Billhook

Because I can see that I am never going to convince many of you that just to have an unattached fast rope option is a good idea, perhaps it would be more interesting to have another Arbtalk survey. Fast rope down from 50 foot Who would you be prepared to do this for on a promise? Monica for me, it is hard to believe that she is fifty years old (youngster compared to me!) but has matured like a fine red wine. Just think, all that experience!

Monica Bellucci Color by marinameira on DeviantArt

A dozen possible reasons for needing the fast rope technique. 1. A gang of yobs tie up your groundie and start to have some fun with the controls. 2. A gang of yobs start hooning their cars around where you are set up, lose control and crash into a leg 3. There is a mechanical failure which causes the machine to topple but leaves enough time to grab the rope 4. There is a failure of the ground under one of the legs, perhaps an old manhole with a rusty lid then covered with tarmac but not apparent when setting up. 5. An electric cable which was well clear of where you are working is brought down and over by a vehicle running into it and the cable falls across the MEWP making it live. 6. A drunk driver ignores all the barriers and crashes into a leg 7. A stolen car chased by the police rams a leg. 8. A light aircraft with engine failure chooses to land in your vicinity and crashes into a leg. 9. A deadly poisonous snake had found its way into the box section overnight and suddenly appears in your basket. 10. The acetylene gas bottle you were using to do some cutting suddenly has a blow back and safety valve failure and starts to heat up. 11. The can of paint thinner tips over and there is a spark and the whole cage starts to burn. 12. Monica Bellucci walks under the MEWP and says that she will give you a freebie if you slide down the rope. 13.

[ame] [/ame] [ame] [/ame] If the alternative was certain death, I would opt for the steady handover hand descent with the loop over your foot but these Marines seem to do all right just pinching the rope between their feet, with a full back pack and weaponry.

I am not attached to the rope. It is just there as an additional safeguard in case something unexpected happens. On a positive note, if you bother to watch the video of the guy in the gym rope climbing, he demonstrates two methods of standing on the rope and taking both his hands off! He makes a fast descent at the beginning and he has no gloves on. I admit that I only knew the first technique of winding around your leg. At school only a few of us were strong enough to climb but we all did a descent. I suppose it has all been banned now for H &S reasons. I never hope to do this, it is never going to be a regular event, it is just there for belt and braces. Going back to the video, (I know that this thread has been going on for too long and I am sorry for those who have gone to sleep!) I am sure that what he demonstrates is a useful bit of knowledge to practise perhaps once or twice. You may one day need to know how to safely descend from a rope for unexpected reasons and he shows you how to do it.

As the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy states in bold letters on the cover. "Expect the Unexpected"

And here is a video of me practising my rope work! [ame] [/ame]

So you have done all your checks, put up barriers, mobile phone charged, machine in perfect condition. You are fifty feet up and one of these starts to appear. [ame] [/ame] No normal ground check would help as many are in built up areas with tarmac over them. You are telling me that you would not grab the rope if it was there. Not the greatest option I grant you but it has to be better than the alternative of going over with the basket.

But surely that is exactly what I am doing? Planning ahead and giving myself another chance. Assume that the machine is tested and the operator is trained and everything is nearly new. I am not talking about operator of machine error but the sort of events that go on in the real world like the incident with the bus. Yes there may well not have been anything suitable to attach a rope or fall arrester above where they were working, but do you not think that it would be good plannig to have the extra safety measure. The Titanic analogy is rather better than I first thought. They like you thought that they had every safety feature thought out and tested. It could not possibly sink with all those watertight doors. I am sure that they had a tickbox of a checklist before they set sail. Hydraulics, tick, radio, tick, lifeboats ahhh now we won't be needing many of those will we? Lifeboats are dangerous on the high seas anyway and people might suffer rope burns trying to slide down into them. Imagine being 50 foot up on your tickboxed cherry picker on a building site and one of these guys turns up unexpectedly [ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8aR3iDs-H-8[/ame]

So to be quite clear about this, if you had the option of falling 50 feet attached to a MEWP platform or grabbing (literally) a lifeline you would choose to go down with the machine??? Don't think you would have done very well on the Titanic with that mentality.

It is not good but twenty minutes is a long time and it would not take long to call for help on the mobile. Surely given the option of dangling for a bit or going down with the machine, the dangling has my vote! My original question was about what kind of rope system would you use to exit the cage in the event of a mechanical or electrical failure. These things happen in spite of Loler and all the checks you should do. Even if you had a groundie the machine may not operate and you need to come down. It cannot be any more unsafe than coming down from a tree or abseiling. At the moment I have the fall arrester which is heavy and cumbersome to rig up but which does the job and gives me free movement in the cage. I also have this thick hemp rope as another option. This rigging up time is not so bad as I spend a lot of time in one place when painting. All I was asking was is there a better way as to me lashing myself to the cage is signing your own death warrant. Surely also in a 140 ft Genie there is something very wrong with the design if by pulling a lever you go down so fast that you come out of the cage. My machine works in a very steady manner.

Can you just explain that one again please and tell us what the outcome was. I have a Troll Lynxx full harness which I use with the fall arrester.

Why do people fall out of baskets then? Why do they need to be attached to the basket if they are operating within the confines of the basket? If I am attached to my fall arrester and the machine topples. I may receive a bruise or two, I may be left dangling forty feet up, scared but alive but with nothing like the injuries I would have falling 40 feet with the machine I am just saying that I like to have another option there. I appreciate that there are times when things happen so quickly that I could not grab the rope . In that case I would have thought that it there would be a slightly better chance of survival being thrown clear rather than being taken down with the basket. Frankie Lawrence said he would have received more injuries in his accident had he been attached to the basket. Dean Lofthouse said much the same about someone who jumped from the basket. Kimtree talks about a motor nearly catching fire! How would you feel if the fire spread to the hydraulic oil tank and was slowly making its way up the pipework at the same time choking you with black smoke. You would just sit in the basket and wait for a slow and terrible death I suppose if you had no rope. But there are other times such as the dustbin lorry reversing, which is usually driven by mad idiots in a hurry, when you can see what is about to happen as the 20 ton beast heads towards your machine and you could well have the time to, well I know I could, hang on to the rope and slide down. Treequip, I would like to know the kind of barrier you had in mind to stop a bin lorry. If a bus driver can hit one going forwards i am sure a bin lorry would have no trouble in reverse. It is an option. Surely we are talking about being as safe as possible. I keep the machine as well maintained, tested,, greased as I can. Visual inspections before use but accidents do happen and I am just giving myself an extra chance. Split second it may be, but it is amazing how quick the human body can react when your life depends on it.

I am not suggesting that anyone should cut corners on maintenance or procedure. What I am saying is that in this particular case I am an owner operator and the machine seems to be well built compared to many. Because I have owned and operated it for over ten years I am well aware of its limitations, more so perhaps than if I had been working for a firm which kept hiring a different model each time they needed one. The regular time consuming job is painting the windows at the top of a forty foot tower. Because I am in the same place nearly all day it means that I am often on my own, but with wife and mobile nearby. The basket is nearly touching the wall and I put the thick rope out of one of the windows to run in between the basket and the wall. The only point the rope is anchored is to a beam inside the tower. I spend days doing the job and the possibility of perhaps someone backing into a leg in spite of warning tape is always possible (especially in a van), likewise, the longer you are up there the more time there is for a mechanical or hydraulic failure. All I have to do is drop a paint brush and grab a rope and true it may happen too quickly for me to do anything. But imagine the scenario of the postman coming in and with mind on other things, backs round heading for a leg. From my position I can see clearly what is about to happen, grab the rope and prepare to jump out. The alternative without the rope is to watch in horror as the accident happens giving you time to see your life go before you as you plunge forty feet to the ground. It is only an option I use on this job. For other work I use the fall arrester attached to something above where possible. Is this deemed to be a bad idea also as it seems many of you would prefer to take your chances being strapped to the basket? Falls from the basket are usually because someone is leaning out to try and saw off a branch just out of reach. It has to be better practice to move the machine rather than strap yourself to the basket so that you can lean out of it.

Then I must refer you to my earlier post. Would these guys have survived serious injury if they had another option? It does not matter how good your pads are or how good your groundie is, if a bloody bus comes round the corner and collides with a leg. It may be that the ground which was apparently sound when you first looked, had a sink hole and there are times you are aware that something is going wrong with either the legs or the mechanics and you do have enough time to hang on to a rope and believe me if I had the option of falling 17 metres strapped to a basket or take my chances with a stout rope, I know which option I would choose.

The rope I am talking about is about two inches in diameter and hemp not nylon, like the ones used for climbing in gyms. http://www.traditionalropecompany.co.uk/images/pic-04640.jpg Did you never do rope climbing in the gym at school? It is not too hard to let yourself down slowly using your legs and body. Certainly preferable to falling! If you are in a tree it may just let you guide yourself to a safe branch. If you are doing building maintenance then it is sometimes possible to "walk" down the wall.

Yes I see in the training manual this is the perceived wisdom but I would feel much happier to have a stout rope attached to a secure point above me, long enough to reach the floor and close enough to catch hold of should an incident like this occur. A belt and braces approach. If you attach yourself to the basket you are bound to go down with it. Two men thrown 25ft to floor after bus hits cherry picker in Tunbridge Wells | Kent and Sussex Courier or this Tree surgeons hurt in cherry picker plunge at Milborne St Andrew (From Dorset Echo) Don't you think that these men would have had a fair chance of avoiding serious injury if they had such a system?

Thanks for this reply and for the one from Dean Yes I always have a full harness and I have done an abseil course though never bought the equipment. The 20 metres of rope and petzi sounds reasonable. The only advantage of my heavy fall arrester is that allows quite a bit of movement but will lock in a second whereas a rope would need to be fairly slack to give me the equivalent movement which may mean a small fall or swing should the basket drop away. Are there any fall arresters that once they have saved you, allow a steady descent if you pull a lever?

I think that abseil rope system is what I need. It is not so much trees and chainsaws where I would have someone on the ground, but I use it a lot for painting and maintenance work on gutters, electrics etc where I may be in one position for some time and it is a bit tedious for someone to stand and watch paint dry. On a few occasions I have extended the boom and one of the legs has moved a fraction and cut out the hydraulics on the microswitch. Usually a phone call and half a wind on the leg jack is all it needs but I have a rope just in case. The rope is not obviously as good as an abseil system hence my question about the best one to buy. I cannot see why having a fall arrester strapped to a stout branch or other anchor point above where I am working is a bad thing. If there is a catastrophic hydraulic/mechanical failure or the ground gives way under a leg or someone drives into it surely it is better to let the basket fall the 17 metres beneath you rather than go with it, even if it does mean you are left dangling, scared but alive!

I have a 17 metre Simon Topper MEWP. Good machine, well built and stable. I do like to fix a line on to whatever I am working on as an additional safeguard in case the machine should malfunction or topple or maybe someone collides with it while I am up there. At the moment I have a rather large and cumbersome fall arrestor. Never had to use it thank goodness but even if it was in action it would leave me alive but suspended 17 metres in the air. Is there a better solution using a line system. I am not a climber and at over 60 a little too old to want to start. I have abseiled for charity and was hoping that one of you could recommend the best system for arresting my fall and then allowing me to lower myself to the ground in the easiest fashion.

I am the other side of the Wash in Lincolnshire We went off to Donington Park on Saturday to watch the Historic Racing and it was freezing drizzle with a biting wind. It was entertaining to watch the old cars struggle a bit and there were several ground loops! Hardly anybody there and felt very sorry for the rain soaked traders who were expecting better. But the Blackthorn was fully in flower in all the hedgerows on the journey.

I'll second that. We had two huge Turkey Oaks on the farm which toppled over in one of the big storms. Too big and heavy to move and in an inaccessible place but the Lucas Mill made short work of them both. I milled a variety of sizes from 1"x 8" to 8"x 8" (now they were bloody heavy!) If you wait for the bigger sizes to settle and then re mill I cannot see why they are not used for many projects. On the farm I use the 3" x 8" on an eight foot wide grain pusher as being both strong enough for the job but also easy on the hardwood grain floor or should I misjudge and hit the wall. The odd plank which did warp too much I used as decking on a veranda of a log cabin which I built in 2000. Although exposed to the elements they are not in contact with the ground and have stood the weather for fifteen years with no sign of decay. I am sure that if you quarter saw and stack correctly you will find some lovely material to use for indoor projects and I have never noticed it smell more than any other wood.

BBrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr It is brass monkey weather here, The white flowers of the Blackthorn are fully out and yet again the old saying "Beware the Blackthorn Winter" comes true. Every year on the dot as far as I can remember. Is there some science behind this?

Local lad came round last night to tell me that the next door neighbour farmer and friend had died on Monday night. This spooked me more than a bit, but let;s hope that is an end to it. Superstitions about rooks ROOK: Should a group of them leave an area where they have settled, then a human connected with that land is about to die. They are an omen of summer weather to come: if they are high up it will be fine, but low down and it will be cold and wet. Adrian Dangar 12:01AM BST 18 May 2002 Comment There is something about a rookery that is quintessentially English: the reassuring return of the colony each February to rebuild bulky nests; the harsh cawing as the birds wheel in the sky, a sound as familiar as lambs bleating in spring; and the siting of so many ancient rookeries near great country houses, as if to confirm the superstition that these birds breed only where there is money. Unlike the murderous carrion crow, which builds a solitary nest and prefers the eyes of live lambs to leatherjackets and earthworms, the rook is a communal and dignified bird. Both are jet black, with an iridescent sheen of purple and blue. The rook, however, is distinguished by a pale grey patch of skin the size of a sovereign at the base of its beak. And, like jackdaws, magpies and jays, both are members of the corvidae family, renowned for intelligence and cunning. The rook's acumen extends to a sophisticated and well-regulated way of life in clusters of up to several hundred nests, the residents of which must conform for the greater good. Occasionally, a wayward or sick individual is condemned to death by a "rook parliament". In this bizarre avian trial, the entire population of the rookery takes to the sky in a cacophony of cawing and frenetic wingbeats that serve as a prelude to battering the victim to death. Rural superstitions acknowledge the rook's uncanny ability to predict disaster and there have been several instances where a human death has been preceded by similar eerie displays. In at least one of these cases, the birds deserted the nests that had served them for generations and never returned. It may be surprising that anyone should want to kill a bird so shrouded in mystique, yet rook shooting during May is one of the countryside's oldest traditions. At this time of year - some even pinpoint May 13 as being the optimum date - young rooks are clambering out on to swaying branches for the first time. Opinions are divided over the necessity for a cull. Some farmers reason that the damage rooks inflict on seedlings is made up for by their destruction of agricultural pests. However, the annual ritual involving 12-bore shotguns or .22-calibre rifles is eagerly anticipated in many parts of the country and hardly dents a population that is difficult to keep in check once the birds are mature. Provided a rookery is visited just once during this brief season, only a fraction of each year's young will be harvested. The unlucky branchies, as young rooks are sometimes labelled, are often collected to form the main ingredient of rook pie, a country dish that has been around for centuries and even merited a mention in Dickens's Pickwick Papers. Some claim that four and 20 blackbirds baking in a pie are not the songbirds that pull worms from your lawn, but that the nursery rhyme refers instead to rook pie, at that time a staple dish of the poor in spring. Some parts of rural Britain still indulge in this dish. The landlord of the Fox and Hounds in Acton Turville in Gloucestershire, Mad Chico, hosts an annual rook pie night. "I make an extremely moreish pie, with sausage meat, sherry, brandy and spices to complement the rook meat," he says. "It's so delicious I have to set some aside for any regulars that cannot make it." Until recently, the Carrington Arms in Ashby Folville, Leicestershire, held a similar evening for the Quorn Hunt's earth-stoppers. The landlord's recipe of bacon, eggs and rook breasts marinated in milk was so popular that each guest took home a slice of pie in a pot to eat cold the next day. Since the demise of the English elm, ash and sycamore are the preferred choice for rookeries. By the end of summer, the trees that have served as home for a few months are abandoned in favour of roosting sites sometimes many miles from the nursery. But flocks of rooks swelled by survivors from the breeding season endure as an irreplaceable feature of the English landscape. Sponsored

I would wear a dust mask and some eye protection as most parts of the tree are poisonous. At best an irritant but some people suffer more than others with rashes and sore eyes. http://www.wood-database.com/wood-articles/wood-allergies-and-toxicity/ http://www.getwoodworking.com/forums/postings.asp?th=2378 http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/wis30.pdf