Video: Adjusted gun/tapered hinge experiment

I love your video editorial style. That finger pointing to the left in front of the camera was great!

Once the tree has started falling it's pretty difficult to get it to start swinging another direction. I'd imagine that if you'd bore cut that second hinge to what wound up being its final shape, then cut the back strap, you'd have seen a more dramatic turn to the right from the face.

I've had some luck sticking a rock or wedge of wood in one side of the face causing the tree to rotate a bit, but the direction really doesn't change once it's committed in my experience.
 
Man I got to get my PC fixed so I can see Ekka's videos!

Glens, I usually bore cut all my hinges especially my tapered hinges, and then start to cut out toward the back leaving the small strap of wood to release. I will stick a wedge in too on the leaning side which does help (I think) to keep the tree on the stump a little longer and more importantly, keeps the tree from setting down and pinching your saw as you're cutting out towards the back.

Sometimes you don't have anything available for a side tensioning line.

Chris
 
Yeah, Chris. It's just so much more precise to bore and form the perfect hinge at leisure than to hope for the best at best. I almost always bore for that reason; not to mention it's rather impressive to onlookers. Especially when they see you walk up to a tree close to 4' in diameter with a 24" bar on a 90cc saw and just jam that bar in like the tree was made of butter :)
 
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Sometimes you don't have anything available for a side tensioning line.

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If there is nothing available, but space for a pick up truck, we'll use that. If there is not room to maneuver a truck in, we'll turn in 1 or 2 four foot ground anchors and use them. When we're done, turn them back out.
 
Norm, you are absolutely right about using ground anchors if you need a side tensioner line. Same as setting a "deadman" anchor for guying poles and rigging.

I remember seeing that demonstrated in the ArborMaster Rigging videos. I never considered that.

Thanks
Chris
 
i think both strategies try to serve to the gunned apex. The tapered hinge hitting target; is were the mechanics succeed to, and the adjusted gun hitting target are where the mechanics failed at.

Because of that and being able to take the tapered hinge into tree and turn sideways for horizontal sweeps; or even turn back to balance load as being lifted; makes me favour tapered hinge. Also, a tapered hinge can help balance a side with backlean tree across the hinge pivot; so all wedge push and rope pull effort is to serve forward/ not fight sidelean.

i think the fire might have taken some elasticity from wood; to give less tension pull. A tapered hinge works on apportioning more fiber to ballast/offside/anti-lean side and back field. This gives 3 things; more fibers pulling from these positions, as well as places fibers further back (leveraged distance), and more in line with lean angle(more favourable leveraged angle for support). All this requires elastic pull i think.

i think in good wood; trusting the tapered hinge and wedging or pulling forward into gun is best. It takes whatever leveraged force; and increases hinge strength; making tapered hinge pull harder. Wedging or pulling agianst lean addresses the lean more linearily/directly; without this final multiplier. Whereby, as you releive the lean with the wedge push or line pull, you unload the leverage on hinge, and thereby how hard the hinge pulls. So are just replacing an autonomous reaction force, and losing another stacked leverage multiplier. In wood with less elasticity on the tension side; i might give pull/push to steer(against lean) instead of strengthen hinge (serve into gun).

The outside portions of the hinge are most important/ as most leveraged. Including tapered hinge. i think the equal/opposite of tapered hinge is dutching lean side only; a compression rather than tension adjsutment. Also a change in pivot; giving less leverage to lean and more leverage to hinge support. So, in tree and on some tough ones i've used a kerf in lean side after making face, or a narrow face full across and then open up off side face farther from top and/or bottom(but no dutch closure on that side). i think this all is in keeping with Mr Dent's book.

Working Split Face Control

Of course all this only works on my crazy planet /forum/images/graemlins/tongue.gif.
 
I AM planning on doing a video to show the effectiveness of the taperd hinge in adjusting the direction of fall... It depends on how the hinge is cut and is somewhat species dependent.. gotta have stroing fibers in the wood or the hinge will just break with no control...
 
If you're using a tapered hinge to adjust and effect direction of lay, you're doing it wrong. Tapering the hinge wood is nothing more than leaving the hinge thicker (and theoretically stronger) one one side to account for lean. Works best when coupled with a few inches of stump shot.

Cutting hinge wood during the fall to affect swing is an entirely different technique, as is adjusting the gunn to compensate for lean (parallax error).
 
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If you're using a tapered hinge to adjust and effect direction of lay, you're doing it wrong. Tapering the hinge wood is nothing more than leaving the hinge thicker (and theoretically stronger) one one side to account for lean.

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This is the way I was formally taught, what I have researched, and what I practice too.

Good video Ekka. As usual.

And why does Ekka have to be anonymous?
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If you're using a tapered hinge to adjust and effect direction of lay, you're doing it wrong. Tapering the hinge wood is nothing more than leaving the hinge thicker (and theoretically stronger) one one side to account for lean. Works best when coupled with a few inches of stump shot.

Cutting hinge wood during the fall to affect swing is an entirely different technique, as is adjusting the gunn to compensate for lean (parallax error).

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eric,
This post shows clearly your juvenille notions of right and wrong... There is no true "right and wrong" here. That is a childish mentality. Children and people that lack creativity and vision love rules. Often because they are too lazy or shallow to think for themselves. And more than that, they love to "be right" and make anyone that thinks differently wrong..

So stick with your childish rules if they works for you, but leave me out of it. For me there is only what works and what doesn't. What I can make happen and what I can't.
 
Danial, you're misunderstanding my intentions: Screwing around on your own jobs to discover new ways is cool, and I've defended you on that point. Teaching others to do so without them fully understanding the mechanics is dangerous. You've admitted there's a factor of unpredictability involved; I know it as well, and that unpredictability is what cancels it as a dependable tool of the trade; one where lives and property are often on the line. (By example, I could point out your notched snap cut used in your Siberian Elm removal video; you make no mention of the fact the the potential exists for the butt of the log to slide down and back while falling early from vertical, and kick the butt backwards several feet. Then there's the notch in your avatar...)

Post up a video of you hitting the mark a few dozen times in a row using only the taper of the hinge to control the lay, and you'll prove me wrong. I'm not trying to be critical of yourself personally; however, I cut as many as 200 trees in a single day, and have lots of experience to draw my conclusions upon. As a paid consultant to other companies, I'd be liable and remiss in teaching unproven methods. Just because you can use a butter knife as a screwdriver doesn't mean it's the proper tool for the job. Like it or not, there is a "right" and "wrong", and physics doesn't stop just because we'd like it to.

(If you want to make personal attacks, like calling me "childish" and "juvenile"... perhaps you should look at that little (c)garbage you put into your signature. I seriously doubt you're spending money to copyright every single post, and since this is a web forum... you have no rights to reserve. I'll refer you to the terms of service of the forum. That is childish AND petty, as well as self-aggrandizing and arrogant.)

My phone call offer still stands, by the way; I'd be happy to call you on my dime, if you'd prefer. Perhaps we can share a few thoughts and communicate without the barrier of lost inflections.

FWIW, I may be misunderstanding what exactly it is you're doing; perhaps you're combining several methods at once? Your posts always have an air of secrecy, like you're a great master waiting for the student to figure out the lesson. That isn't the way these forums are supposed to work, and it's counter-productive.

By all means, keep experimenting, and keep posting up your findings.
 
Exactly my point...
There you go again with your right vs wrong mentality..
If its unpredictable, then call it that.., if there are risks then say it is risky and explain why.. That doesn't make it wrong... And it is the "I know what is right" mentality that is my main point here. People love to be right and talk a bunch of crap about others online. And you're at the top of the list.

You think you know it all, but you remain unaware of the what you don't know. You think "in the box"..

I've been criticized for making my notches too wide, too deep, too shallow, my backcuts too high, too low. I was criticized on the tapered hinge article by you and others for writing about something so simple and basic, that "I might as well write on where to put the gas and oil", then on the other hand, Ken Palmer told me to my face that his scientist buddies in Germany have proven that the tapered hinge has no effect at controlling side leaning trees. According to Palmer, it doesn't work...

People need to think they are right.. and it keeps their mind in a box. And they will start wars to stay in that box. Demanding proof, then denying it when it comes, refusing to use even a modicum of common sense, attacking the personage of those that think outside the box, projecting their shadows onto others, pointing the finger, and spreading the ugliness of their own emotional wounds onto others.

Then there are people outside the box like Bruce Lee. He eventually became a pop star in the movies, but he was hated by many in the martial arts community early on. He had to deal with rigid thinking people stuck in their dogmas, so sure of the "right way" and what couldn't be done.. The one inch punch was outside the box. And he had to "prove it"..

And in your box thinking, you hold me to the standard of a teacher... There are a zillion idiots out there posting on these boards and uploading videos on youtube.. Are they all teachers? When I publish an article or sell a training video, then hold me to the standard of a teacher.

On that note, there is ZERO chance of the log kicking backwards past the stump on any falling cut I make where the falling tree does not contact another tree (or building)on the way down.. ie the siberian elm video..

You think my post have an air of secrecy... The reason is becasue I don't throw my pearls before swine. I got tired of hearing crap from small minded people, so I save my little nuggets and share them when and as I see fit. Which in a way is a shame. Its people like you with your lack of love and ugliness that dampen the brilliance of these internet forums as opportunities of great sharing and learning amongst the brotherhood.
 
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You think you know it all, but you remain unaware of the what you don't know. You think "in the box"..

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All this inside the box outside the box. WTF!!!!
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Get off my copyrighted saying.
 
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