Cabling Advise

evo

evo

Been here much more than a while
Location
My Island, WA
I'm pruning out a 80'+ pondrosa pine in the coming week or so. The tree was brought over from eastern Washington as a sapling. The owner kept it in a pot for years and pruned it to stay small. They gave up and decided to plant it in the ground.

The tree now is about 80' tall and has a half a dozen or so diff leaders. Some crotch's look sound (little to no included bark) while one in-particular has 8 feet or so of included bark as a co-dom stem. This crotch is about 30 feet off the ground and both stems are close to 24" dia. None of the crotch's (co-dom stems) so any outward signs of cracks. I have no doubt that cable would be the right call, and the home owners are all about preservation of the tree.

I plan on using EHS cable. Since this is my 1st cabling job on my own I have a few questions.

Pros and cons of cobra/dynamic vs. ehs in this application?

Any thoughts on Though bolts with eye's vs lag bolts?

Any thoughts or experience using "Rigguy Wire Stops/hubs"? I'm very curious on this. Is the cable stiff enough to prevent any "slop" inside the wood, IE side loading from wind?

Also where I'm completely stumped at the moment is bracing. The co-dom stem that has 8' of included bark is the one that I keep wondering about. Will braces help or hurt? There isn't active signs at the moment of it splitting out, and so there is no crack to pull together. My intuition is though to brace it for the added security to button it up that much tighter. Any flaws in doing this.

I have the ANSI cabling standards in the mail to me. I also know that pictures would help, and I will get them when I do a little pruning/weight reduction.
 
An inclusion requires a static cabling system, evo. We have used the rigguys to much success, but you have to make sure that you put the straight strand (unravel each end) into the central cone. Otherwise, they will come loose. Good luck.
 
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An inclusion requires a static cabling system, evo. We have used the rigguys to much success, but you have to make sure that you put the straight strand (unravel each end) into the central cone. Otherwise, they will come loose. Good luck.

[/ QUOTE ]Agree, an 8' inclusion on a pine seems to call for static, and yes that center strand is the straight one and that goes in the taper (cone piece). 2/3 up or more.

Bracing is way more damaging, and need unclear.

ANSI cost 2x what the ISA BMPs do and are much less useful in practice.

If it was in a pot all that time the roots may be a mess--send a pic of the flare along with the top ok?
 
All very good advise above.

I just finished a static cabling job using 1/4" EHS cable and it worked fantastic. I first used the RIGGUY Wire Stops last year and was very impressed with them.

A couple of tips when working with the wire stops. Before unraveling the strands to insert the wedge, mark the center strand with a small Sharpie pen. This will help you keep track of that center strand which can get mixed up with the others when untwisted.

I also used a 7/32” nut driver with a quarter turn counter-clockwise to open the 1/4" EHS wire more easily and get the correct pattern for the wires to work correctly with the tapered wedge.

Also, you only need to bend the middle wire to prevent the taper from coming loose, but if you decide to bend the other 6 wires, bend them IN NOT OUT, as this would prevent the inner taper from tightening down correctly.
 
This is a prime example of supposedly professional arborists giving out bogus advice to an amateur cabler.

The sad part is that it won't become apparent for 10-15 years when corrosion causes these ridiculous Rigguy wire stops to fail, and the customer that paid for a professional cabling job ends up paying a high price indeed for your expedience and lack of foresight.

By all means, call Steve like I did, and ask him if any wire cable manufacturer in the world has approved his wire stops for use with their cables? The answer is no, and for very good reasons. It compromises the integrity of the cable, separates each strand and subjects them to a crushing force that wears the galvinization off the cable, then hides it all away in a location impossible to inspect.

Use tree grips for your cable terminations, they have a proven track record for many decades now, do not compromise cable integrity, and are approved for use by all cable manufacturers.

Never use a lag bolt to anchor a cable in any softwood tree, which all conifers are.

jomoco
 
Time will tell, but I think it's a valid product for static jobs.

As with any cabling job, an inspection program should be setup to monitor not only the wire rope, but the tree as well.

Also, please provide me with valid engineering tests done by the manufacturer that shows that the wire rope looses its integrity with the RIGGUY Wire Stops or did the manufacturer just say it wouldn’t work?

I don’t want to get into a pissing contest with you Jo, as you’ve already proven with the “Chipper Safety” thread, that no one can win an argument with you, so I won’t even try.
 
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Also, please provide me with valid engineering tests done by the manufacturer that shows that the wire rope looses its integrity with the RIGGUY Wire Stops or did the manufacturer just say it wouldn’t work?



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Doesn't responsibility for that fall onto Steve, the guy selling an inferior cabling product without gaining approval from any cable manufacturer prior to marketing his product?

http://www.preformed.com/preformed/files/literature/NU-SS-1023TreeGrip.pdf

jomoco
 
Thank you all so far. Using static makes since and cobra (dynamic) is something that I'm just curious about. Correct me if I'm wrong as I hope/know some of you will. Dynamic seem to be just for added security for situations with no defects. Such as sound crotch's and wood without cracks, seems like it's just used to support limbs where weight reduction isn't enough.



Guy, I will get photos of the root flare. I do have some concerns in this area of the tree as well. It could use mulch and aeration. The client has a bunch of junk piled up under the tree, etc... I did order the bmp's with the ANSI book just to cover all my bases. I'd like to pick your brain about the braces after I take some photo's.



Jomoco, The main reason why I was ASKING about the rigguy wire stops is that I'm uncertain that there is enough room between the stems to use tree grips which I'm familiar with.

Also another thing that I'm going to have to look at while in the tree is triangulation of some of the stems. The rigguy "hub" seems like it would fulfill this role nicely. 10-15 years from now shouldn't be too much of an issue since the cable should be raised to accommodate the growth rate.
 
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Jomoco, The main reason why I was ASKING about the rigguy wire stops is that I'm uncertain that there is enough room between the stems to use tree grips which I'm familiar with.

Also another thing that I'm going to have to look at while in the tree is triangulation of some of the stems. The rigguy "hub" seems like it would fulfill this role nicely. 10-15 years from now shouldn't be too much of an issue since the cable should be raised to accommodate the growth rate.

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In tight situations as you describe, the typical solution is to rod the crotch just above the inclusion, then place your cable at the 3/4 mark above the inclusion. Of course pics will get you more precise advice.

jomoco
 
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Well that's pretty cool.

Wonder how they work, the PDF won't open for me at the moment.

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I agree, it is pretty cool, and a huge improvement over Rigguy's faulty design.

That said, I still have issues with any cabling termination that eliminates the thimble and eye ring due to the issue of side loading, which the thimble and eye ring isolates onto themselves rather than the cable, and subsequently the tree itself, egging out the cable entrance hole over time, damaging the cambium, bark and xylem, inhibiting wound closure.

And we all know what happens to a wire that is bent repetitiously over time.

jomoco
 
Preformed wedge grips are awesome to install! They are more expensive, but are very easy, and don't require any tools beyond cable cutters, cable grip and comealong. That said, when I tried to order some from bishop, they said they had several reports of failure and took them off the shelf until they could get more info from preformed. This was almost a year ago, so I'm not sure of the status, and have gone back to rigguy in the interim.
 
What ever happened to hand wrapping a short span with common grade cable? :) I have not tried the Rigguy system and dont really want to. The whole reason we replace cables that are grown over is to prevent that bending action on the cable. The rigguy system starts off with this problem. I like through bolts, thimbols, dead ends and cable.
 
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What ever happened to hand wrapping a short span with common grade cable? :) I have not tried the Rigguy system and dont really want to. The whole reason we replace cables that are grown over is to prevent that bending action on the cable. The rigguy system starts off with this problem. I like through bolts, thimbols, dead ends and cable.

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Typically, short spans such as crotches with included bark are more a candidate for a static cabling system with EHS wire rope in which case you cannot hand wrap (splice)such as you can with common grade.

You could rod the lower stem and use a static cabling system 2/3rds up from the codom.
 
rodding/bracing is a lot of damage compared to rigguys. the side loading/movement scenario is a consideration but not a dealbreaker. i've argued this with jon ad nauseam and will not again.

i just bought 8 of the wedge things but not used any. think i oughta call preformed/bishp to see wtf is up with them. seemed too easy to be true; maybe so?

evo good luck getting the bottom of the tree cleaned up. maybe the forks are not as bad as they look--pics?
 
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