Intentional Barber Chair

  1. very safe
  2. on target
  3. effective

did |I mention very safe:baaa:
probablly the single most important thing a young feller/arbo can learn from

Dan, thanks for taking the time to do this!
if you cut a 1/3 or more perpendicular to the lay and through the side you want the bc to settle onto and finish the cut opposite, it has been my experience the tree fall opposite of you, leaving the a bc between you and the dropped stem
I call it notchless felling but more importantly for me in removal of long over reaching limbs with the tendency to barber chain. call that around the world cut.
another thing the more into the root flare the less chance for bc, due to the nature of root flare wood being considerably more tenacious.
We talcked a bit about this in past and I also like back cut less felling at times. Sapwood is wonderf;ul thing
Have a beer and think about this shit for a minute. It is cracked up to be!
 
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Yea, the intentional barber chair is right up there with landing on the moon, the splitting of the atom, the advent of Penicillin, and "natural" looking breast implants! WTF?
 
Intentional barber chairs, notchless felling, sniffing poo-poo on your finger, and falling out of trees. Im starting see a connection/theme here!
 
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We did achieve the objective of dropping the trees in the street without damaging the pavement. We had enough other wood on that job, and could have used the gum to pad the fall of the ash, so that we really didn't need to create a barber chair to achieve that objective. So I have to admit that I did it more for the fun of trying/videoing something new than out of necessity.

However this is not the first time I have used an intentional barber chair and I actually have used the experiences of trying to create them, to come up with a couple tricks for how to avoid them.. So there is usually something that can be learned by paying careful attention to what actually does happen.

I have seen a lot of guys using ratchet straps to keep trees from splitting.. You now have seen what taking 8 wraps with some old half inch line can do.. Pretty easy and effective safety move when needed..

Rico,
what do you think was dangerous about that job?.. Obviously no one was anywhere near the tree when it moved, and the tree wasn't going anywhere until pulled.. And the skid steer absolutely was keeping the split trunk from coming towards the saw op when the relief cut was made...

Working in the woods with tall straight grained trees will effect your viewpoint. I suspect you may know someone that was seriously injured or killed by BBC.. East coast suburban hardwoods are so much different, with the lowest crotch often being just a few feet high.. almost hard to BBC trees here.. Can happen up in the tree though on heavy front leaning leads... that's where the tricks come in handy... If nothing else just wrap them up...
 
One thing you can say for sure about my vids..

they have been the most controversial tree vids out there if you look at the response on the forums over the years.. Article on the tapered hinge was the same way, with some guys saying "I learned that the first time my Dad took me into the woods when I was 12.. You might as well write an article about where to put the gas and oil"... at the same time Ken Palmer told me that his scientists in Germany had proved it didn't work..
 
rico said:
Very Dangerous.
Pointless.
Ineffective

Did I mention dangerous?


I could go on and on here, but I think ya get the point!
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I agree totally stupidest video and thing I’ve ever seen, why put yourself in danger or anyone else? Easily could of notched that one like you know the way your supposed to, putting videos up like that and untrained guys watching and trying that which I hope no one ever does is a recipe for a fatality. That’s all from me, any of my guys ever did that and survived would be on the unemployment line
 
I have done felling with similar purpose by just ding an ultra high scarf/notch and rigging a heavy duty catch rope to prevent the trunk hitting concrete below where the trunk would normally strike. It takes extra time but is more reliable as bbc can often fall off the side of the stump and damage anything below it. Also it allows one to lower the trunk to the ground rather than push it off. Helps to use a rubber bumper under the rigging point strop to take the shock.

I have considered this technique to land trees on the road but as seen in the last tree to fall, there was a heavy strike to the blacktop that didn't penetrate right through. You will often find there are cracks or micro cracks where the impact happened and water gets through on the next rain. Rain penetration will cause a soft spot that vehicles passing will buckle and break and the road will need to be patched. The damage is deferred and assumed to not be there.

I think everyone knows someone that has dropped trees on the road before, and I often do if I know the road is definitely scheduled to be replaced very soon. But if not, then **may** be a little irresponsible to make this standard practice, depending on road type and weight/structure of tree etc
 
Daniel said:
Rico,
what do you think was dangerous about that job?.. Obviously no one was anywhere near the tree when it moved, and the tree wasn't going anywhere until pulled.. And the skid steer absolutely was keeping the split trunk from coming towards the saw op when the relief cut was made....
Click to expand...

The value in the video, is its another of a very dangerous condition that many may not see very often in our work environment because most of us use proper felling techniques (of which you champion in so many of your videos/posts) to avoid it at all costs because of its unpredictablity. Normally this condition is not captured on video because of its unpredictability. So the video has value. But intentionally causing a tree to barber chair in any situation is dangerous and absolutely useless in almost all urban environments (10:35 ish shows a limb broken directly on the pavement... what you were trying to avoid) Yes the sawer was not near when the tree split, but even you said you did not expect it to stay aloft which creates another, separate hazard which then must be dealt with. In that case a sawer had to re-enter the hazard area to finish the job.
 
flyingsquirrel25 said:
The value in the video, is its another of a very dangerous condition that many may not see very often in our work environment because most of us use proper felling techniques (of which you champion in so many of your videos/posts) to avoid it at all costs because of its unpredictablity. Normally this condition is not captured on video because of its unpredictability. So the video has value. But intentionally causing a tree to barber chair in any situation is dangerous and absolutely useless in almost all urban environments (10:35 ish shows a limb broken directly on the pavement... what you were trying to avoid) Yes the sawer was not near when the tree split, but even you said you did not expect it to stay aloft which creates another, separate hazard which then must be dealt with. In that case a sawer had to re-enter the hazard area to finish the job.
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Well put flyingsquireel!

Basically what he did was use a very dangerous, highly unpredictable, unsafe method to create a hazardous situation downstream. Sounds like a great idea to me?

In my world we avoid a barber chair at all cost. I have spent hours strapping up a big top so nobody dies during the glorious 5 minutes of blowing a huge top.

We won't talk about the fact that the method was utterly worthless in lowering the damage to the road.

News flash Daniel. We have Oaks, Madrones, Bays, Eucs, Maples, Acacia, and many other hardwoods out here. Its not just Reds, Firs, and Pines buddy!
 
We can agree to have different viewpoints about the value of the technique, but don't argue with facts.. the street was not damaged.. The broken limb you mentioned did not poke a hole in the blacktop. Preserving the blacktop was the goal and it was achieved... Trees fall, limbs break, that's a given... Of course we don't know what would have happened if the tree had been hinged over. Maybe no damage, but we'll never know...

I think it should be obvious to any faller that has some experience with ash and dropping trees into the street that there was a lot less force on the top falling than if the tree was hinged over. I see one broken limb on of the entire tree. Dropping a big ash into the street would normally blow it up. For those that don't have that experience, a simple look at the physics involved should suffice. Near half the weight was still on the stump, and the remaining wood fibers acted as a drag on the movement of the falling top. And the taller the tree, the faster the tip speed during the fall, so shortening the height of the tree is going to slow the speed of the tips at impact. (See video below for another perfectly live ash from the backyard on this same job.)

Also if you listen again, I did account for the possibility that the top would stay up, and mentioned ahead of time that the skid steer loader could be used to safely get it down. The skid steer loader was set pushing the top hard to one side so that the top could not have come my way, before I went in and made the final relief cut. There was no danger to anyone or anything in this video..

 
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I knew I feller who could In tentionally barber chair a giant oak inside spitoon...and it fit a time or two..are you feeling lucky ....well are ya ..............
 
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