Today's training had the first group on the Kona side of the big island up in the hills and cutting Ironwood trees hanging over an old road bed that will be used for material storage for repaving the highway running near.
The wind howls to the tune of about 45 mph over this old road and it doesn't stop. The area trees are blown at this rate most of the year so the saw operators are somewhat used to the added excitement.
The group did very well with the trees and the hinge is definitely your friend as you steer these leaners to the ground. The escape routes are limited as the road sides are almost vertical banks and it requires working from the bad, leaning side, of the tree in most plans.
I had to keep highlighting the fact of the stance and position you must take when cutting to establish the hinge. Most of the trees were less than 14" with side leans of 4' or more so having a correct hinge, properly placed, to be an important prerequisite to safety and control. You have to stay in a position to see the face notch.
Everything you do, once the face notch is complete, must line up parallel to the notch. If you do not put yourself where you can see this you will do one of two things. One- leave too much hinge wood. Two- cut too much off. A loss of control can be experienced with either of those scenarios but the second with heavy leans is definitely the most undesired. For those that are not familiar- the hinge should be 10% of the diameter in width and 80% of the diameter in length. A ten inch tree would have hinge of one inch wide (a max) by eight inches long (a min). The hinge is your friend...
Good sawing!
Tim Ard
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