Wedgin' n jackin'

Screenshot_20220711-185827_Gallery.jpgI jacked a trunk over today for the first time in about 4 years. I typically prefer tag ropes and I had one set here as a backup, but I was felling a 40' trunk with only about 50' of yard between privacy fences. Didn't feel like smashing my mini today, so it was parked off to the side instead of pulling.

Tree was a 43" dbh pin oak, roughly 100' tall. Climbed and rigged to 40' then felled. I used a 20 ton bottle jack and a piece of 1/4" diamond plate backed up with wedges.
 
Jonny said:
You using the porty to keep your log from rolling away? If so, that’s pretty damn clever!
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Yes sir. Worst case senerio of the log jumping off the stump and into the fence or rolling into the metal shed kept playing through my mind. So I did several things to combat it.

Tied off the log to the Porta wrap
High stump
Open faced to get the top of the log to dig into the dirt to stop forward movement.

It all worked great. Here's a little video of it going down. https://photos.app.goo.gl/kxG6E1uqnWiFjcCN6
Should have escaped the other direction to not block the camera. :muyenojado: I'll never be a youtube star at this rate. :ROFLMAO:
 
flushcut said:
There have been worse videos on YouTube. You just need to over explain what is going on first and burn up a few dozen minutes before the action shot.
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Good pointers. I should probably add in some unnecessary drama to the job. Perhaps a commercial break right as it's starting to tip over...

We may need to start a "youtube tips and tricks" thread.
 
568F3158-A21E-445B-8DEA-FF62CEB97822.jpeg22732D71-5C1B-4D1B-8B15-C9662506798D.jpeg3A9A1194-B189-4DBF-A118-336E8B7FED5E.jpegNothing huge, but a few degrees of back lean on this old English Oak to overcome. The log appeared to have excellent salvage potential so I didn't face it out too deep or too open. I used a thin hinge and stacked the wedges in the stump.
 
Looks cool, but I don't really understand the use of a jack instead of a pull line (with a little MA). What's the advantage of the jack? A long pull line set high in the tree seems like it would produce more felling force than a jack setup like in the photo. What am I missing?
 
dmonn said:
Looks cool, but I don't really understand the use of a jack instead of a pull line (with a little MA). What's the advantage of the jack? A long pull line set high in the tree seems like it would produce more felling force than a jack setup like in the photo. What am I missing?
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From my armchair.. crew, location and regulation.

A pull line requires a MA, big shot and a half mile of rope, a bunch of setup time. Assuming you can find a big stout limb for a base tied pull.

Lots of projects like this are heavily regulated, so everyone but the sawyer has to be 1 tree length away if they are part of the felling project. All others have to be x2 tree lengths away.

The tree is probably 100-150’ so a tag set at 50% has to use at least a 225’ line to keep the crew on the other end out of the 1:1 zone. That and any brushing of anything will cause shit to go flying! So the safety thing is a very real concern.
 
Thanks for the info. The work I do is usually for trees less than 100 ft. I also put a redirect block in the direction I want the tree to fall, and double back toward me. I use a rope puller for the MA and have it set up a safe distance/location from the base of the tree. It DOES take some time to set up, but I have no jack and no experience using one. I also have about 600-800 feet of rigging rope--lots more than my wife knows about.
 
dmonn said:
Looks cool, but I don't really understand the use of a jack instead of a pull line (with a little MA). What's the advantage of the jack? A long pull line set high in the tree seems like it would produce more felling force than a jack setup like in the photo. What am I missing?
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Evo pretty much said it all, I was the only cutter that day, skid crew was out there but a half mile away doing their own thing. A jack is faster. Pain in the ass to carry around though.
 
dmonn said:
Thanks for the info. The work I do is usually for trees less than 100 ft. I also put a redirect block in the direction I want the tree to fall, and double back toward me. I use a rope puller for the MA and have it set up a safe distance/location from the base of the tree. It DOES take some time to set up, but I have no jack and no experience using one. I also have about 600-800 feet of rigging rope--lots more than my wife knows about.
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Soooo you know jack. LOL :ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO::sisi::coffe: I’m sorry I couldn’t resist.
 
chiselbit said:
Sierra Nevada’s on the Caldor fire/ burn.
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My guess was fire damage. Has to be a dozen Pine species there. Is the salvage rate half way decent? Looks to be a few large trees with a greater amount of younger intermixed?
 
oceans said:
My guess was fire damage. Has to be a dozen Pine species there. Is the salvage rate half way decent? Looks to be a few large trees with a greater amount of younger intermixed?
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What you are seeing in that pic is essentially the last tree of size, everything else has been cut. All those little trees still standing are too small to harvest. Behind me is the creek and there’s still timber on the other side but you can’t really see it in the pic. Ponderosa Pine, sugar pine and a little higher up in elevation Jeffery pine. White fir and Doug fir and incense cedar. Quite a bit higher and we have red fir and lodgepole pine. Lower elevation we have gray pine(p.sabiniana) which has no value and is not logged.
 
chiselbit said:
What you are seeing in that pic is essentially the last tree of size, everything else has been cut. All those little trees still standing are too small to harvest. Behind me is the creek and there’s still timber on the other side but you can’t really see it in the pic. Ponderosa Pine, sugar pine and a little higher up in elevation Jeffery pine. White fir and Doug fir and incense cedar. Quite a bit higher and we have red fir and lodgepole pine. Lower elevation we have gray pine(p.sabiniana) which has no value and is not logged.
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I did notice the silt fence, so the nearby water explains that one. Looks like quite a job. Have you ever been around any of those areas long enough to witness the regenerative growth? That is always of interest to me. That, and where does all the wildlife go that manages to survive. Might be a hunter’s boon if it gets condensed in another area.

More so, while I was driving to my first job site today, I was wondering what the protocol would be for jacking several degrees, and would there be a potential for the jack to pop out if the angle opens up too much? Is the bottom of the jack box sloped a bit to prevent that, or is it best to just keep the two faces parallel in the beginning and let it ride? Does the jack have texture on top and bottom to dig in?
 
oceans said:
I did notice the silt fence, so the nearby water explains that one. Looks like quite a job. Have you ever been around any of those areas long enough to witness the regenerative growth? That is always of interest to me. That, and where does all the wildlife go that manages to survive. Might be a hunter’s boon if it gets condensed in another area.

More so, while I was driving to my first job site today, I was wondering what the protocol would be for jacking several degrees, and would there be a potential for the jack to pop out if the angle opens up too much? Is the bottom of the jack box sloped a bit to prevent that, or is it best to just keep the two faces parallel in the beginning and let it ride? Does the jack have texture on top and bottom to dig in?
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Hey Eric, no silt fences there, lots of regen coming up already and it will all get planted with mostly Ponderosa Pine. I’m not sure if they wait a couple years and then go through and plant Douglas fir or if it just comes up on its own. The brush comes back fast. That fire (Caldor Fire) left a lot of “fingers”of unburned areas throughout the fire. So maybe some of the animals survived. Last year I was cutting on the Bear fire complex near Oroville ca and that fire decimated everything in its path. Caldor was different. On the real hard leaners I will do my back cut first and get the jack seated and apply pressure, then do the face cut. On the tree in the picture I did the face first, back cut with wedges as soon as there was room for them and kept the tree from setting back, then after I was far enough I cut the jack seat, got some good pressure and started working the backcut in to the desired hinge, jacking and wedging as I went. Yes you are correct, if that jack seat is angled wrong it can spit out a jack with much unhappiness. I will sometimes slope the bottom of the seat towards the hinge a little bit. It’s amazing how much those jacks can lift. Yes the jacks have texture on top and bottom to help prevent slipping.
 
chiselbit said:
Hey Eric, no silt fences there, lots of regen coming up already and it will all get planted with mostly Ponderosa Pine. I’m not sure if they wait a couple years and then go through and plant Douglas fir or if it just comes up on its own. The brush comes back fast. That fire (Caldor Fire) left a lot of “fingers”of unburned areas throughout the fire. So maybe some of the animals survived. Last year I was cutting on the Bear fire complex near Oroville ca and that fire decimated everything in its path. Caldor was different. On the real hard leaners I will do my back cut first and get the jack seated and apply pressure, then do the face cut. On the tree in the picture I did the face first, back cut with wedges as soon as there was room for them and kept the tree from setting back, then after I was far enough I cut the jack seat, got some good pressure and started working the backcut in to the desired hinge, jacking and wedging as I went. Yes you are correct, if that jack seat is angled wrong it can spit out a jack with much unhappiness. I will sometimes slope the bottom of the seat towards the hinge a little bit. It’s amazing how much those jacks can lift. Yes the jacks have texture on top and bottom to help prevent slipping.
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Great reply! It’s easy to lay down a few quesrions and takes much more to answer them all. Thanks! I learned a ton from it. Might even start carrying a jack around with me.
 
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