Thesnarlingbadger

Nice one, yes I’ll check it out and if I need to just pass them on to a sharpening company I will. Cheers

Nice one. Thanks mate. I’ve got some diamond disks knocking about at the back of the yard somewhere. I’ll Start the sharpening this week. Cheers

Fair enough. I’m a short arse so the cab seemed alright to me. Hope you get something sorted soon mate.

Fair point. What’s done is done. I’ve got into a busy work load now so the yard stuff will take a back seat but I’ll consider clear pvc throughout when all the other sheets blow off (roofing is not my forte).

The new Hilux has a 3.5 tonne tow. I’m sure you’ve already looked in to this. But I believe they are the only 4x4 on the market now with rear diff lock. They carry a tonne so put them in the right tax bracket (for now) but there is talk of the bed having to be the same length or bigger that the cab so they are not a car, this would undoubtably put all the double cab pick ups on the wrong side of this. The whole tax pick-up thing is really becoming a bit of a pain in the arse and it’s all because loads of city office types use them to drop their kids off to school. I think it was Coca Cola recently got done by HMRC for using VW combi vans because they are not classed as a van. How this is the case I do not know but if this is the lengths they will go to I think all 4x4’s have a pretty bleak future.

Mainly due to the fact this pvc sections end up brittle and cracking after a couple of years. Don’t mind replacing a couple every now and then but not a whole roof. The logs actually get a fair bit of light from the sides and the other roofing I managed to get a decent discount as I got a load that got damaged in transit. £5 a sheet and had to buy 3 for full price.

Last weeks work. 34 conifers down and ground out. Had an emergency job come in on the Monday so I had to put it back a day and spend Saturday grinding the last stumps, wouldn’t have been so bad if they didn’t all have bloody iron bars in the trunks [emoji25]. 12 loads of chip but customers kept the thousand or so logs so that was a bonus. The predator 360 worked bloody hard and did me proud but out of curiosity any of you know the best way to sharpen multi-tip teeth? (I have about 50 dull now), also has anyone used the rock multi-tips? Worth the extra couple of quid? The first pint went down pretty fast on Saturday evening. And the emergency a split out Holm Oak for a university I do some work for fun climb and it was just make safe and stack brash didn’t get many pics as we had to knock it out quick. The base was riddled with white rot and the standing steam was like a wobbly tooth.

a quick cheep one the lads and I knocked up a couple of weeks ago to store the logs sales for next year. I have a new love for free pallets.

I wish, they would certainly make our job a lot easier.

“Get away from her you bitch” I still use this line regularly usually when the misses cat is to near the kids.

I would say Aliens, Shawshank redemption and Apocalypse now. But there are plenty of others Kelly’s hero’s is a good in.

I’m doing the CS32 at the end of next month and hopefully this will teach me a thing or two about winches. At the moment I just keep pulling that leaver and close my eyes thinking I’ve not had one snap yet, it’s got to be this one.?‍♂️

I’d say the powers that be have good reason to take those rights away from you. Mind you id blame the winch. I think this tree would have split on the bend and gone sideways before the winch gave up on me.

Cheers Mark. I know if the tree owner phoned me to look at it and I went out I’d have said MEWP straight away. But the fact I turned up to do it on the day I felt like I should at least give it a good go. I’m not pissed off I walked away from it, and the end of the day I’m still here and I’ve got a family to support. Not worth the risk. I know some people would have done it and if I was younger and still in my glory days I probably would have.

It wasn’t a big job (the Ash was probably only 50ft) and to be honest if the roof wasn’t right under it I wouldn’t have had an issue I’d have just cut lumps off and sprung about a bit but I wasn’t comfortable getting up past standing in the main brake in the branches. The tree had so much movement. If the trees behind were higher and I could get a decent enough anchor I would have been a lot happier and probably not have started the thread. I know there are people on here who could have done the job without a second thought but not me.

That was the plan but I wasn’t able to get up the tree high enough to cut in small bits the lean on it was giving it was to much bounce and any time I moved it would bow down about 5ft and spring up again. The main point and i’m willing to admit it is that I didn’t feel safe in the tree at all.

Not a bad shout but then I’d be adding more ropes in to an already tight spot with the rigging line as well. Although the trees behind look taller the angle I was at when roped in to then was near horizontal and made getting in to a comfortable position a nightmare.

Yeah I will do when I speak to him tomorrow.

Hi Matty. Yeah I didn’t like the winch fell idea at all not with that much force already in it. The rig tag line idea was my favoured but the I’d have to get out on the main low branch as it was to close to the roof the rig in one go and I don’t like the idea of that much weight shifting on an already externally springy tree over a roof. Another idea I tried was to winch the leaning tree at about 8foot up from the base to get it away from the roof a bit (the amount we were able to pull the tree up with the winch was a good 15ft across but if the winch snapped or I accidentally dropped a limb on it the result could have been terrible not to mention tensioned winches around the ground staff, not my cup of tea. Thanks for the input.

Other climber didn’t want to go near it. And with the risk of putting the roof through I wouldn’t want to put anyone else in the position. I’ve always said I’d never ask anyone to do want I couldn’t/wouldn’t. I’m sure there are climbers out there who wouldn’t bat an eye but the older I get the less I take risks. Money comes and goes but I only have one life.

Thanks Khriss that was my thought.

Just not able to climb high enough or out far enough to cut and chuck. I’ve been climbing several years but didn’t like this one bit.

This was a plan but once up there with the spring of the tree I thought I don’t want to climb any higher (there was a good 5ft bounce when I was at the main junction of branches. It take a lot for me to say no but this one felt very wrong.

I was recently asked by a landscaper if I could nip out and take down an ash for him, he would do it himself but has a knackered shoulder, he said it was half a days work and there were a few beaches hanging over a roof. Now I haven’t really had time to look at the job but said I’d do it and invoice him once done. This part isn’t an issue. I turned up to do the job and realised it was going to be a bit of a challenge, not an issue as I like a challenge and a good chance to set up a interesting rigging system. Anyway the idea was to put a pulley block up in the trees behind and myself to cut stuff and swing it through with a tag line on the branches to pall them away from me. So I sent my other climber up another tree to put a block and rip in while I climbed up the Ash. After stripping all the ivy as I spiked up I got to the main branches and realised that there was a lot of spring in the tree. I didn’t have a good gut feeling as the whole top half of the tree was over the tiled roof. I then put and a cover in another tree to come down on to it but the angle was awkward and would put me right in the way of the rigging system, so that option was out. I had a 3.5 tonne winch on me so I winched the tree so it was bolt upright and the plan was to fell it back in to the woods behind but there would have been so much tension half way up the trunk where the bend was there was too much risk. So that idea was scrapped. I have left the job without doing it as I don’t want to put the roof through or risk my neck. I’ve only ever walked away from one job in the past and this was due to the fact it needed a MEWP and my previous employer didn’t get one in. The only way I can see of doing this job is also with a MEWP. But I am keen to see if anyone else has any ideas. I doubt I’ll be doing the job as I have suggested to the tree owner that he gets a company in who own a MEWP and have told him of one I know in the general area. He was happy that I was honest with him and was fine about the whole thing. Better safe than sorry as they say. I hated not having the guts to do this tree as I am a competent climber and have always found a way around tricky situations as plenty who know me will know. However this job just didn’t sit right with me and something told me that even though this was a healthy Ash the tree wasn’t going to behave itself. Even though I feel pissed off with myself I am going to bed tonight without an insurance claim looming over me. I’m really just seeing if anyone else hand any bright ideas on how to tackle it. Just as food for thought. Pictures of the offender below....

In all honesty though I think this may be a helpful course. I have a good team of lads and I always make a point of going through any minor jobs and laying our roles for people in the morning. However I have worked for a handful of people where it’s just a free for all on site and no one has a clue what they are doing, jobs like this do make a day stressful and dangerous. I’ve seen near misses such as someone cutting a trunk and and it’s rolled with someone on the other side.