Maybe it’s just your delivery, but certainly sounds hubristic to me.
These are your opening sentences, and your introduction into this conversation. Who’s slinging monkey poo?
On a personal note, I totally appreciate you checking in on us. No matter the mud slinging, we are tree family, but I also truly can’t understand why you come here and post such. It feels like you just jump in wherever you please and pick a fight.
I remember the early days of the buzz, when these conversations of ‘salami’ cut first started. That included the silly but safe tongue and groove methods..
you present as if you have invented slicing hung trees down. And while it’s plausible you discovered such methods only though your personal experimentation the door closes when others mentioned that it’s a tried and true method, or a dangerous one.
You don't have to prove anything to me bro. We've been around the block enough to make it clear you know how to put a tree on the ground. You are very good at what you do. And you've done some hairy work that many others wouldn't even think about attempting. Me too! That doesn't mean we are going to agree on everything. We just have a difference of opinion.
I actually went and looked up the meaning of hubris:
excessive confidence and self-pride...
that's very subjective... the excessive part... You need confidence to do tree work at a high level. When you're life is on the line or there is a 3 million dollar house at risk, YOU NEED CONFIDENCE! Without it, you're better off raking leaves or cutting grass.
They called Ali "full of hubris"... until he backed his "excessive" pride by beating Liston's A$$.... Was it hubris or was he just good and didn't mind telling you so?
You guys don't like being told that you don't know what you're talking about, but that doesn't mean its not true.. It's not excessive pride to say that if it's true... And it is true.. not just about you.. it's true about the whole industry... With very few exceptions there is an entire industry of tree workers that have been taught to cut the notch 1/3 deep or 80% the width, BUT NO ONE KNOWS WHY... not the complete why at least... Being the guy that gets in your face and tells you how ignorant you are doesn't win any popularity contests, but that doesn't mean it's not true.
A very controversial subject. I seem to attract cotroversy for whatever reason. I'm used to it and don't much care about the shit talkers.
When I wrote the tapered hinge article in 2004, someone on the forums said... "you might as well write an article about where to put the gas and oil in a saw, I learned that at 12 years old the first time I walked into the woods with my father." On the other hand, Ken Palmer told me to my face that the tapered hinge doesn't work and his colleagues in Germany had proved it. That was almost 20 years ago and the industry is no closer to a consensus on the subject.
The cover photo of that TCI Mag (july 2004) showed me in the back cut, where there was a letterbox center plunge to gut the hinge... Now, this was 2004 and to be honest, that was the first time I had ever used the technique, and didn't understand the pros and cons. My mentor told me to do it on that back-leaning oak and I did it. That just happened to be the picture used for the cover. Well sure enough the editor got some complaints that the hinge had been damaged or whatever. Some people freaked out because they had never seen the cut before. Now it's much better understood and accepted practice, but not then.
When I first showed the plunged vertical snap cut around 2010, the uninformed thought that was crazy, reckless, dangerous, etc.. I had been using that cut since 1989. Tom says he was using it in the 70s. I didn't invent the cut.. but I did modify it by using the staggered plunge... That was the first video published showing the "salami cut" on whole trees. The cut was criticized by people that lacked skill and experience. I defended it because I know better. I know what if can do and what to watch out for. It was controversial at the time, at least in some circles.
Same thing for taking large treetops. Again the FIRST video on youtube showing taking multiple large tree tops. Again, people freaked out, calling me a wreckless maniac. "why don't you just take the top out first" etc... Now everyone and their grandmother are taking big tops out on Youtube... But that wasn't the case then.
So I've been criticized for being some wreckless maniac tree cutter for what is everyday work to me. It's no big deal to me. Truth is the real hairy stuff never made it to the camera. I didn't want the distraction. I've done lots of things that were the first to ever be shown on Youtube. And many things that have never been repeated. There is a long list... I've had to correct and educate people that consider themselves experts on these forums for years.
And Ya.. my style rubs people the wrong way. people don't like being told "I'm better than you.... I know more than you". But if it's true, it's not hubris.. So call me an a$$hole instead.... When it comes to the why of the 1/3 rule...Some of you are clueless. At best your knowledge is incomplete. That's everybody here.. If you want to debate that, let's go... Since you can't, there is nothing left to do but start the personal insults and name calling... HAHA... bring it on. I speak the truth.
