Posted by Vaughn on Tuesday, December 30, 2003 at 11:18PM :
During my Christmas vacation, the wife wanted two trees taken out by the side of our house. Both trees were about 1-1/2 feet in diameter in the trunk and located between a wood fence, sidewalk and the street. Since they were in a rather tight area (4 feet between sidewalk and fence) my strategy would be to use the winch on my PW to remove the trees. I drove the PW up on the sidewalk and parallel to the road to center it inline with the trees for a straight pull – all set! I rapped my chain around the first limb and began to pull using the winch and stopped just as the cable and chain was tight. At that point I looked in all directions to make sure no car or pedestrian was near by, then let out the clutch and in three seconds – snap, the limb broke off and laid parallel to the side walk. Oh did I feel powerful!
After I downed each limb at its trunk fork, I sawed them to the length of the truck bed and loaded them on. After I removed all the limbs of the first tree I was left with about an 8 foot high trunk. I thought things had gone well and now it was time to tackle the trunk and stump – cut a few roots here and there and I could pull it right out – wrong! I was using a mattock and I dug around the tree exposing the roots and began using the axle side to cut through each root. I cut and cut and cut and……. and I though I was through, but no! So I connected my chain and started winching to the point the winch started pulling the truck with locked brakes. I backed off and cut some more. Meanwhile all the guys in the neighborhood stopped with their Chevy’s and asked if I wanted them to pull it out. I replied, “oh sure, lets see what your truck can do!” I got not takers, only red faces as they drove off. Back to the stump – cut and pulled, cut and pulled, revved the engine a little more – SNAP! Oh no the cable broke. No problem just a bad area in a cable that’s a little rusty (3/8 diameter cable). Tried again, SNAP, broke the cable. By this time it was getting dusk and I was getting frustrated, so I stopped for the day. During the evening, the wife and I went and bought a BIGGER cutting axle.
The next morning I started again cutting through roots that seemed like they were as big around as the tree itself. I continued with the winch with less torque than before with no luck removing the trunk/stump. After working most of the morning I decided that was it! – I needed a new strategy. So I decided to under cut the stump as much as possible on the side I was pulling on and use the chain saw to finish cutting the roots. Took the chain saw and starting going down into the root until I felt it cut through the other side of the root. After going around the stump cutting the roots and another pull, the trunk/stump was out – finally! WHAT A HOLE!! Two of the roots were about a foot across. After taking both trees out, I told the wife and kids – I need some new cable for the PW.
My Christmas gift I picked up today – 188 feet of 7/16 cable. I’m ready to go again!
Happy New Year to all!
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