What's the dumbest thing you've ever done?

[sedanman]

What is the one thing that when it when it was over made you wonder how you got out alive. I've had several of these (mostly car related). The dumbest chainsaw realted thing I did was helping an old man start his new chainsaw without first explaining the throttle lock and activating the chainbrake, he panicked and tried to hand me the saw..........BAR END FIRST ON THROTTLE LOCK, I had to back pedal quick to not get cut up real bad.

 

[tony marks]

lets see now. they are to many to mention. how about sending a young man out to cut some wood to fire place length and an hour or so later, finding him out there making enough smoke to send smoke signals, an mad as h---
yep ,i put the chain on backwards. later now

 

[Gypo Logger]

This is without a doubt, the craziest thing I ever did.
John

 

[Gypo Logger]

Here's another very stupid thing I did, but there aint no cure.
The picture was taken in 1980, the first year I ever used a saw to make a living as a tree spacer on Vancouver Island. I am the one standing up, I was only 26 then.
John

 

[FSburt]

hey gypo i take it that tree spacing is the same as precommercial thinning. Cool shot. My dumbest thing was trying to stop a moving chain with my hands, real smart move but I caught myself at the last second and thought what the hell did you almost do. I probably would not be sawing today if I had did that because i was using a brand new stihl round chisel chain. I got the adrenaline rush about 2 min later when it hit me what almost happened. The other thing was not staying at the stump long enough while falling a snag and smashing a picnic table. I got out there when the tree atarted moving and left alittle too much on one side and watched in horror as the tree closed in the face and veered off towards the table much to my crews enjoyment at seeeing the boss f up. I ended up spending my weekend fixing the table. PS gypo are those trees in the background Doug Firs? and what spacing were you thinning to.

 

[Gypo Logger]

Hi Burt, its been awhile since then, but the the trees in the forground are either Western Red, Yellow Cyprus or Hemlock, as these trees always have a whip like leader. I suspect there was Doug Fir in there as well. I believed we spaced to 2 metres in this sized wood. It poured out all day and just as we finished this beautiful rainbow came out. We all had Husky 266's then, a bit of overkill, but a good entry level saw. we got anywhere from 150- 275$/acre then depending on stems/acre, but it was the most physically demanding job I have ever done.
John

 

[Gypo Logger]

Photo Point is gone and I am just going thru a pile of floppies to find pics that I'd forgotten about. Heres a Black Cherry log I got 900 U.S for that I sold to my Southern friends in Ohio.
Please Lord, send me some more Cherry that we can call Green Gold and give me the serenity to know the difference.
John

 

[D]

The stupidest thing I ever did was own a McCullough.

Seriously, the stupidest thing I ever did was tie a rope around my waist and throw it over a branch....then tie it to the bumper of a truck. Instant Hi-Ranger. It was also on a very busy street in Denver. It was a huge 40ft dead Jap Elm. What an idiot. It was worth doing, I have a good story to tell. Luckily I am alive to tell it. I think I was 16. My truck was a 1953 Dodge D500 with a 20ft stake bed. That huge truck had a 218 in it. Was an awesome engine, but underpowered. It managed to lift me up the tree though.

 

[FSburt]

Hey gypo I totally agree on the physical part of the thinning it is hard to describe to somone who thinks all you do is cut small trees but when there are 5000 trees per acre and you have to take it down to 200 thats alot of constant on the trigger sawing. Nothing taken away from the procutters who fell the big wood with big saws but there is no way to get the weight of the saw off your body like cutting a big stick where you can dog in and get the weight onto the dogs for a few minutes. Teh only thing you can do when cutting little guys is to distibute the weight to your thigh by keeping the saw body as close to your body as possible. I know I probably turned afew heads when I stated how many hours on the stump we spend thinning but gypo you've been there and understand. The rewarding part is when all the slash is piled and we get to go back and see how it came out after all the work and then 20 30 yrs later when the stand is ready for its first commercial thinning entry. Just curious gypo how did you guys deal with hung up trees.

 

[Gypo Logger]

Hi Burt, I to, always wanted to go back and see how the trees have grown 20 years later after the thinning.
We often did camp work and shared facilities with West Coast Fallers, one faller told me that if he was going to hire someone to work in the woods he would hire a spacer. I still hope to take him up on that one since a West Coast Faller has the most elitest job in the bush next to the one I have. lol.
Hang ups were dealt with in several manners, usually with a pusher tree ( extremely dangerous). This method sometimes resulted in what we called a " teepee", with several trees hung up on the one you had originaly hung up, so you were forced to enter the teepee and sever the offending tree and run. ( even more dangerous). Generally I just plunged the leaner at shoulder height and cut out of it and repeated until the S of a B was down.
Most of the time it just flowed and you had good and bad days.
I remember when I first started and we had finished a strip and were walking out. The forman asked me to dump one he saw that was to tight. Obligingly I cranked up the 266 and stump jumped it right across his hardhat, wet leader first.
Anyway his hardhat tilted down with the impact and broke his cigarette kinda in half and it dangled there all wet and out.
He cursed me with every four letter word in his limited vocabulary as everyone laughed like mad except me.
It took him 3 days to forgive me after he realized I felt worse about it than he did.
Gyrochopper

 

[John Paul Sanborn]

19 years old, topping out and chunking down dead pines in NC. one my gaffs usnk in the rot.

Topping out a dead tree without a wedge or pull rope with me.

Cutting into my tie in spar. I realized it before I got too far. Friday, long storm week five years ago.

 

[homelite360]

my stupidest thing i ever did was cut my leg open with a poulan. i still haven't lived that one down with my friends yet. every time i get another saw they ask me if i am going to really cut my leg off this time or make another half ass attempt at it.

 

[Walt Galer]

Howdy,

Parking my rig downhill from a bushler, who was one of my test logger's. As I came up on him up on the mountain-side: "By the way Walt. Where did you leave your rig?" (Smash, crash, flip, slide.) Fortunately he missed the rent-car! The 3 foot diameter pistol grip went by about 75 feet off the bow! To this day, I know he did it deliberate just to get a rise out of the factory man. (There was no way a man as good as this one was going to let a tree get away downhill and be made into slivers).

Regards,
Walt Galer

 

[Gypo Logger]

Hi Walt, I was there and I saw that!

 

[rbtree]

OUCH!!!!!!

What's that 4" branch doing THERE???

Oh ouch on the candy apple paint job too!!

Nice Jonsy tho!!

 

[tony marks]

he is smilin so he had to have good insurance. still ouch is the right wd.if i did that id have to move way back in the woods somewhere.so nobody could hear me crying an my wife laughing later now

 

[Dieseldog]

Better hope someone in the Ministry of Justice doesent see this picture.They may want us to qualify and register our chainsaws!

 

[Keener]

Oh come now lads! I know there has to be more stories about trees not cooperating or close calls of some description!
So how about one of mine.
Well this guy from England is visisting B.C so he calls up and asks about work, says he did climbing and such back home.
Anyway turns out he can climb and seems to have some skills so on a job in our snob hill district I let him fall a red cedar we had already rigged a pull line in.
Well the stem was straight but most of the branches where on the back side over the cedar panel fence and garden and road.
Everything is going great , two of us are starting to pull the tree in the direction we want but he figures it's not going down fast enough so he cuts more holding wood, all the rest of the holding wood.
So now my helper and I are skiing across the lawn hanging on to the rope with the tree rapidly falling across the fence,garden, road ect.
So while the old lady in the Mercedes waits we cut the tree of the road then garden and pick up the fence bits.
To top it all off the lady we are working for comes out just then surveys the devastation, and says "you boys are doing a super job" she smiles a goes back inside.
Anyway we fixed up the fence the garden was fine and alls well that ends well I guess.
Now lets hear your stories lads, don't be shy.

 

[mikey]

DUMB THING

Many year ago,with my first saw in hand,I agreed to trim one of my dads huge Chestnut trees.Against his advise,I position the 24'extension ladder incorrectly and climbed on up.I started cutting this large limb,my dad advised a partial bottom cut first but I was going to show him I knew what i was doing.Everything was just fine until that limb broke,swung around and knocked my ladder out from under me.I didn't hear my dad laughing until I got up and tried to look like the fall didn't hurt or scare me.I guess from time to time I needed little reminders to listen to my dad

 

[dbabcock]

Bought a Poulan 2300 POS.