educated arborist

Finding the time & motivation for distance learning is very hard indeed, Resources are far more scarce & you can't just pop into a lecturers office to clarify something. Deff stick it out as long as possible, getting the best grade isn't paramount you may learn even more than the 1st's students who spend all their time forfilling criterior as apposed to furthering their knowledge. From what i've seen of your posts on here you are clearly an inteligent & capable student. Have you spoke to your course tutor about it all? it may be worth making the trip to Myerscough to re-connect with the course & discuss your options face to face. Hope it goes well, Mike

There is i beleive, but don't take my word for it. Its worded something like "being able tho maintain a speed of 30mph on the flat under its own propultion" I'm sure Huck can recall it from memory, we've discussed it before. Huck???

best get demolishing some of our infastructure then lol, wouldn't it be great if all before us new what we know now prehaps we(our race) wouldn't have been so reckless. That said i'm a capitalist through & through & love my fast cars but i do wish that developers & the public were MADE to consider trees a little more

Good post, should be intresting. Dr Mark Johnston said to us "Arboriculturalists are the interface between trees and people" and this is where the debate begins. How should we best balance our ethics? what is best for the client? what is best for the tree? what is best for the local area? what is best for the eco-system? Dr Mark lectured us to great extent on these issues and was an inspiration. Avoiding removal at all costs was certainly something he apposed, its all about striking the best for all balance & to do that is very deep indeed. Rmoval & replacement of more suitable and/or benificial species in a more suitable environment/position is sometimes a better option. Should we chose a species that is polution resistant? should it be deciduous? should it grow fast? shold it grow with an ex-current or de-current form? sould it be RB, BR or CG? how large should it be? how large should it grow?how may it need maintaining?what habitat shall it provide & how quickley?(the list goes on & on & on) We can seldom please all parties but will do our best to try. Increasing urban tree stock is a must The benifits of urban trees are ENDLESS. But doing so involves plantng, pruning, protection, legislation, education, planning, co-ordination and plenty more. It'd be nice to see a concerted effort from a trade body to help with the education & co-ordination of the public part:wink:

Correct. Some1 said that £350k must have been a big accident, How much do you think a life is worth??? (i degress somewhat) but if you drop a tree of a house your insurors are pissed but not too pissed, if you injure a person They are REALY REALY Pissed! Spoke to two brokers that are big in arb insurance & one underwriter. All 3 said: Regardless of whether or not a lack of Loler lead to a 'claim/ Benifit' being paid they would seek to take legal action against the policy holder, as the contract would be void. This legal action would seek to recover the benifit payeed plus costs plus an indemnity. Some1 else asked is not having a Loler inspection Illegal? The Loler Regs were made LAW in december 98 and are black & white. Not using a top handled saw one handed is not only not law but it is not prohibited in any guidence or best practice. Why it is you'd think that i don't know. The thorough examination of arboricultural equipment is required by law to be undertaken every 6months for PPE lifting equipment & every 12months for rigging equipment. That is black & white & can not be argued against. Using a saw one handed in the tree due to poor work positioning is against best practice (AFAG 308 etc) but is not LAW per-say. You would however have a hard job arguing that any resulting accident was faultless as industry guidence clearly forbids it. Loler inspection is not only law but it is a good & fair reflection of the condition of your equipment. When assesing your own equiupment (your pre climb & weekly HLWT inspections) there is a high risk of familurarity by which people see defects slowly progress. There are many defects which only your loler inspector will be able to assess the severity & significance of defects; I often have clients ask "and did that not fail?" having assumed the defect was significant. There is also the opposite for instance the old wire spring on a micro grab was absent (allthough that has now been extensivly covered on AT) or stitching on a harness has unpicked symetrically creating the illusion that it is all there.

next thursday soon enough? will be in the north west loler inspecting thur & friday night Then inspecting Scotland on sat & sun. Call me on my mob if anyones intrested.

can't publisise the docs unfortunately, The formentioned £350k case actually involved a tree surgeon who had under-declared his last years turnover (quite significantly) but it is all the same thing. Insurers will try to recover their losses is their is legal grounds to do so. They are here to make profit not provide a public service. I've worked with a number of insurance compnies & a couple of tree surgeons facing them when loler was not in place. Loler is not only a legal requirement but it is written into your contract that you must comply. The cases i worked with where loler was not in place only involved amounts of £8k & £11k and the firms simply paid the insurers the money There are different types of court orders when persuing money CCJ, BO, AO, LO etc etc and the orders have different restrictions etc. Some allow eviction, some don't some restrict ballifs from seezing 'tools of the trade' some don't but no matter what personal items cannot be seized. Eviction orders are subject to the same sort of conditions as private landlords giving fair notice etc etc. Beleive it or not most people who are subject to these situations tend not to like to publisise it & many go to great lengths to hide it from their competitors, neighbours, friends and even their families. Whatever they did wrong in the past they did not do so milisiously and deserve our discretion & their anninimity if they so wish.

the insureance pays out but then the insurers take you to the cleaners as the contract you took out insists you are compliant with PUWER, WAHR LOLER etc etc. It has hapened to a tree surgeon in the UK and it was not pretty, the type of court oreder the insurers aquire means that you can loose all but the esential clothes & toiletries if you can't afford to pay (in the formentioned case the amount was just over £350,000!!!) you lose chipper, van, car, saws, house & everything in it.(unlike bankrupcy etc where they can't liqudise the tools of the trade etc)

just un-plug it, it won't set it off & then un bolt the airbag unit if you wish. The airbags don't go off if you un-plug them else every1 who ever got a flat battery would have deplayed air-bags wouldn't they. Ive done it on loads of trucks, cars & 4x4's (usually to fit laptops in the space they occupy.)

OK had quite a few jobs like this now. Firstly we should stop talking about 'BT' Openreach have a contract which means they are responsible for all telephone lines, their maintainance, renewal repair etc. They do not prune cyclically or preventativly they will only repair tree related faults as & when they occour. You will find it very hard to talk to openreach directly & if you do they will bill you for their services. Openraches contract is with the government & the retail providers such as BT, Talk Talk, Tiscall etc etc. if a customer has a fault they speak to their retail provider be it BT or talk talk or tiscalli etc to report the fault. The retail provider then speaks to openreach on a top secret phone number and tells them to fix it. so if you are honest about the whole thing then you have to ring openreach & pay them to temporeraly remove the line & re-instate it Or pay them to repair it were you to bring it down. the less honest way round it is to cut the line/ drop a log on it when taking down the tree & tell the customer to ring their retail provider & tell them a tree/ part of the tree fell on the line, the remainder of the tree is dangerous & the tree surgeons are on their way. the third way is for you to ring openreach & tell them that a tree's promt failure is immenent/ a big limb has allready shed & pinned the line & that it is coming down today/ first thing tomorrow morning. & tell them that they should send an engineer out asap else the tree will bring it down. I have succesfully done the latter several times & worked well, engineers were crakin blokes and exagerated the whole situation to their superiors 2 back my story up. Got their personal mob no's now which helps 2. hope it helps

for the final time some comprihensive diagrams of speed line tensioning

your looking at things the wrong way up if that makes sense? on a speed line take the line frop the top of the tree to the bottom end 2 your anchor passing it through a pulley attached to this anchor then back through another one attached to the line by prussic, you are now facing the top of the speedline plling on the line with a 2-1 advantage with a change in direction, add another pulley to the bottom (the anchor) & run the rope through you now have a 3-1 but you are facing the wrong way. add a forth and you have a 3-1 with a change in direction. better still buy a flippin fiddle block and you anchor the fiddle block line at the twin pulley situated at the prussic (top) end and you have 4 pulleys providing a 4-1 & you are facing the rigth way!you are looking at your speedline the wrong way round, the top tree is not your anchor the bottom one is, you are exerting the load in the opposite direction.

lol, it's like being back at school. But i aggree with you (not on the fight bit) it is a 2-1

love the cat but that is only a 2-1 advantage lol PMSL would you like ME to draw a three to one speed line tension rig 4 u???? just teasing. but this IS the point i have very adly tried to make.

should have worded it better & applied it to tensioning speed lines whilst facing the right way. which would require only 4 pulleys but anchoring the rig arse about face. I stand (partially) corrected lol but monkeyeed's rig IS a 2-1 as both my & your diagrams demonstrate expertly!

WRONG!! y dont you think or question what you see presented to you? some of your diagrams are correct, some are wrong. Your diagrams make my point all by their self!! the 3-1 in the above diagram is the EXACT thing we were discussing and is OBV wrong! just look at it, then the 1 on wiki then this one again then the 1 on wiki:thumbup:

corrected scetch, sorry.

ahhh wiki the fountain of all knowledge. Monkeyeds pic is not of a 3-1 set up it is 2-1. on wiki there is a pic of a 3-1 setup which would not typically be used by an arborist as they would be using two twin pulleys & providing they anchor these pulleys at the right end of the fiddle block they shall acheave a 4-1 advamtage. If they anchor it at the wrong end of the rig then they would only acheive a 3-1 but why would you do this??? if you were to only have three single pulleys & have a desire to tension a speedline with your back to it then you could tecknically obtain a 3-1 pull but i have never heard of any1 tensioning a speedline with their back to it. As for my source of diagram I just drew it on word and in all fairness in my haste i jeffed up when drawing them & did draw a 3:1 when i ment to draw a 4-1 and a 4-1 redirected.

hopefully this will not only upload but make it easyer to understand.

why bother replying? who reading this post is to know whats right or wrong? Its v.basic physics but it doesn't matter if you don't understand just carry on making it up & if anyone chalenges you intelectually just shout louder & if that fails, just make fun & call them names instead! Real Mature. If you google physics for dumbies, mechanical advantages i'm sure u'll c what a 2-1 4-1 6-1 & 8-1 advantage is. It has to go in even numbers when using ropes & pulleys, the only way to get an odd advantage is to set up 2 tripple pulleys in a draditional fiddle block rig then set 1 pulley with the rope passing off the fiddle block & onta an anchor then pull on this pulley by its narrow end. I'll draw a picture & scan it in if i get a chance.

don't mean 2 piss on some1's chips but it is not a 3-1 to do this involves at least 7 pulley wheels! it will be a 'true' 2-1 or some people call it a re-directed 2-1. Treevo made this mistake at the A trade fair during a demo & allthough we work with big safety factors in arb i think its advisable to be aware of the forces involved.

christ, would be intresting to try and retro fit cells! and the cost pfhhhh, i expect most people would sooner live with the change in drive level. The cells are a great design when planting but even then can you warrent the cost? they are way too expensive IMO i planted som EEEH standards in a car park last year & the cells worked out 10x more expensive than cellweb.

thin ice, v thin ice. There is a fair amount of conflicting research on this matter, but i post primerily to expand on deans post. 90% of the time reductions result in weak unions. The larger the wound-stem ratio diamiter the weaker the union, the wounds really do have to be miniscule to stregthen the tree & some of the reductions in your photos will have inherent weak points needing cyclical pruning to prevent branch failure.

can be a good method to install a rigging point if your not climbing anywhere near where it needs to be, done it a few times but is a very gear heavy way of installing a friction saver IMO. PS if you rig off this set up then the loading will be up tp quadruple that of the peice being lowered (gulp)