Full skip semi-chisel? Gettin paid to cut stumps.

[1270d]

Cut in a little passed center and then rotate around the stump with your cut. That way your chain is in clean wood 99% of the cut and its only interaction with dirt or grit is when the chain is leaving the wood. This way there is minimal pressure between the dirt/wood/cutting face. If you just start cutting away you drag every bit of grit through the whole cut.

Make sense? It works for me

 

[rwoods]

I think he means the stump is a water oak as opposed to a burl oak. Ron

 

[HuskStihl]

You've stumped me on this one Jon. Pun intended.

HS might be implying to wash/rinse the bark first to remove some of the sand. Maybe use a garden sprayer.

Philbert

Philbert, you should know by now I never suggest anything truly useful

I think he means the stump is a water oak as opposed to a burl oak. Ron

Ronnie Woods is the winner!

 

[northmanlogging]

That's a thought. I'm hoping to only have a week in there though. 50 stumps a day sounds reasonable. I could be shootin a little high there. I don't know. I was cutting 30 sawtimber trees in there a day, plus the pulp. So 1 long cut per stump and 50 sound more than reasonable. Sharpness issues are going to be the biggest thing. I plan to bring my grinder onsite. I think I will need it. As for the "fame" sales- I've got a Stihl 440/460BB with about 2 million bf under its belt if anyone wants it! Muffler is triple ported. Cylinder has the standard woods port job. Shes kind of in pieces right now. I'll start the bidding at 50 cents! Oh and its an UGLY lookin machine. Tensioner doesn't work to well. Starter is kinda limp. I gave the full wrap and big dogs away. Hmmm. Other selling points... Um It was never hit by a tree or bucked log. Never fell outa the back of a pick up. I did use it to fight goatman in the swamps once. street cred there.

the 390's are a 90cc saw right? should be enough, Throw a new .404 tip on an old bar and a new clutch rim, be ready to get stupid.

I'd give you a Dollar for that saw if you think it might run again, but you have to sign it and send some press photos

 

[HuskStihl]

Bitz, please disregard my earlier post. If you can get all the way thru with a 32, you won't need more than the 390. You'll want to stick a half wrap on it. I like dogging in just above the dirt, angling the bar up a couple inches and rolling thru. The stumps are slightly angled, but the chain stays out of the dirt. You can cut 50 little stumps a day easy, the hard part is dealing with them afterward. Who's responsible for cleaning up the heavy little buggers.
Pure newbie opinions........1)carbide chain is too expensive and hard to sharpen to make it worthwhile for this project
2) while I'm sure 404 is awesome, I wouldn't buy a whole new setup for this project. A 385 with a good chisel chain will handle a 25" stump in about 35 seconds (22 if you happen to have a masterminded 394 and a super mike chain handy). If you keep the tip out of the dirt, you should get 10 stumps done before you just can't stand the chain any more. Grab a diet coke and some beef jerky, touch up the chain and do it again. Unlike most advice I give, I have actually stumped 30 in a day preparing for the stump grinder

 

[bitzer]

Jon- Kinda figured it was a water oak tho we don't have those here. I meant you takin that stump for burl? I figured under a minute per stump really. It was tough bidding this job. I figured about 10 bucks a stump. Other bids were double that. Its public record what I'm makin anyway so I don't mind sayin. The stumps stay where they lay. That was part of the deal. I like that part.

North- I don't know why I was thinkin I'd need a new bar. Just dumb. That sounds like the ticket really. The 390 is an 88cc saw. With my mods its probably runnin like 110ccs. It'll do.

 

[bitzer]

I wonder if I should bolt some extra pipe to the muffler to blow it farther away from me. I've done some big stumps and that does suck, breathin in the exhaust.

 

[HuskStihl]

Jon- Kinda figured it was a water oak tho we don't have those here. I meant you takin that stump for burl? I figured under a minute per stump really. It was tough bidding this job. I figured about 10 bucks a stump. Other bids were double that. Its public record what I'm makin anyway so I don't mind sayin. The stumps stay where they lay. That was part of the deal. I like that part.

North- I don't know why I was thinkin I'd need a new bar. Just dumb. That sounds like the ticket really. The 390 is an 88cc saw. With my mods its probably runnin like 110ccs. It'll do.

That's a really good gig. I forgot, was 4" the max allowed height? If so, you could keep the chain pretty clean, and depending on acreage, easily do 100 a day. Just sharpen up a bunch of old chains and hit it

I wonder if I should bolt some extra pipe to the muffler to blow it farther away from me. I've done some big stumps and that does suck, breathin in the exhaust.

I was thinking you were doing the big (42" bar, 5 minutes, wedges) stumps. I wouldn't worry about smoke on the ones you're doing. Smart bid!

 

[Gologit]

I'm no expert on removing stumps...I usually use a Cat or explosives...but would it work to cross-hatch the top of the stump deep enough vertically that when you start the regular cut you're only removing a section at a time? I've done that on some oak stumps and it sure saved all that heavy lifting and the wear and tear on the saw.

 

[mdavlee]

Bob the double hump raker won't hurt anything stumping unless you have to file it down past the hump then it will take a little more work. If you could get a .404" tip and swap it on one of the bars and then swap it back later on. Might save some money over a new bar.

 

[Sagetown]

HS might be implying to wash/rinse the bark first to remove some of the sand. Maybe use a garden sprayer.

Philbert

Yep; Pre-Prepping all those stumps with a spray of water would save some chain. Don't know if it'd be worth it or not though.

 

[bitzer]

Most of the stumps are around 16-24". So at 2" above the ground could be more like 24-32". Icepick mentioned to me that a back pack blower would clean out around the root swells pretty well.

 

[northmanlogging]

if yer going to have the chain grinder on hand, then just stick with the 3/8 chain you been running.

And rather then mess around with wrestling the cut of bit of stump, I'll stick a wedge or 2 in, don't bother beating em just stuff em in by hand, takes most of the weight of the "round" off the bar. When you're done cutting it off the saw will usually slip out the back side and the wedges will pop free pretty quick too.

I think the largest one I've done like this was about 5' tall and 5' in dia. took about 20 minutes with an 066 and a 36" bar, big ugly multi stemmed yard tree...

knowing what I know now I should have called the hardwood dude out and made some coin on it....

 

[Trx250r180]

this sounds like a misrable time ,like was said before ,when i cut in dirt ,i bore and cut from the inside out ,seems to help my chain live longer

 

[2dogs]

Bitz, please disregard my earlier post. If you can get all the way thru with a 32, you won't need more than the 390. You'll want to stick a half wrap on it. I like dogging in just above the dirt, angling the bar up a couple inches and rolling thru. The stumps are slightly angled, but the chain stays out of the dirt. You can cut 50 little stumps a day easy, the hard part is dealing with them afterward. Who's responsible for cleaning up the heavy little buggers.
Pure newbie opinions........1)carbide chain is too expensive and hard to sharpen to make it worthwhile for this project
2) while I'm sure 404 is awesome, I wouldn't buy a whole new setup for this project. A 385 with a good chisel chain will handle a 25" stump in about 35 seconds (22 if you happen to have a masterminded 394 and a super mike chain handy). If you keep the tip out of the dirt, you should get 10 stumps done before you just can't stand the chain any more. Grab a diet coke and some beef jerky, touch up the chain and do it again. Unlike most advice I give, I have actually stumped 30 in a day preparing for the stump grinder

Nonsense! It has to be regular Coke. I didn't read the rest of the post.

 

[2dogs]

I'm no expert on removing stumps...I usually use a Cat or explosives...but would it work to cross-hatch the top of the stump deep enough vertically that when you start the regular cut you're only removing a section at a time? I've done that on some oak stumps and it sure saved all that heavy lifting and the wear and tear on the saw.

Not really. Most stumps, at least the low ones have really gnarly wood with the grain running in all directions so cutting down is tough and slow. Worse than cutting regular end grain. Still there are times when that is the only way.

I would use a hard nose bar or have a spare bar. Sometimes using a Pulaski to chip away the bark will save your chain.

 

[paccity]

since i discovered this my saws don't touch stumps. on a 24" stump foot and a half deep sweep roots in five min, spread the mulch , done. have done a lot of private forest where we thinned and stumped to make the land owners private parks look nice with min ground impact. will almost go anywhere you can walk. but at 50k new you have to keep them working. by the way dougfir stumps are way slower than oaks.

 

[madhatte]

How much per acre does running one of those cost a landowner? I might have just got an idea or something.

 

[paccity]

How much per acre does running one of those cost a landowner? I might have just got an idea or something.

100.00 to 125.00 hr. rate go's down the bigger the contract. plus mileage if aways away. really a for low ground disruption. and just put the mass back in the ground.

 

[madhatte]

OK, so ~24" stump is ~5 min, ~$100/hr, that's ~10 stumps/hr, I might have reason to remove several hundred stumps. Gotta think some.