Tree vs. power line.

[vtsnowedin]

I have fun posting every good thing I do with my tractor here so it is only fair if I post a full account of my screw ups. My neighbor widow wanted some trees close to her house cut so she would not have to worry about them being blow over and onto her house. No problem I think I can use the tractor to either push them away from the house or pull them away with straps and or chains. It was a cluster of sugar maples with some leaning towards the house. The first trees went OK but the biggest that leaned the most toward the house got me. instead of falling off to the side of the tractor as planned it fell sideways and just missed the garage. Problem was that the house power feed was hitched to the garage and the tree top did a good job of swatting that to the ground. Our power co-op sent a crew right up and they did a great job of getting the power back on at no charge but let me know I shouldn't make a habit of it.

 

[GirlWhoWantsTractor]

Congratulations vtsnowedin! Ya broke EVERY SINGLE RULE about how to take down a tree, and survived. Glad you're okay.

 

[vtsnowedin]

Congratulations vtsnowedin! Ya broke EVERY SINGLE RULE about how to take down a tree, and survived. Glad you're okay.

Oh not EVERY ONE of them! There must be some I haven't got to yet.

 

[RandyT]

Used to work in Indiana as a utility forester. The first week on the job, was called out to a brush fire under a 138 KVA transmission line. The fire department discovered the cause of the fire, when they found a knee cap. Guy had dropped a tree into the line, and the resulting voltage and amps, melted the saw down to nothing and ignited the magnesium components of the case. Other than the knee cap the saw operator was cremated on site.

 

[vtsnowedin]

Used to work in Indiana as a utility forester. The first week on the job, was called out to a brush fire under a 138 KVA transmission line. The fire department discovered the cause of the fire, when they found a knee cap. Guy had dropped a tree into the line, and the resulting voltage and amps, melted the saw down to nothing and ignited the magnesium components of the case. Other than the knee cap the saw operator was cremated on site.

Oh yeah that is some nasty voltage. This was only 240v service line and it didn't even pop the breakers. And yes before anybody types it out I know 240 x 30 amps is enough to kill you.

 

[travlitt]

Looks like the fault would be before the breaker. The transformer fuse would be the one to "pop"

 

[Redneck in training]

Crew hired by our utility was clearing their right of way. One of our trees was too close to the line so they wanted to butcher the tree by cutting all branches on one side off. My wife told them just cut the tree completely but not to drop it on our fence. While felling it they missed our fence but dropped it in 25 kV line. Hitting the wires didn't trip the protection in the substation but created a power surge that damaged bunch of electronic devices and fried many smart electric meters within about a mile. Our house was, despite being closest to the cause of the surge, spared but our whole house surge protection device was annihilated. Since new one was paid by the utility I bought the best I could find.

 

[Redneck in training]

Friend of mine told me a story about trying to make a tree fall in certain direction by pulling at it with a pickup while cutting it. When they cut the tree wind made it fall exactly the other way than intended and threw the pickup like a kids toy.

 

[TJP89]

Friend of mine told me a story about trying to make a tree fall in certain direction by pulling at it with a pickup while cutting it. When they cut the tree wind made it fall exactly the other way than intended and threw the pickup like a kids toy.

Yeah, I forget how to do the physics there, but I know that a 50/60 foot tree has enough weight and length for a lever to move just about anything. I cut down a big dead willow recently and the guy helping suggested he push on the trunk about 5ft up to get going in the right direction. I told him that that wasn't going to do squat if the tree went backwards, so he'd just better stay away from the tree and saw. The notch is what really directs the fall, get that right and you're mostly there.

 

[vtsnowedin]

Well the tree in question in my case had about a half cord of wood in it so weighed about a ton. I was pulling on it with a 7500 lb. tractor. Trouble was I couldn't drive the tractor and the saw at the same time. I should have used a higher hitch on the tree and a longer chain line and had somebody pulling steady away from the house as I cut the last cut.