Felling Diagrams

[grweldon]

The diagrams are great!  What would be even more helpful is to include why you might use one over the other.  Thank you John.

[John Vander]

I put these diagrams on the forum hoping that they would be helpful in promoting safe workmanship. There's a couple more I will add with some explanations too.

[Full Chisel]

Looking like a lot of work went in those. With respect to safe workmanship, the diagrams which demonstrate bore cutting are assuming a cutter is ready to do that kind of work. Before you go into that, be sure you understand the implications of cutting with the bar tip regarding the danger of kickback. You feed the bar in from the lower quarter of the bar tip. I'm concerned with what would happen to a saw user that plunges straight in.

[John Vander]

Full Chisel, that's a very good point. Bore techniques produces safe felling, but to master the bore cut take practice. Just plunging the saw into the wood results in some serious kickback!

[beenthere]

I've found that if the angle isn't right when beginning the bore cut, the tip just bounces out.
No serious kick-back, but some kick-out that doesn't flip the bar or chain towards the operator. 
Just what I find anyway....

[John Vander]

BORE CUT TECHNIQUE

The attack corner of the bar first enters the wood at full throttle to make a bore cut . As the bar enters, the saw is brought around. Go slow and do not push hard on the saw. The cutters are working hard to clear a lot of wood, so you need to give the saw time. Dull cutters makes this job hell, so make sure you have a sharp chain. (picture to follow...under construction)

[John Vander]

On the initial entry I've found that the bar just bounces off, but when the saw is in the wood, there is some unfriendly push back if the bar gets too much wood. Since the bar cannot fly upward as with a standard kickback, the only place for the saw to go is backward. A bit nasty.

In thread #28 I said "kickback". My apologies. I meant "pushback."

[beenthere]

I have trouble looking at your great graphics that have the upside down or backward chainsaw shown.
Any way that you can replace that saw?
I think it sends a wrong message to any newbie trying to figure out just what is happening in your diagrams.
I may be the only one, but it hits me like a sharp stick in the eye.

[John Vander]

beenthere, anyway I can replace the pics? I could try to remake them, but is there a way I can take out the old ones?

[beenthere]

You can add new pics and modify your posts, without too much fanfare.

The last graphic, there appears more to be wrong than just an upside down chainsaw. It is a top handled one as well, which I wouldn't recommend for boring.
And to me, the graphic is backward as one wouldn't hold a saw upside down to begin that plunge/bore cut safely. The sweeping arrow would come in from the other direction (first pointing away from the hinge to begin and then along the hinge as the bore gets deeper). Or just move the vertical line representing the hinge (should be a wider line for a good hinge) over to the right of the vertical arrow representing the bore cut.
They just need some good editing, but I don't want to or mean to take away from your good effort to make up good graphics.
On the other hand, I think a newbie to felling trees would be either real confused or try some things that wouldn't work very well.
Has to be your decision.

[John Vander]

Sure thing mate, I'll work on the diagrams to make them more accurate. Thanx for the comments and info.

[John Vander]

I modified the pictures where the saw is held horizontal as to avoid confusion, leaving only the bar of the saw to show where it goes. In diagrams where the saw is held vertical I left it as such.

[exSW]

Really good diagrams.I used a cut the other day that I didn't see.Made my notch,then did two wing cuts from the corners of the notch that nearly met up on the backside(oblong shaped trunk),then made my plunge cut through the base of the wings leaving a hinge.Then powered straight back following the wing cuts.Heavy oak leaner went exactly where I wanted it,with no split trunk.I've been eyeballing this tree all summer to come up with this plan.   

[Piston]

Thanks for taking the time to post the diagrams, and the tips on bore cutting.

[John Vander]

exSW: That's an interesting combo with the bore cut and wing cuts. I really prefer bore cuts above conventional felling methods. I sometimes also add wedges to either side of the bore cut to give a bit of extra lift on trees that don't have that much lean. Someone might say that it is not needed to do bore cuts on trees with little lean, but bore cuts keep the wood in one piece, and there is no chance of the back cut opening up too soon before the hinge is properly prepared. I find that with the bore cuts I can take my time and set up the hinge precisely. Here in Japan, the trees are standing so compact in some areas that precise felling is needed to put them down without creating hung up trees. A well prepared hinge is made possible by using bore cuts.
Piston: Glad I could be of help. Safe felling mate! ;)

[John Vander]

 

 

BURNT OUT TREE

This diagram is for felling a tree that has suffered fire damage. It is advised though to take extra precaution with trees like these. The yellow area is the scarf. The red shows the hinge. Try as best to prepare the hinge in sound wood only. Bore in to test the soundness of the wood. Tying it up to avoid crumbling during the fall helps. Cut around the back or bore to make hinges on both sides first.

[exSW]

exSW: That's an interesting combo with the bore cut and wing cuts. I really prefer bore cuts above conventional felling methods. I sometimes also add wedges to either side of the bore cut to give a bit of extra lift on trees that don't have that much lean. Someone might say that it is not needed to do bore cuts on trees with little lean, but bore cuts keep the wood in one piece, and there is no chance of the back cut opening up too soon before the hinge is properly prepared. I find that with the bore cuts I can take my time and set up the hinge precisely. Here in Japan, the trees are standing so compact in some areas that precise felling is needed to put them down without creating hung up trees. A well prepared hinge is made possible by using bore cuts.
Piston: Glad I could be of help. Safe felling mate! ;)

Part of the problem was 22" tree and 20" bar.The wing cuts made for  a through and through plunge cut.The tree was  an field border oak leaner.East/West border with the tree leaning and growing towards the southern exposure sun(northern hemisphere).   

[John Vander]

Sounds like you did your homework before felling that leaner! Yeah, good planning results in good work. I can see how the wing cuts helped to establish the hinge on the opposite side.

[John Vander]

 

 

BUCKING

This diagram shows how to buck logs with top bind and bottom bind.

P: position of faller
T: tension
C: compression

Cut No. 1 is made by reaching over the log and making a vertical cut on the opposite side. The arrows show the direction the saw travels.

[John Vander]

 

 

ENLARGING SCARF

This is a cutting sequence diagram for enlarging the scarf.

[beenthere]

Cut No. 1 is made by reaching over the log and making a vertical cut on the opposite side.

A reason for this cut and the other one on the sides is for ??  Maybe a bar that won't reach through the log?

For compression on top of log, I sometimes bore cut just under the top and drop down. This leaves some wood in compression that acts like a wedge.

But the diagrams don't rule out reading the combination tension points on a log or limb to stay out of trouble. A lot of my bucking cuts are made on logs that are in a pile.

Plus need to take into account where the log lies on the ground or off, so's to keep the bar out of the dirt.

[John Vander]

This bucking method is handy where bar length is lacking, but it is also good for where tension and compression levels are very high. Yeah, long trees especially lying in piles contain a variety of bind and it can be difficult to precisely determine them. The idea of this cut is to cut away at the wood so that pressures are gradually released. If the tree was touching the ground, cutting over the top would be unwise as the bar tip would end up in the soil. This is used for top or bottom bind trees suspended above the ground to some degree. We get a lot of typhoons here in Japan that do some real damage to woodlots. Windthrown cedars are like bombs that go off when that pressure is released. I have to work very carefully so I won't get my head ripped off. I use a variety of cutting techniques to remove storm damaged trees. Find many trees where end bind is combined with side bind and torque bind ( aka twisters, where the tree makes a spinning motion when pressure is released, like the turning of a drive shaft).

beenthere, those logs in piles..how did they get there?

[Thehardway]

I like this post and find the diagrams helpful. Most terms are somewhat intuitive but not sure I understand all of the terms being used completely like  the term "strap".  Is there an official glossary of felling terms somewhere?  Perhaps a sticky with it would be useful? Thanks for all the hard work that went into this.

How about some info on trees with multiple trunks?  seems like we have a lot of maple, ash and oak that like to grow with three trunks just above waist height.  Felling at the ground would be unpredictable at best and cutting each individually limits options.  They can also limit the saw positions as well as the safe position of the sawyer.  These are the ones that always have me strategically planning.

[John Vander]

The strap is the piece of holding wood that keeps the tree from falling while the faller prepares the hinge. I will work on some double leader diagrams.

[John Vander]

BORE CUT DIAGRAM



 

The red section on the nose of the bar shows the kick back area. The green area is the attack corner of the bar that enters the wood first before the saw is brought parallel with the scarf.