other should of been more use on a tag line , that's my opinion though.... none of it would usually appeal to me and I can see why it would to a lot of people , he has an audience and his good at his job and can provide entertainment .

Lay them flat ? Rig ?? I'm not impressed by smashing out big bits of wood ... any one can do that it's not rocket science..: and the one vid I did see of a technical takedown was an absolute shambles ,most of the others are gun Ho ,suicidal,Xgames out of control special Olympics .. I'd take reg coats down to earth and in control any day of the week.

No comment

And the advantage to having them go down brash first ?? Hit the ground and like a spring put the butt through your truck window or neighbours shed

I've had some right weirdos wanting too , I got on well with the last ranger and we had an agreement ... he's been moved on and to be honest I would rather do it myself as I'm always at a loose end when the salmon fishing season is over.. it just meant I didn't do any planting but broadleaves in shelters this year and that was limited as shelters are bloody expensive !

Good luck with that !!! Unless your eating road kill you will starve ! You can't shoot Deere with air rifles and I'm pretty sure bow shooting in the UK is illegal ... you will struggle to find any ground to shoot on and more importantly trying to get any gun licence from your local police force right now is near impossible even if you have very valid reasons , I've been waiting since last august and I am still waiting for a reply.. I've given up planting trees on our 33 acres of Christmas trees as Deere are jumping the fence and eating every thing, forestry commission rangers have been replaced by contractors who have no interest in shooting anything unless they can pull the trigger from there vans.

I'd agree with that stubby , I had a guy tell me I should be running an 8pin on ms460's years back ... it took away every thing that made them good , ie torque in hardwoods so switched back pretty quickly. Ported 560's on a 15" bar with an 8 pin is good fun though.

3/8 as at the time I brought it I was running 560's on 3/8 so converted the 550's to run the same just for ease so they could all run the same 15" bar and chains .... I got rid of the 560's and replaced them with ms400's But the mk2 550's seem alright on 3/8 tbh.

I'd get what is ever the most decent price at the time and what you want Mike , I use husky X cut for my 550's, I had a reel of the Oregon new chisel last year but got a reel of the stihl which I prefer when it ran out , just slightly softer to sharpen... overall I prefer the stihl but they are all good chains..

I would of removed it, your encouraging potential root girdling which could kill the tree in later life or cause large areas of die back , slowing down the roots being able to grow and support the tree itself in the early stages is not good , I see a lot of poorly performing and young dead trees which still have it on and I'm convinced it's caused there decline..

The surveyor will have done a report on any tagged trees and remedial work recommended in category of urgency if it was needed.

Cut it with hedge cutters and do it yearly....

You wanna be careful if your stalling the tractor , I've ripped a pto box apart on my old international because the previous owner of a hi crack had welded the shear pins , It didn't occur to me that's why it was stalling the tractor ......Personally I hate the things but would take one over a hydraulic powered or petrol splitter.

Hmmm they will have gone up a bit but you still won't find anything commercial grade and decent for less. Possibly it could be converted 🤷🏼

Check out AMR range from fuel wood they do a PTO 17t splitter for less than 2k ours has been good for the money although the return springs don't seem to last they can be bodged .. you get what you pay for .. we run it alongside a Posche which is a different league but triple the price.

Having owned over 20 electric carbed saws from all stables over the last ten years I would describe them all as very reliable .. I don't think I've had one problem tbh....

Getting a bit old now but I always rated the Vermeer 252 if you can find one with low hours for a good price it would be worth a shot.

Pines will give you low cover if they have enough space and you have no Deere or livestock on them and you don't formative prune.

Fuel consumption would be one factor.

I used to grease them daily , never had that problem with hl75's so I will stand by what I said say a km 130 has more torque than a two stroke and will kill gearboxes if your using it for cutting instead of trimming... not ideal in our line of work , I had one last two hedge sessions on a 130 and I had a Hl 75 that was 5 years old and still on the original head gear box... I would also make the statement that the 130 is a god awful pile of shit and by stand by that too! Sell it and don't look back.