Close Call

[Carl Russell]

@Does’ Leap 38808 wrote:

…. Carl, if you come up with an easier chaining method I would love to hear about it. Chaining time is the biggest drawback I can find to using a sled. ….

This is interesting. I’m sure it just has to do with practice. You may also be over-thinking it, because in the scheme of things it is really just a very small amount of the time in the context of cutting, skidding, rolling, and drawing the large load over a long distance.

Just hang in there. Eventually you’ll be able to do it in your sleep, which if you’re like me, you’re already doing… I mean actually in your sleep….. I constantly wake up from practicing some aspect of my work in my dreams…

On the kids in the woods, or other people, I am not anti-social. I regularly have visitors, helpers, and cooperate with others. I enjoy some of that for sure, and really like the symbiotic results of working with like minded folks with similar skills.

My kids have been with me in the woods from very early. I agree that many times, the work I do requires a level of exertion that makes it very difficult, and possibly dangerous for them to be in the woods with me, so I mostly work alone. Timber was riding with me the other day, setting chokers, and got a chance to drive the horses back into the woods from the landing.

In the hustle and bustle of the world I move around in, it is hard to remember the value of that product of time spent with my kids. Mitch reminded me of clearing brush for my father and the other men in the neighborhood while they cut wood when I was six years old. I remember getting to sit on the stump of a tree that “Barber-chaired”, and the old Mac 35, with points in the ignition, that would catch on fire when you started it, when fuel had been spilled during refilling.

Carl

[Carl Russell]

@Does’ Leap 38808 wrote:

…… I loaded up a cord of wood + / – today and went just over half a mile (thanks to Google Earth I can now dial in my skid distance accurately). Although I will often “go light and go often” while ground skidding and using my arch, I tend to load as much on my scoot and sled as I think the horses can draw. When I am drawing fuel wood, I have a pretty substantial hill leading up to the house (in contrast, my sawlog landings are mostly downhill). I will often block off a quarter or more of the load at the bottom of the hill so they can make it up.
……..

This you? http://burlington.craigslist.org/grd/3459482153.html

Carl

[Does’ Leap]

No. This is me: https://post.craigslist.org/k/UPkUPvNZ4hGGUtRY41xQFw/HFwQN?s=preview.

However, I have had no takers after having had this up for a few months. I am not interested in selling split wood. I block and split 20-25 cords/year and am not interested in handling more wood than that. I can get $70/cord of log length wood at the landing. That yields me slightly more than half of what I get for a straight truck of hemlock and is a tough nut to swallow. I can understand if it is byproduct of hardwood saw logs, but selling firewood alone is tough. However, I think I am going to have to go that route as I have more fuel wood to remove than I can use. I will write it off (in my mind) as woodlot improvement and take what I can get. Do you sell firewood? What about on logging jobs?

George

[Carl Russell]

I don’t sell any wood from home. Right now I have all I can do to get what I need, but I have acres of wood that must be cut, and I do plan on selling; log length, blocked, split to pick up here…. what ever and how ever.

On jobs I usually sell log length. It is hard to justify the market value, especially with horses. Most mechanical operators I know are willing to pay $5-10/cd, because there is a lot less handling, and because they want the job. Sometimes I let it go for free because I always mark a lot, using worst first. I also use a lot of non-commercial methods on my own jobs, often just girdling some of the least useful stems, and leaving anything smaller than 5-6″ and shorter than 12 feet.

Because I don’t pay stumpage, I use basically the same price structure that you are faced with. The stumpage value and productive efficiency of the hemlock subsidizes the harvest and sale of your fuelwood. I usually charge the same per volume for cutting wood as I do for cutting sawlogs, so the loss due to the wood, is borne by the profit made by cutting logs. Because of this I tend to minimize the cost of harvesting fuelwood by the non-commercial methods I described above.

I have seen so many woodlots that have been managed by foresters that maintain a certain percentage of poor quality trees, harvest after harvest. This is entirely because the realistic appraisal of harvesting cost versus market value does not sell timber sales. They usually throw in a little tail with the hide, but not so much that the logger can’t afford to pay the highest possible stumpage for the good logs. Stocking is reduced significantly to increase harvestable volume to increase economy of scale, and many codominant sawlogs, that could benefit from 10-20 years additional growth, are thrown in to sweeten the pot.

Landowners like yourself who can see the long term value of reducing low quality stocking, and are willing to see that investment come out of the profit from the sale of better products will have a much improved resource down the road…… and set an excellent example of real stewardship.

Keep up the good work.

Carl

[wally b]

There is a guy I know out here that used a ‘fid hook’ to grab his chains under and between logs. It is a light peice of flat steel with a ‘grab style’ hook cut into the flat bar at the end. It was originallly designed to get under the bigger diameter timbers like redwood we have out here, but I imagine it would be good for retrieving chains anywhere you didin’t want to put your hand.

Gregg Caudell is the guy and has a picture of them in his book.

wally

[mitchmaine]

hey wally, we used old dump rake teeth. spring steel, holds its perfect shape to pass under a log. just heat up the end and put a tight hook in it, use the coil end as a handle, they can’t be beat

[Does’ Leap]

Hi Wally and Mitch:

I have been looking for some old fidd hooks for a while, mainly for binding my bunk chains on the bobsled, but I can see how they would come in handy for grabbing chain as well. I have lost so many chain grabs (i.e. contraptions used to pass under the log to grab a chain and pull it through) that I started bending 3/8 round stock on the end of my logging chains (upper right in the picture below). I am a convert.

George

[IMG]https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-rj55Aux6_Ts/Ttkb6IXynyI/AAAAAAAABEI/ut9EnbWgHC0/s1024/P1030522.JPG[/IMG]

[j.l.holt]

I saw a old timer one time that had a set up like this…front of the bob where the solid toung was had a short pipe (two foot long). the toung was the next size bigger. it slid over. The two were hooked frrom coming apart by a stout chain being welded to each. So when the team stepped up the toung slid forward.. To the end nearest the sled he had two grab hooks welded.. He would drag up the slack by hand and hook them. As the team pulled they kept the chain tight.

[j.l.holt]

I had a couple of inquires to how I made my last bob sled..thought some one here might be interested,so here goes. I used two pieces of ‘H’ beam for the runners. First thing I did was gather up a old pair of yard sale skies. Strip off the hardware. and match them the the botom of the runners. Torch cut the front to match the tip of the skies. I bolted the ski to the bottom with 5/16 carriage bolts, just snug. I took a piece of 1/4 X 2in flat stock and welded the front to the beam and let the lower back over lap the toe of the ski so it would ride over things with out breaking. bolted it on down the line about 8 places. Welded a scrap 2×6 channel iron to make the cross piece and a couple 1/2in rebar to make angle braces to the front. I had a bucket full of U-bolt from spring shackles. Two on each end made the stake pockets and 4 drilled from the bottom up under the cross piece.
To make the toung I used a piece of thick wall pipe, welded into a ‘T’ ends were burned threw the runner tops with a backing plate so they could piviot up and down. The ‘t’ joint is angled braced because this is where the presure comes when making a turn. The second piece of the toung is a thick wall pipe that slides over the first, the longer the inside pipe is the better. Get a 1ft piece of the best chain you can get. one end is welded to the out side toung piece,the other end is welded to the inside piece. This lets the out side pipe slide forward about 12in before coming tight. I cut a piece of 2in square 12in long with a 45 deg angle on one end. Weld this to the out side pipe with the 45 under cut down. this way you can mount the double tree and get a nut on the bolt that goes through the double tree. Last thing to do is weld three grab hooks to the back section of the toung. Roll the log up on the cross beam, chain up with a slip hook. go under the cross beam and forward to the grab hook on toung. Drag up the slack by hand and hook. When the team steps forward they slide the outer toung makeing the chain come tight before the bob moves. You are pulling the log by the chain,not the bob. The bob just holds it off the ground. The chain passes under the cross beam and through one of the U-bolts under the beam, keeps them centered up.3-4 of these u-bolt is enough. With a seat up on the front your good to go. If you want more info or try to porve me wrong. just post something.

[Does’ Leap]

Sounds interesting. Can you post some pictures?

George

[j.l.holt]

I don’t have any pictures. but if you e-mail me I can draw up something and my wife can post them back to you.

jefflholt@gmail.com

[Author]

Posts