Glass in damaged tree to be removed. Thoughts?

SeanKroll

Treehouser
Joined
Oct 13, 2016
Messages
12,253
Location
Olympia, WA
I have a cedar to remove, about 36" diameter. Its been smashed by a run-away moving van. A lot of glass has been cleaned up, but some is stuck under the bark on sap, and there are micro-shards that can't be cleaned up.

Thoughts on how to approach it in relation to the glass? Its structurally fine, but it blew off a huge piece of bark, 20 square feet or more.

My thought is to put tarps around the base to catch debris, and shave the lower section around the impact zone.


On a side note, I told the customer to get a Registered Consulting Arborist on here team. $7800 appraisal value for lose of property, plus $xxxx for removal/ disposal.
The insurance company said that they figured she wanted to keep the tree and would offer about $2500 in damages. Just got the Jobber approval, haven't heard the details from the customer yet.
 
Try not to hit the glass with your saw. I've hit glass bottles before when clearing underbrush (many years ago) and it dulled my chain instantly, like hitting a rock.
 
Glass in large pieces is no bueno. Never ran a chain saw in to any but it can/has destroyed some of our bigger circle and band saws. I was running our head saw and hit a glass insulator once. It ripped a 2 foot pie shaped chunk out of an 8 ga 60? diameter circle saw and sent it 30 ft through the back wall..... bad deal. Glass insulators and cotton picker spindles are a sawyers biggest fear! 😂
 
  • Thread Starter Thread Starter
  • #4
no, not chunks. Little bits, the stuff you'd think to brush away, not be able to pick through. Matchhead size.
 
Ignore it.

By your own admission, you have clean-up standards that are over the top unnecessarily high. Let it go a bit.
 
  • Thread Starter Thread Starter
  • #10
There is glass stuck to the tree, which will be dismantled, cut and handled, transported and milled.

I don't want any glass shards in us or gear. That's all.

Not a matter of clean up.
 
Most insurance companies have a glass clean up crew available to them come in to clean up glass . Call the insurance adjuster and request a final clean up of possible glass shards before you start and when done. They will probably vac up the saw dust as well. Puts the liability back on them in case someone gets glass in their foot, finger or something.
 
  • Thread Starter Thread Starter
  • #12
Ignore it.

By your own admission, you have clean-up standards that are over the top unnecessarily high. Let it go a bit.

I'm happy to leave a mess when asked to. That last job was working on the neighbor's manicured lawn for our ease. Protective plywood made cleanup easy. No smashing debris into the grass under foot or tracks, or from falling trees.
 
How about wrapping a trap around the damaged area/glass covered area wreck the tree out and haul the affected log to a burn pile instead of the mill.
 
Peel with axe and pressure clean at different angles if still concerned.
Still treat as hazard like embedded metal, also as concentrated sand that will dull saw.
.
 
  • Thread Starter Thread Starter
  • #15
I could cut/peel the loose bark, pressure wash, tarp it, strip it, fell it, mill it.


It's still valuable wood, and I need cedar for a building or fencing.
 
Bore in outside the impact area then cut around keeping the nose near the trunk's center and/or the out coming chain perpendicular to the surface.
When the log is on the ground, give it a slight kiss with the stump grinder. It isn't a big deal for its teeth and the glass shards can't go deep in the wood.
 
right angle grinder with aggressive paint stripper pad where you will make the cut......more later before you mill.
 
Agreed, Sean. You are not. :)

No slam, just a fact that you have readily acknowledged before.

Now I'm not making any concrete statement...I'll leave it for you to consider, as I know you to be an extremely intelligent and introspective man...but maybe there is a connection between this thread's observations by you and me, and this one by our friend Mick, who admittedly can be a bit rough in his approach :)...

Sean, your problem with your hired guys is history repeating itself. Starts off sweetness and light, then goes downhill.

There is a common denominator.

Maybe thoroughly clear communications challenge you on other fronts besides posting here...

Just a thought; always on your side, my friend.
 
Worth a try, I'd agree. Better than the sanding pads, almost certainly.

Hell, I'd go at it with a sharp axe. I could clear that amount of stem down half an inch to clean wood in not much time.
 
  • Thread Starter Thread Starter
  • #23
Agreed, Sean. You are not. :)

No slam, just a fact that you have readily acknowledged before.

Now I'm not making any concrete statement...I'll leave it for you to consider, as I know you to be an extremely intelligent and introspective man...but maybe there is a connection between this thread's observations by you and me, and this one by our friend Mick, who admittedly can be a bit rough in his approach :)...



Maybe thoroughly clear communications challenge you on other fronts besides posting here...

Just a thought; always on your side, my friend.

Here, typing, multi-tasking, coffee, emailing, surfing multiple sites at once, doing admin work while doing this and that, with Dahlia in the background, at times, I don't take the care or have the focus that I do on jobsites, nor am I as articulate, when rushed. If I wake up at 2 in the morning, wide-ish away, and do some surfing, definitely not so clear.

Like a lot of guys having some beers after work, I'll burn one down and surf. Not the same focus as at work, where my 'living' is on the line.


No matter what I say, some guys that will stand out of sight on the other side of the truck, and start talking to me my while I'm busy working, tracking 5 things at once, asking "Do you want this, in there?", don't get it. I've started ignoring it, rather than ask them, "Sorry, I was busy concentrating over here. Do I want which 'this', in which 'there'?" or say, "No, just bring everything to the back end of the truck, like I asked you to, and you said 'ok'. Please bring everything to the truck. Plan the work, work the plan."

If I was sitting at my desk, at the computer, phone to my ear, someone wouldn't barge into the office, and start talking to me about unimportant, extremely vague things, unless their brain is not very sharp.
I've had to tell an employee who kept trying to talk to me while I was texting a customer, holding the phone up in front of me, "I'm conducting business right now, is it important that you interrupt this communication with a customer. I'm obviously using my phone, I'm not listening to you. Please let me finish the work I'm doing."

or

hide behind things when told to stand out in open so I don't have to wonder where they are when dropping killer pieces from the sky, if they are in any vicinity of the dropzone.


and

I still only have one 'driver's side', and one 'passenger side', and literal measurements of distance for moving equipment with guidance.




When I worked at State Parks, my co-worker/ supervisor was a 40-year experienced professional, we kicked ass and took names like no-other Arbor Crew team in a long while, at the least (mostly my supervisor dealt with 'helpers' as his team-mate, aka drunk guy, not the brightest guy, couldn't climb out of the bucket or fell easy trees-guy, the guy who almost whalloped him in the head with a bag of 5/8" stable braid.)
Unfortunately, that place was guarded by the wolves, and my boss was a ph.D, trying to run logging shows at times, expecting us to make miracles happen with rot-rotted honkers, with a 40 y.o., 65 HP Garrett 15 or 16 skidder.
No rookie bullshit. No sneaking off to text someone. No Space Cadet's on the launch pad.


Unfortunately, I don't work well with low-functioning, low-skilled people, who space out, and can't remember things well.

My current employee is quick on the pick-up, and tells me how good of a teacher I am, and how much he's learned by watching my cutting (oh, pat myself on the back, a low-skill guy is impressed by a high-skill guy, right:lol:) and showing him so many ways to work smarter and easier.




He doesn't go, "I know. I know. I know.", when he doesn't. Usually a great sign of some who doesn't know, and can't be taught.

If I started, "I know. I know. I know.", to Kyle, who was teaching me to weld, what would I expect from him. I'd expect him to hand me the welding gear (don't even know what the welder-thingy is properly called), and watch, or tell me to STFU, and open my eyes and ears. I'd rather he say, "I'm training your because you don't know what you're doing, and I'm the pro. Pay attention."

If I didn't pay attention, or listen to my skilled supervisor, I'd expect to hear, "Don't let the door hit you in the ass, and never come back!"

My punctuation can be atrocious when I'm rushing, online; I do know how to use a semicolon in both main ways, although, don't always do so when distracted, rushed, multi-tasking, or for clarity.

I often use "its" when the proper contraction is "it's". ITS is the possessive. IT'S is the contraction of it is, IIRC.

Quotes, particularly within multi-clause sentences, are not my strongest area of punctuation, either. Multiple-clause sentences, with appositives mixed within, don't make the clearest internet reading. Granted.

When it's important to be clear, I take the time to make it clear, when I'm not buzzing from strong coffee and an empty stomach.

Dahlia just work up. Time for making breakfast.
 
Back
Top