Tom D

Thanks Baz, Robbie is a good friend of mine, he is currently employing one of the guys that I normally use, hence the requirement. I've had a few response of here now and have shuffled the jobs around to give us some breathing space. I'll know later today wether I can bin this cast.

I've got 2 of them, they're great. I also have a 357 which, now its had a new carb is als going well. I love the simple robust design of the 254 though.

I was thinking about this thread today while working in Edinburgh which is a reasonable sized city, I have worked there for the last 8 years. During that time I have not seen let alone worked on a 100 foot tree. Outside the city yes but in town 80-90 foot is the biggest I've seen, and they're pretty rare. Any locals want to disagree? I think its interesting how people, even tree surgeons over estimate the height of trees, when you think that a building like centerpoint tower in london is around 11 feet per story, your 100 foot tree would be at the 9th floor. We all must regularly work allong side buildings, anyone been looking in on the 9th floor or even the eighth? I reckon the 5th or 6th is as high as I've seen in. remember an average 4 bed house is going to be about 30 foot tall anyone regularly go over 3 times higher than one ? Not being deliberately argumentative, just saying go buy a clinometer, you may be surprised.

you can still get this stuff http://www.starchsupplies.co.uk/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=34

Insurance is always going to be an issue in this day and age, most big estates are going to run a mile if you ring up asking if you and 20 mates can climb their trees. However I do have a couple of options which may get round these issues. This is why I've suggested this so early in the year, hopefully we'll have time to organise something pretty good. As for the AA meet any AA member is welcome anyway so this can be an Arbtalk meet and we'll keep it separate. The AA meets have a bit too much emphasis on free labour where as I was thinking of a more casual day out .

Thats what I was thinking.

Very slick Stevie, is that your house next to the contacts info:001_tongue:

This must be totaly devastating to the communities involved. I hope it rains soon, there seems to be no other way to stop the fires. Apparently the flames are four stories high and move at 40mph.

I could get somwhere round here pretty easily too ( eastern Borders ) but since most people are in the central belt I suppose somewhere in the middle would make more sense. We all could post details of potential sites on the group discussion and come to some agreement as to which is best. I'll make some enquiries as to which sites are available and potential accomodation etc.

Just posted this to the Scotland group: "I was thinking that it would be nice to have some sort of get together this year. As these things take time to organise and people are busy I thought I'd raise the issue now. I was thinking of maybe a day climbing somewhere where there are some good trees followed by a few beers. It woud be nice to get together and swap ideas climbing tips and techniques and a few stories so I'll be looking out for a venue and will keep you posted. I was thinking of some time in spring or early summer." Any non group members / non posters / lurckers please join if interested everyone's welcome.

I've not heard that before but my inspector did say that 8mm is the minimum size for prussic cord so "Bail Out" at 7mm is a fail. I suppose there must be a minimum rope size as well.

I find pictures and video really distort the heights of things, sometimes small trees look bigger and vise versa. Like Reg I reckon the pics before and after the top is felled out make 100' seem unlikely so I'd say around 70' for these but only Buzz knows what they really looked like. I sympathise with the drag though, up here a lot of the tenemant flats have to be accesed through the building so you can end up taking stuff like that through peoples houses... Nightmare.

Someone else asked me that the other day, I am starting to wonder is someone has been telling tales. No I didn't, it must have happened after I left. BTW. I left with a colleague and we started up as a partnership so its understandable that a few "rumours" began circulating, like the one that we were sacked.

The guy I used to work for had a 12" bandit on the front of a mog, It had a winch above the infeed, it was better than any tow along that I've seen working with 170Hp going through it it was a real beast. Quite often 30 foot leylandii went through without any cutting, fills the chipbox quick though.

I hurt my arm Skiing Alistair, thanks for your pm's I'll be sorting out the jobs tomorrow and we'll see how the xray goes on wed then I'll let you know how much work there'll be.

Due to my arm being in plaster at the moment I am looking for an extra pair of hands for a while, i will be having another xray next week and if the news is bad will be in plaster for another 4 weeks:sad: I am looking for a climber ideally but not necessarily a lead climber so just cs38 would do, I could try to make the days fit around someones availability to some extent but i will probably need someone for 10 - 20 days work over the next few weeks. There is also the possibility of further subby work in the future. Please Pm if interested. Many thanks Tom

Get well soon mate.

Up here they chuck loads on every year, no ill efects.

Nice video Reg, not seen a speedline in action before. How were the lines tensioned / lowered at the bottom? I'd like to try it sometime. BTW how come you wear gloves all the time, except when its really cold.

In many ways using a topping down strop or a krab on a sling is worse than using a crotch due to the bend radius being so tight. Invest in a pulley even if you dont buy anything else. I think theres nothing wrong with three strand for rigging and its better suited to those dirty jobs and crotch rigging as well as taking wraps round the stem. Once you get a nice braided rope you wont want to use it for those jobs and so will need a friction device as well. I still use three strand when there's only one branch to lower rather than messing around setting up a pulley.

the first one looks like Bjerkandera adusta, not sure about the other one though.

I still have a three strand polyprop lowering line and a topping down strop, and I still do a bit of natural crotch rigging. But there's no way I'm giving up my ropeguide and hitchclimber:001_tongue: