History Channel - High Tech yard stuff w/ Davey Tree too

[M.D. Vaden]

Did you folks catch that History Channel show today or tonight on High Tech yard stuff?

It included grass, sod, irrigation, etc., but eventually had a segment showing Davey Tree and tree moving.

 

[John Paul Sanborn]

Was that the one with the monster tree spade that they keep one on each side of the rockies?

 

[eagleknight97]

No, brand new episode of Modern Marvels

 

[M.D. Vaden]

Was that the one with the monster tree spade that they keep one on each side of the rockies?

Seems they flashed a tree spade momentarily, but primarily, it was where they move the massive saucer rootballs on pipes and beams, using jacks, cranes and moving equipment on tracks.

In one of the pre-commercial trivia blips, they mentioned a record move by Davey tree, of an oak which was over one million pounds - I'm guessing that may include the rootball too.

 

[clearance]

Hi M.D., I was recently looking at some heavy haul trucking pictures around Ft. McMurray Alberta, they had this huge piece of oil plant machinery on a trailer with many, many axles, it was pulled by three big rigs and pushed by four, massive, the biggest load moved they said. It was 1.7 million lbs. Davey is making this 1 million lbs. thing up up, maybe 100 000 lbs, think about it, dirt is only a couple of thousand lbs. a cubic yard.

 

[rbtree]

Clearance, I've read about a few tree moves that weighed 100-200 tons....

 

[clearance]

Clearance, I've read about a few tree moves that weighed 100-200 tons....

Still only 400 000 lbs. (200 tons) but a pretty big tree none the less.

 

[John Paul Sanborn]

The mega moves that they do are same site relocations. They need to use a certain area of the landscape, some one says that they have to keep that old tree, so they do a 2 crane lift onto rails and move it slowly over to a location a few hundred yards away.

 

[M.D. Vaden]

Actually, the soil deliveries and removals I've done for landscaping, have me recalling that one cubic yard of soil - especially moist clay - is about 2700 to 2900 pound per cubic yard.

Not far from 3000 lbs.

Two online references said that moist clay can weigh up to 125 lbs. per cubic foot, and in that case, each cubic yard could be upwards of 3200 lbs.

If a massive tree's rootball - circular, were equivelent to 10 yds. long x 10 yds. wide, and say, 2 yds. deep, that would be 200 cubic yds.

200 x 3000 lbs. is 600,000 lbs.

I could imagine a massive oak tree's trunk, limbs and leaves weighing as much as 200,000 lbs. or more.

So it seems that a 1,000,000 pound move may be realistic.

 

[turnkey4099]

The first of two expansion joints for the new Tacoma Narrows bridge just completed its delivery from Minisota to the bridge site. It was stopped due to overweight at the Port of Entry into WAshington from Idaho. Too much weight concentrated on some of the axles. It was held at the port for almost a month while they tried to add more axles. Bridge company finally hired a new company to complete the more. solution was to add trailer/axles to the side makeing up a unit that occupied 2 lanes. Restricted to no more than 12 mph for the remaining 300 miles. I don't have the total weight but the reports inidicate that the trailers/axles needed to spread the load out weighed at least as much as the unit. Under a million IIRC. The second (and last) unit is on the way hauled by the original company (Big Boat Movers or something like that) on thier original trailer then transfering to the new company again at the Wash POE

Big Boats says their company _may_ survive but they are teettering on bankruptcy due to this contract.

Harry K
Harry K

 

[clearance]

Actually, the soil deliveries and removals I've done for landscaping, have me recalling that one cubic yard of soil - especially moist clay - is about 2700 to 2900 pound per cubic yard.

Not far from 3000 lbs.

Two online references said that moist clay can weigh up to 125 lbs. per cubic foot, and in that case, each cubic yard could be upwards of 3200 lbs.

If a massive tree's rootball - circular, were equivelent to 10 yds. long x 10 yds. wide, and say, 2 yds. deep, that would be 200 cubic yds.

200 x 3000 lbs. is 600,000 lbs.

I could imagine a massive oak tree's trunk, limbs and leaves weighing as much as 200,000 lbs. or more.

So it seems that a 1,000,000 pound move may be realistic.

Not going to argue, but what did they move it with, like how many axles on the trailer, how many push pull rigs, 10 yards wide (30 feet) you say. I would like to see a picture. Should be pretty easy to tell from that.

 

[M.D. Vaden]

Not going to argue, but what did they move it with, like how many axles on the trailer, how many push pull rigs, 10 yards wide (30 feet) you say. I would like to see a picture. Should be pretty easy to tell from that.

I'll bet this one here on the left if fairly big. Hard to know for sure, but estimating from the size of machines etc., I'd say that that's probably a 30' wide rootball - fifteen feet either side of the trunk.

http://www.davey.com/cms/davey_tree/298f33b59927ab70/index.html

It seems that moving one twice as heavy, would simply require doubling the supports, beams and rolling equipment.

I found two online pages, referring to a 353 ton oak moved in Auburndale, FL, and written about in a 2006 National Geographic magazine issue. That's slightly over 700,000 lbs.

One extension service webpage from Colorado, referred to a tree in excess of one million pounds.

By setting the show calendar back to yesterday, I found the description on the History Channel website for Yard Tech in Modern Marvels, which reads...

In the 21st century, turf grass is the number one crop grown in the U.S. When suburbia exploded after World War II, turf became the defining characteristic of nearly every yard. First, it's off to the research greenhouse facility at The Scotts Company to learn how grass seed is bred for special characteristics. Then pay a visit to the Toro Company, a big name in lawnmowers. The Rain Bird Company and its automatic sprinkler systems is the life giver to thirsty lawns across the country, and The Davey Company specializes in moving trees in excess of one million pounds. Finally, take a trip to California Waterscapes and watch as a crew installs a waterfall and koi pond.

 

[adam]

San Diego Zoo @ treemovers.com, quite impressive.

 

[SilentElk]

Wow, talking about real tree moving! Here I was thinking about this 144" tree spade I have somewhere on my computer. You guys are talking much bigger.

 

[Ax-man]

I finally got a chance to see this, we have On Demand as part of our cable service, this segment showed up in the History Channel, Modern Marvels section just recently.

The mower, turf grass and irrigation part was OK but did nothing for me as I have no interest in mowing grass, nor making the lawn look nice. That kind of stuff is for someone else not me.

The tree removal with the chipper was one of the better ones I have seen on TV, at least the climber's had PPE, too bad they were using Husky saws.

The tree moving which is the basis of this thread was interesting, especially when they showed the old way of moving and transporting a big tree with the Irish Whip or English Spar. I would have like to have seen more pictures on that as it is very similar to what I have thought of building for moving trees, if it ever happens that is. Tried a search on the net for at least a picture, no results.

I was surprized to see those pipes under the rootball of that Oak they were moving be left under the tree and just buried the pipes in the backfill part of the job without removing them. I don't know if this would effect how the tree grows later on it's life or not. Is this a common practice when moving a big tree like that??? I can see the pipes and probaly the I-beams as being figured into the cost of the job and just written off at the end of the job. I am sure the people that move stuctures do the same thing as each is different and have to custom make these supports for each job, if they can be reused on another job so much the better.

Larry

 

[beelsr]

I was surprized to see those pipes under the rootball of that Oak they were moving be left under the tree and just buried the pipes in the backfill part of the job without removing them. I don't know if this would effect how the tree grows later on it's life or not. Is this a common practice when moving a big tree like that??? I can see the pipes and probaly the I-beams as being figured into the cost of the job and just written off at the end of the job. I am sure the people that move stuctures do the same thing as each is different and have to custom make these supports for each job, if they can be reused on another job so much the better.

I still haven't seen this episode (missed it again) but if they used the pipes as rollers and left them buried under the rootball when done, yeah, this is done and it makes for an, ummm, interesting future removal...

 

[BoesTreeService]

Biggest ever moved...

On page 28 of this months (May 2007) issue of Arbor Age there is an ad that shows a photo claiming to be the "biggest ever moved", and is labeled below the photo as a Live Oak Tree. Its only a quarter page ad and the photo is tiny but the tree appears to be quite huge, perhaps 40-50 foot root ball. Interestingly enough, the ad is not for Davey Tree or tree moving, but for Superthrive tree food. It claims the large tree moving was enabled by their product. Maybe someone with a decent scanner can post that photo on here. I might go to the superthrive website and check it out.