Using a high lift jack for jacking over trees

[Slvrmple72]

Had a codom silver, we put a rope around both stems and used the felling of the one half to pull the other half against the lean away from the house. what a dumb idea that was.... made a real cluster---- pile of branches.

 

[arborjockey]

Dont the stick style of jacks put a lot of pressure on the hinge? :msp_confused: To me if the lean is significant you need a rope to PULL the top 75% of the tree. If its just moderate a little lower. But pushing on the bottom seems like your side loading hinge wood and that leads to blow outs and trees going backwards. I watched a hilbillys push on tree with a backhoe while another guy cut under him. Look bad and it was, the tree blew out. Could of been the operator? I still think setting a rope is kinda quick. The 1st time i saw that thing in Sherrill I pictured lots of misuse. Im no knocking on it i dont understand it.

 

[pdqdl]

Dont the stick style of jacks put a lot of pressure on the hinge? ...

Well, yes, but FAR less force than a wedge. Force on hinge is greater, the closer to the hinge you get with your point of leverage.

You are putting side force to tip the tree about 5 feet up the side of the tree, probably 4' away from the hinge. This is much further away from the hinge than the wedges you may already be quite comfortable using; and they are often less than 15" away from the hinge.

A wedge works a HUGE mechanical disadvantage, and pile a lot of force onto the hinge. Not quite so bad with the long jack, and practically 1:1 with a rope tied high in the tree. Obviously, the rope gives the most mechanical leverage, but often is not necessary or practical.

Hence, this thread.

 

[pdqdl]

... I watched a hilbillys push on tree with a backhoe while another guy cut under him. Look bad and it was, the tree blew out. Could of been the operator? ...

You got it right, it was some hillbillies that didn't do it right. Pushing trees over with a big machine can be quite safe, but not if you do it wrong.

I damn near put a big cottonwood on top of my bobcat once, mostly due to my lack of experience with that machine (and pushing over trees with it). Done properly, they can deliver many tons of sideways force to tip a tree. In general, I think pushing trees over with bobcats is not a good idea, since their bucket height is taller than their wheelbase is long. A backhoe would be a formidable tree pusher.

 

[2treeornot2tree]

I have used a big track hoe to push trees over as I cut, but I don't think I would use a backhoe, not enoguh weight and it can't get as high up in the tree to push.

 

[pdqdl]

A big track hoe doesn't even need a chainsaw to take out big trees. They just rip them out of the ground and tell them to go away.

The biggest cottonwoods in our area are nothing more than sturdy weeds to a big track hoe. I watched one taking out 3'-5' dbh cottonwoods at the top of 40' slope once. It only took about 10 minutes per tree, and that included the time it took to dig a path up the 2:1 slope from the bottom of Brush Creek. That excavator then tossed the tree down to the bottom of the creek, and another large excavator broke it into little pieces and loaded it into end-dump semi trucks.

There wasn't a chainsaw on the job, and they got rid of about 1/2 mile of fully mature cottonwood trees.

 

[2treeornot2tree]

Yeah I have seen them push over trees, but most times they have to dig up the roots on one side. When I used them, the root balls stayed, so we didn't want to tear everything up so much so we used the saw with the track hoe.

 

[Rickytree]

Old boss pushed over monster's with his 570 case loader. Got a video of him pulling one over which he wasn't a big fan of. I asked him which was better and he replied that pushing was better because you have more control. Used one of the forks to push as high as they could reach. Man you'd see the huge tree just shake. Biggest thing is not cutting through the hinge especially when there was side weight. So much faster, can't wait till i gots my 570XLT with cd and one 12 under the seat.

 

[treemandan]

I didn't read this whole thread so forgive me if this has been answered.

Why are you bothering to mess around with throw balls on those things? Why don't you just grab every rope you got worthy of pulling on, fly up there in your bucket and set em all..... 25 minutes max and you have an easy safe way of yanking those things over..... you'd spend more time than that screwing around cutting notches to fit your jack in.

Most likely he would BUT I doubt the head of the operation ain't interested in paying him to bring his bucket ( you know how that goes) BUT I am glad you brought it up.

 

[treemandan]

oh yeah.... if you don't have enough ropes tie your long ones twice, then attach your fiddle block on the ground.... voila

And yet another spastastic idea.

That whole job looks like fun fun fun but I think the dunderhead in charge is mucking it up.

P.S. spastastic is good

 

[2treeornot2tree]

Was setup to go out friday to drop the trees from the bucket, and chip the branches with flaggers sub contracted (flagger force). Then I get a call today, he and his dad used a backhoe to push over the trees while his dads wife flagged traffic. Said it went pretty good. I thought to myself it probably would have went better if you knew how to run a saw. So now they dont need me friday, I am now out $1000, and then he asks me if I am mad. What you think? Idiot At least I got paid for what I did so far the other day. That was quite funny, he somehow forgot I told him $50 a hour, and was thinking I was charging him $35 a hour, and not charging him for drive time. That didnt work out to well for him, I got $50 a hour plus drive time.

 

[pdqdl]

This seems like a good time to post a pic about pushing things over. Naturally, the rules for sending a tree over with a jack are not any different from using a loader bucket. Obviously, the higher you are pushing against the tree, the more leverage your machine will have to send the tree in the desired direction.

The big risk in pushing a tree over is two-fold:
1.You must be certain that you have enough power available to send the tree over. (true for all tree felling)
2. You need to secure the trunk of the tree by some means to prevent jumping off the stump and falling onto the machine. The risk of this occurring is greatest if the tree will still be hanging over the machine when the hinge is likely to break.

Make the notch first, then put in the back-cut considerably lower than the notch. This creates two sections of wood that are firmly pressed against each other by "gravity opposing the machine". When the machine pushes the tree over center, the force is removed and the tree goes the direction you wanted.

This method corrects for some of the risks incurred while pushing a tree over with a tree. I strongly suggest chaining trunk and stump for trees that are particularly prone to barber-chair.
View attachment 225377

You comments or questions are welcome. No one taught me this, and I have not seen it elsewhere. I am sure that some folks will think it a crazy method to cut down a tree, but it worked every time I used it. Obviously, this is a higher risk maneuver than just putting in a rope and pulling hard. Sometimes that isn't an option.

 

[treemandan]

Was setup to go out friday to drop the trees from the bucket, and chip the branches with flaggers sub contracted (flagger force). Then I get a call today, he and his dad used a backhoe to push over the trees while his dads wife flagged traffic. Said it went pretty good. I thought to myself it probably would have went better if you knew how to run a saw. So now they dont need me friday, I am now out $1000, and then he asks me if I am mad. What you think? Idiot At least I got paid for what I did so far the other day. That was quite funny, he somehow forgot I told him $50 a hour, and was thinking I was charging him $35 a hour, and not charging him for drive time. That didnt work out to well for him, I got $50 a hour plus drive time.

Yeah, it sounds like you would have been better off dead than to put in with that guy anyway. " it went pretty good" means " holy crap what a pain in the ass it was". " dad's wife flagging" means " poor lady almost caused 6 accidents, 7 if you count her".

Its always a laugh.

 

[2treeornot2tree]

He said it sounds like the guy wants him to finish the last 5 acres of the property. I know he gave them a price of $65,000. So when he asks me for help again, I am gonna tell him its gonna be a flat $30,000. If he dont like it he can go get his daddy and his backhoe.

 

[2treeornot2tree]

This seems like a good time to post a pic about pushing things over. Naturally, the rules for sending a tree over with a jack are not any different from using a loader bucket. Obviously, the higher you are pushing against the tree, the more leverage your machine will have to send the tree in the desired direction.

The big risk in pushing a tree over is two-fold:
1.You must be certain that you have enough power available to send the tree over. (true for all tree felling)
2. You need to secure the trunk of the tree by some means to prevent jumping off the stump and falling onto the machine. The risk of this occurring is greatest if the tree will still be hanging over the machine when the hinge is likely to break.

Make the notch first, then put in the back-cut considerably lower than the notch. This creates two sections of wood that are firmly pressed against each other by "gravity opposing the machine". When the machine pushes the tree over center, the force is removed and the tree goes the direction you wanted.

This method corrects for some of the risks incurred while pushing a tree over with a tree. I strongly suggest chaining trunk and stump for trees that are particularly prone to barber-chair.
View attachment 225377

You comments or questions are welcome. No one taught me this, and I have not seen it elsewhere. I am sure that some folks will think it a crazy method to cut down a tree, but it worked every time I used it. Obviously, this is a higher risk maneuver than just putting in a rope and pulling hard. Sometimes that isn't an option.

I dont think you would want to back cut under your wedge, If the hinge brakes it could jump off and the loaders gonna eat it. I would cut it just like I would any other tree, maybe leave a little bit more hinge.

 

[treemandan]

He said it sounds like the guy wants him to finish the last 5 acres of the property. I know he gave them a price of $65,000. So when he asks me for help again, I am gonna tell him its gonna be a flat $30,000. If he dont like it he can go get his daddy and his backhoe.

When they say " 65K" they are lying. And if 65 ain't a lie then the price should be 85. Come on, this guy does not sound like he knows his ass from a hole in the ground. Sounds like the guy is in over his head and trying to squeeze dimes out of nickles.

Whatever, I know i have had enough of people wanting my expertise while they circle jerk.

 

[2treeornot2tree]

Yeah I dont know, he said the other prices were $120,000 but hes been known to bs. Oh well, is what it is. I priced a job the other day with 9 pretty big birch trees amongst a bunch of other trees. Was gonna give you a call if I get it and see if you wanted to climb for me for a day.

 

[treemandan]

Yeah I dont know, he said the other prices were $120,000 but hes been known to bs. Oh well, is what it is. I priced a job the other day with 9 pretty big birch trees amongst a bunch of other trees. Was gonna give you a call if I get it and see if you wanted to climb for me for a day.

:msp_thumbup:

 

[pdqdl]

I dont think you would want to back cut under your wedge, If the hinge brakes it could jump off and the loaders gonna eat it. I would cut it just like I would any other tree, maybe leave a little bit more hinge.

Well...how deep the back cut is placed is determined by the chainsaw operator, not my hasty drawing. Not necessarily drawn to scale, each cut would be determined by the situation. Clearly, you would want to leave enough hinge wood to hold, yet cut deep enough to allow the machine to push the tree over.

You got the risk right: placing the cut low prevents the hinge from breaking until the tree bends over in the correct direction.

 

[mattfr12]

:msp_thumbup:

What is he doing for 65k that's around one of our biggest bids? Just curious to what the job entailed. Ours required two cranes and picking out over 100-150 small to medium trees over trailers then a single phase line.