Nick Harrison

Potentially scary situation there, if that had happened in an emergency situation or if you had needed to get yourself out of an exposed position sharpish you could've been in some serious trouble....luckily you weren't. Am thinking bout sending my sj direct to ART and see what they say, agree with you though that this device could perhaps have been built with heavy handed Arbs more in mind? Will be interesting to see how these issues that have been discussed affect any future updates by the manufacturers?

sounds like a plan...have spoken to HB who say they'll post back to ART to get it re-thread, no idea on cost yet tho...if it's a silly amount then may well try your idea...cheers

Talking bout buying shiny things over cake & coffee???..see you there

I got mine from HB too, think I'll give them a call, would be great if ART sorted the thread out....did they charge you at all??...thanks for the heads up by the way

£30 bit easier to swallow than £75....assuming the cheaper option meets the NM needed for the sj?

don't have the manual to hand so can't say what the NM is, judging by how easily i threaded it I shouldn't think it'll be anything too strong? Good point about these types of discussions emerging from greater use of the sj's, i've had a couple of niggles and have only been using it for a few months...firstly had issue with the velcro strap, something I think many others have had too, more recently was varying degrees of creep through the cam but I suspect this was probably down to me not operating the sj properly initially (not using the wooden friction block enough)...this last issue with the grub screw has made me start the question whether a sj should be my main climbing set-up?? thing is though, when the sj is working properly it's a treat to climb with!

had the same thought....might investigate getting a new thread put in there

yep, worked that one out after i'd done the damage...

was in the process of changing the cam over in my Spiderjack 2.1 when I overtightened the grub screw that holds the lever in place...manual recommends a torque setting for securing the grub screw but when I've had this screw out before I've just tightened by hand with no problem (a very small allen key needed to remove this screw and I don't own a torque wrench that operates with such small tools). It seems I was being a bit too heavy handed on this occasion and have now threaded the grub screw so that it no longer bits/stays in position hence the lever cannot be fitted to the main body. I've attached some pics below to try and explain better....wondered if anyone else has had this problem and if so how they've solved it....my fear is i've knackered it and will have to buy a whole new body/spiderjack? or else find a way of getting the screw to bite and thus hold the lever in place...maybe a bigger grub screw?? any thoughts/advice would be much welcomed...

I would def say a Lucombe, leaves look a dead ringer plus it's the area to find one of these trees...i studied at Bicton but can't picture the area you've described....Nobby Clarke is the head Arb lecturer down there, don't know if he floats about on this forum but he must know that place like the back of his hand, if it really eats away at you then i'm due to be down that way in a week or so and can try and look it up for you?

Like the pic, can barely see the ropes and harnesses....

I recently sold up for a family relocation, the finance co where very unhelpful when i asked to cancel the policy. I pay monthly and only had 2 more payments to make but these guys refused to stop the policy, said I had to see it through to the end, not a nice way to treat loyal customers in my opinion, perhaps arbinsure should look to use a different finance co to handle their policies?

i have had a pair for bout a year now, dogs nuts for me....will def buy another pair when these die

best way of tackling these people is to make sure there's fewer buyers around, if i get offered a nice shiny chainsaw cheap i get immediately suspicious, if in doubt i don't buy it, all the guys i know operate on the same principal but obviously someone somewhere is buying these pinched items! never had it happen to me but must be gutting, like previously said, it takes a lot of hard work and effort to build up a small business, hope they get back into business soon...

just catching the tail end of this thread so apologies if my input isn't relevant...i retook the 5837 last october so assume you guys are talking about the same exercise i would have done up in Arley?? putting a car park in an area with three large trees and various smaller ones dotted about? seem to remember one of the big trees was a sycamore, the other 2 were conifers?? i originally failed the 5837 the year before, the most valuable lesson i learnt from that was about time management... i think those of us that have done the tech cert have a good enough brain capacity and knowledge/experience to know what to do in the real world, on this exercise you're seriously handicapped by the time restraint as well as the usual nerves you get under any exam situation. i remember my course instructor telling me to read all the questions first and then think where to begin (sound advise), this time round i looked where the bulk of the marks were allocated and tried to get those bits done first where possible. we all know that this work can be pretty subjective at times, i decided to go with my gut instinct and removed the younger trees to make way for the car park...my thinking was that the 3 big trees, despite the biomechanical issues mentioned earlier, needed to either all remain or all go, primarily because i felt removing just one or two of these trees would open the remaining one(s) up to new exposure which could compromise their stability. i'm not saying this was the best route but i obviously did something right as i managed to pass this time round? as for the drainage question, i completely ignored this, could not understand how to create a drainage system going uphill?? wouldn't mind some enlightenment on that one if anyone knows? we all usually have different opinions and approaches to tree work, often two opposing opinions can both be right. i think the main thing to keep in mind next time round is that you need to treat this module like a driving test, do what you've got to do to tick the boxes to pass the module. once you're out there doing the job you're not against the clock and you can usually discuss ideas and options through with developers/consultants which isn't a luxury afforded on exam day. hope all the above has some use to those that missed out this time round, i know loads of blokes that messed up on this one, so i think it's clear it's not an indication of incompetence but just the usual exam problems, delivering the goods under a lot of pressure in not a necessarily realistic situation. is a shame that abc can't organise getting a May retake established again, waiting a whole year seems a bit unfair to me! i know i felt completely out of synch, had to trawl all the books and folders out to refresh memory...good luck to those retaking next october, at least time you'll have some idea of what's coming!

the office is in southampton so assume course is either there or around nearby?

think i'll go for it, for anyone else interested dale valley are running a course in april and land skills training have got one in march, cheers

Did the tech cert couple of years ago but not had much opportunity to get surveying experience, still clambering about trees with a saw....wondering if this course might be out of my reach considering lack of surveying and report writing? any advice much appreciated??

bearing in mind the proximity of sheds/houses etc i think i'll have to deliver the bad news to the lady, thanks guys for the feed back, much appreciated

Looked at a customers mature silver birch tree yesterday that has a small patch of K.duesta near base of the tree and a couple of G.applanatums bit higher up the main stem. This years growth on the ganoderma is markedly less than previous years, am i right in thinking this is a sign that the tree has less healthy wood available for the fungus to feed off thus internally the tree could be deteriorating? main stem looks to be bulging in the general area of the brackets also which is a bit worrying. Also not sure how worried to be about the K.Duesta, haven't seen this on a Birch before, appears to be the only bit of this fungus, is still fairly small, about 4 inches across? customer reckons this is first time she's seen it but i obviously can't be sure it wasn't there previously. Above all these fungal fruiting bodies is a wound from a major limb tearing off in the past, are these fungus related to this old wound? rest of the tree doesn't look amazing, numerous areas of epicormic growth yet foliage appears to be at the same stage of defoliation as a nearby healthy birch of about same age. havent had a climb in so not sure how stem/leaf growth is. Customer loves the tree and really doesnt want to see it go but target around the tree is a bit dodgy, shed directly beneath and customers house within easy reach if tree failed completely, prevailing winds would push it in that direction. is on boundary with a neighbour so potential there to also damage their property. any suggestions would be appreciated, don't want to send her down the path of decay detection etc as she hasnt got loads of money, cheers

Cheers, think I will give them a go.

got my renewal for PL plus my tools & chipper and arbinsure are about £250 cheaper than trust....the old saying goes if something is cheap there's usually a reason? anyone had dealings with arbinsure or heard good/bad feedback??

Thanks for that, will try out in the morning

Am having trouble with my stihl 200t lately, has not been running great for a little while and not had time to get it on work bench or put it into local workshop, had a frustrating half hour today tryin to remedy the issue in the p***ing rain and lost concentration/patience, now lost where all 3 screws were to start with and the saw is now hard to start. Been checking the plug to make sure not running lean as don't want to knacker the machine. Has anYone got advice on where to start re-tuning it? Have got the manual but it doesn't really go into much detail. Was thinking about buying a tachometer tomorrow to help work it out, anyone know if these can be used on the ms200t?? Any help much appreciated.