Falling pics 11/25/09

[Gologit]

You make a lot of declarative statements about GOL. Ever take a course? I've taken all 4 levels. 10% hinge? Never heard of it. I'll wager your opinions aren't formed by first hand knowledge.

First hand knowledge? Of what, GOL? You'd be right there. I doubt he's taken the course.

NM has quite a bit of first hand knowledge in falling though. Quite a bit.
If I needed some falling done, especially tall stuff on short ground, without tearing up the leave trees and the two of you applied for the job I'd pick NM.
He hasn't read the book but the trees don't read it either.

Everyone here has said the same thing...GOL has it's place. A good faller, an experienced faller, knows when to use the tricks in his bag. A weekend warrior wannabe has to stick to the dogma of GOL. He probably makes mistakes and has close calls he doesn't even recognize. That's scary.

 

[flying pig]

Like a good buddy of mine always says: just because you have a drivers' license doesn't mean you can drive. I've seen lots of 'ticketed' mechanics who can't tie their own shoe laces either. You can read the book all you want but if you don't understand it and have the ability to interpret and apply what you've learned to your own situation, and recognize where something else will work better in your given situation then you aren't any good no matter how many courses you've taken.

 

[northmanlogging]

Well, there are these things called videos, perhaps you've heard of them?

I admittedly have not taken the course, but watched some of the videos and somehow managed to not vomit, I did laugh out loud though.

The point I and every other professional cutter is trying to make here, if you would choke down your pride and stubbornness and read the entire posts. GOL has its place, plunge cutting has its place, buy GOL whether on purpose or not teaches hard and fast rules, those hard and fast rules, be they misheard, misunderstood, or mistaken is what the mojority of folks that use GOL seem to know, and swear by. So from the outside looking in, GOL don't work.

Put it this way, some guys walk around thinking they are hot ****, best of the best at whatever, never noticing that the rest of the crew has to pick up all their messes and broken pieces. Then those same guys are called ********, arrogant, idiots, fools etc by the rest of the crew... and they can't figure out why, they are the best of the best right?

We don't get to describe what we are, others do that for us, if they think we are ********, then we are ********... GOL from the point of view of the guy that has had to clean up way more messes from GOL home gamers then i care to think about, is that ******* that all of us have had to work with in the past.

 

[Gologit]

The point I and every other professional cutter is trying to make here, if you would choke down your pride and stubbornness and read the entire posts. GOL has its place, plunge cutting has its place, buy GOL whether on purpose or not teaches hard and fast rules, those hard and fast rules, be they misheard, misunderstood, or mistaken is what the mojority of folks that use GOL seem to know, and swear by. So from the outside looking in, GOL don't work.

Put it this way, some guys walk around thinking they are hot ****, best of the best at whatever, never noticing that the rest of the crew has to pick up all their messes and broken pieces. Then those same guys are called ********, arrogant, idiots, fools etc by the rest of the crew... and they can't figure out why, they are the best of the best right?

A few years back I was cutting on a fire. I had to open up a couple of old roads into water holes for the water trucks.
There was a thinning crew camped nearby that was shut down because of the fire. They were a private outfit from back East somewhere.I asked the boss if he had a couple of guys I could borrow to help me cut the road open. Easy work, flat ground, no fire danger, but the tankers were coming in the next morning and we needed to hustle a little.
He gave me two guys that he said were the best he had..."They've both had the whole GOL course". At that time I knew nothing about GOL. I found out pretty quick though.
Those two guys were the worst I'd ever seen. They knew one way to cut, open face with a bore back cut. I had a Cat to push the trees off the road but I told them it would speed things up if they could drop as many as they could clear of the ROW. It was all second growth piss fir and mostly small.
They were slow. I could excuse that if they were accurate but they weren't. I've never seen such a jack-strawed mess. The Cat skinner was good and that made things a little better.
I tried to show them a little about directional falling and loaned them some wedges 'cause they didn't have any. They'd never used wedges. They argued with me about directional falling. They thought kerf dutchmen and tapered hinges were too dangerous to even consider. They spent most of their time hung up, cutting each other out of hangups, broke down, or just kind of standing there staring at the trees.
At noon I hauled them back to their camp and their boss and I had a word or two. He still claimed that those two guys were the best he had.
I borrowed a couple of convicts from another crew...you could do such things in those days if nobody said anything...and finished the job. The convicts did just fine. They'd had OTJ from their peers and they were tuned in on how to cut.
That night the thinning crew boss asked if I needed any help the next day. I told him no. Thanks, but no. I'd seen all of the GOL techniques I could stand for one day.

 

[madhatte]

You make a lot of declarative statements about GOL. Ever take a course? I've taken all 4 levels. 10% hinge? Never heard of it. I'll wager your opinions aren't formed by first hand knowledge.

TO RE-ITERATE:

Everyone here has said the same thing...GOL has it's place.

GOL has its place, plunge cutting has its place

We all get that plunge-and-trip is a method that works. We all use it, as appropriate. We also know and use other methods, which are also used as appropriate. GOL is not a one-size-fits-all treatment of trees. It's nothing but hubris to claim otherwise.

 

[sw oh logger]

You make a lot of declarative statements about GOL. Ever take a course? I've taken all 4 levels. 10% hinge? Never heard of it. I'll wager your opinions aren't formed by first hand knowledge.

Why do we have to start making a big deal out of this GOL debate AGAIN? There are many ways to cut timber safely, efficiently, and productively--it often depends on what part of the country you live in, the terrain, the particular tree, and its problems, and even the weather conditions or your level of expertise. GOL was meant to be a tool to teach control, leverage, and safety along with being productive. It is particularly helpful to new cutters--when I took the only 3 levels offered at the time {20 + yrs. ago} I had already been cutting for close to 20 yrs. It was required to become an Ohio Certified Master Logger, I did it, no big deal, didn't hurt me, probably helped keep me aware of many things. Why fight about this--I wouldn't think of trying to tell Northman how cut his 150' Doug Fir, and I haven't heard him telling me how to cut a $5,000 veneer Walnut. We all have different skills as long as we get home safely, make a living, and take decent care of the resource.

 

[northmanlogging]

You guys like to cut in the dirt on them walnut sticks...

I know they are worth money but my guts clench when I have to start digging the roots out by hand... I like tall stumps.

GOL thing is a dead horse, soon we'll be onto a wedge thread again...

 

[Gologit]

...or an oil thread.

 

[Gologit]

Why do we have to start making a big deal out of this GOL debate AGAIN? There are many ways to cut timber safely, efficiently, and productively--it often depends on what part of the country you live in, the terrain, the particular tree, and its problems, and even the weather conditions or your level of expertise. GOL was meant to be a tool to teach control, leverage, and safety along with being productive. It is particularly helpful to new cutters--when I took the only 3 levels offered at the time {20 + yrs. ago} I had already been cutting for close to 20 yrs. It was required to become an Ohio Certified Master Logger, I did it, no big deal, didn't hurt me, probably helped keep me aware of many things. Why fight about this--I wouldn't think of trying to tell Northman how cut his 150' Doug Fir, and I haven't heard him telling me how to cut a $5,000 veneer Walnut. We all have different skills as long as we get home safely, make a living, and take decent care of the resource.

You're right, the GOL debate gets old. But it never seems to die off completely. Nor should it.
I've never cut trees anywhere east of the Sierra Nevadas and I wouldn't begin to tell you, or Bitzer, or any of the other hardwood guys how to do their job. If I came back there to cut I'd probably have to learn some new things and adapt to your methods.
But...if you're in our part of the country, falling the trees we do, you'd better be able to adapt to our way of doing things.
Those kids from the thinning crew weren't bad guys, they were just bad cutters...and they showed no willingness or ability to change. They'd quote that GOL stuff and whine when the trees didn't do what their GOL training said they'd do. Under different circumstances and with more time I might have been able to help them learn if they'd wanted to.

 

[sw oh logger]

You guys like to cut in the dirt on them walnut sticks...

I know they are worth money but my guts clench when I have to start digging the roots out by hand... I like tall stumps.

GOL thing is a dead horse, soon we'll be onto a wedge thread again...

LOL That USED to be done, not much anymore that I'm aware of! My brother and I dug one out for a guy over 30 yrs. ago-- seems like I was running an 056 Super with a 24" bar --basically used up a good chain! Seriously, we cut LOW on good Walnut but don't dig them out!!

 

[Frank Savage]

You guys like to cut in the dirt on them walnut sticks...

I know they are worth money but my guts clench when I have to start digging the roots out by hand... I like tall stumps.

GOL thing is a dead horse, soon we'll be onto a wedge thread again...

I was not on the forum for a longer time, but this seems to me...
You have the blue wedge.
And since you just brought up this topic, I´m suspicious you got the fabled Barbie pink one too

 

[northmanlogging]

No Barbie wedges fer me lol

10 and 12" Red heads and the 8" double taper with the super slim tip.

Plus a couple of those big 15" bananas fer fatty ceders

 

[RandyMac]

what kind of oil do I use on my wedges while doing the Swedish stump dance?
BTW the trees have leaves on them.

 

[KiwiBro]

25:1

 

[woodfarmer]

No, that's fine. I just thought that since this is a logging thread you might have dropped ten or fifteen more that you didn't show.

That was sarcasm, I usually fell 4-5 trees, then skid them out and repeat.
In my 30 years of felling trees, I’ve never had this happen so that’s why I post it here. To get the “professional” opinion.
This is a forestry and logging forum, I didn’t know it was for only those whose occupation is logger, as I do practice forestry management on my bush lots.

 

[RandyMac]

Don't cry, there are plenty of foresters here.
Go steep and deep.

 

[madhatte]

Don't cry, there are plenty of foresters here.

why I oughta

 

[northmanlogging]

what kind of oil do I use on my wedges while doing the Swedish stump dance?
BTW the trees have leaves on them.

Astro Glide, the go to lube for all back cuts

 

[RandyMac]

onion

 

[Jhenderson]

First hand knowledge? Of what, GOL? You'd be right there. I doubt he's taken the course.

NM has quite a bit of first hand knowledge in falling though. Quite a bit.
If I needed some falling done, especially tall stuff on short ground, without tearing up the leave trees and the two of you applied for the job I'd pick NM.
He hasn't read the book but the trees don't read it either.

Everyone here has said the same thing...GOL has it's place. A good faller, an experienced faller, knows when to use the tricks in his bag. A weekend warrior wannabe has to stick to the dogma of GOL. He probably makes mistakes and has close calls he doesn't even recognize. That's scary.

You make a lot of assumptions. All I said was GOL says 2/3 tree dia for face cut. Then I referenced the notch closing before the tree made the ground. Then the crying about GOL started. Never did hear any reference to my observations, just criticism of GOL. Also heard several uninformed statements on GOL standards for cutting including hinge requirements and ALWAYS bore cutting on the back cut. Both are false. But you hire who you want. You're probably right. I've only been falling for about 35 years. I've still got a lot to learn.