Another boring backcut :D

Burnham

Burnham

Woods walker
Joined
Mar 7, 2005
Messages
23,013
Location
Western Oregon
We found ourselves with a bit of road cleanup to do after heavy rains and then a dump of wet snow put some trees down here and there. This second growth got hit by a bigger oldgrowth that went down. It sprung the roots on the second growth and leaned it out over the road, so I went up to fall it this morning.

Pretty straightforward. I put in a normal face, bored to set the hinge, then tripped it from outside, just a little below the floor of the face. It went down fast, pulled a lot of fiber at the holding strap. Here's a few pictures.
 

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Good to see you have got your blade on the truck. Cut and push instead of winching!
 
Hey Burnham, how come you tripped it from below the floor of the face? Every time I've done this, I try to line up my trip cut with the bore cut. It seems to me that if you had lined up the cuts, it might have pulled less fiber.
 
  • Thread Starter Thread Starter
  • #5
Bounce, the theory is the same as how we arrange the placement of cuts when we're taking off a limb when climbing, making sure we don't set up a saw snatcher situation.

So if I can be sure I'm lining up perfectly, even with the face cut floor is fine. But it's easier to aim just a little low, allowing for a bit of margin for error. Then if I have a bit of overlapping kerf when the tree releases, the bar is in the part that's staying (i.e. the stump), not the part that's leaving.

I was taught to complete the bored back cut from the inside out to the back. And I still do much of the time. But Jerry and Stig have shared stories of mammoth root pulls from that technique, and I listen to guys like them, at least some :). Tripping from the outside keeps that monster at bay.
 
The cool thing about those pics is the reaction of the crown growth. There aren't even any stubs where it was sheltered by the neighboring trees. How many years agoo was that road put in there B?
 
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  • #7
It was built about 1950 or so. I expect that tree sprouted after the ROW was cut.
 
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  • #8
TreeDimensional said:
Good to see you have got your blade on the truck. Cut and push instead of winching!
Click to expand...

Naw...we keep the blade on that 3/4 ton Ford 4x4 year around...and I keep the Warn M12000 on my rig year around, too. If I need the blade I swap trucks or get one of the other folks to bring it out. If someone else needs the winch, it's a package deal...I go with it :).

I can do more things with the winch than I can with the blade, all in all.
 
Seems there may have been less fiber pull with a little shallower notch. But not like you where cutting saw logs, so if it hit where you wanted great job!
 
  • Thread Starter Thread Starter
  • #12
Might be so, fair enough. Though the degree of head lean was pretty severe. I could have tripped it a bit faster, too, I think.

Bottom line, like you said, it's not a saw log...and even if it was, not a particularly valuable one.
 
When the head lean reaches that point wood pull is hard to minimize with conventional methods. The Coo's Bay cut isn't always a minimizer either, but often safer to execute.

On another note, I have felled a few hard leaners over the years simply by reaming them off the stump. but I did it only for demonstration purposes. If anyone ever has a hankering to try it, it does work. Of course the usual risks follow the method on such trees,,, as pulling the roots behind the tree, or back slabbing it.

To ream a tree off the stump you got to have a clear drop zone, have a good running saw,, with a very sharp chain,, and be proficient with the method of reaming. And when you have all these ingredients it's a very cool demo of an unusual technique.

I'll try to find just the right tree and do a demo video of the technique. This winter season being upon us should offer at least a few opportunities.
 
I wouldn't think a little fiber pull would make much diff on a hazard tree .The only ones who ever comment about it are veneer cutters .
 
Way to go, Burnham.

My first thought when seeing the picture was, " what the h..., he tripped it from the outside!!!!"

So even a frigging internet expert can learn a new trick or two:)

I don't think that one had enough mass to do a serious root pull, but you never know.

Better safe than sorry.

And like I've said before, I love pictures of your hazard trees, they are soo different from mine.
Also, having visited your area, it ia always fun to see it again.
 
Thanks for the explanation Burnham. It makes sense now. Come to think of it, the only reason I was taught to make my trip cut line up with the bore cut was to minimize fiber pull (the guy who taught me this was a logger, and constantly worried about this even though he had long since switched over to residential tree work). One of the things I like the best about this place is that talking like this to other cutters forces me to examine my own techniques and think about why I do things they way I do. Unfortunately, as in this case, the answer is often simply "because that's the way I was taught." I think as I go forward and end up teaching others, I will try to do a better job of explaining why and not just simply how.
 
  • Thread Starter Thread Starter
  • #23
stig said:
Way to go, Burnham.

My first thought when seeing the picture was, " what the h..., he tripped it from the outside!!!!"

So even a frigging internet expert can learn a new trick or two:)

I don't think that one had enough mass to do a serious root pull, but you never know.

Better safe than sorry.

And like I've said before, I love pictures of your hazard trees, they are soo different from mine.
Also, having visited your area, it ia always fun to see it again.
Click to expand...

The thought I had about the potential for root pull on that particular tree was this: since the cause of it's lean and subsequent status as a hazard was being root sprung after the strike from the falling oldgrowth, I figured the roots on the back side of the lean had to be somewhat compromised...leaving them more susceptible to being pulled.
 
  • Thread Starter Thread Starter
  • #24
Bounce said:
Thanks for the explanation Burnham. It makes sense now. Come to think of it, the only reason I was taught to make my trip cut line up with the bore cut was to minimize fiber pull (the guy who taught me this was a logger, and constantly worried about this even though he had long since switched over to residential tree work). One of the things I like the best about this place is that talking like this to other cutters forces me to examine my own techniques and think about why I do things they way I do. Unfortunately, as in this case, the answer is often simply "because that's the way I was taught." I think as I go forward and end up teaching others, I will try to do a better job of explaining why and not just simply how.
Click to expand...

Understanding the "why" of what you do is the best tool to have in your bag when you face a situation you are not familiar with...otherwise, you don't really have the resources to work out how to proceed in concocting a plan to deal with that new-to-you set of parameters.

As an instructor, that knowlege is the better way to insure that your students will stand a chance of being successful when they head out on their own. There is no way you can teach them what to do under every set of circumstances they will see...because it's impossible to have forseen how all the potential variables will line up.
 
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