hydraulic felling wedge

Drouin Tree Service

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Drouin Tree Services | Excavator Hire - Drouin and SE Gippsland | Landclearing Melbourne

Apocalypsse

Pretty neat little tool he has there. Can you buy those somewhere or is it homemade?

Paul Goodall

Very useful indeed.

Eric Frei

Search hydraulic wedges on Google.

Good idea.

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Tony Knight

Top bit of kit, I was thinking of something simular but more along the lines of a porta power spreader wedge. Simplistic and it get the job done an easier way.

Cheers,

Tony

Willard Holmen

Close to 40 years ago Husqvarna sold a inflatable felling wedge that plugged into the saws engine to inflate.
I never used one but from memory it was a reinforced wedge shaped air bag also called a pillow. It inflated to 4 inches and could raise around 7000 lbs.
There was a similar design sold in Russia.

Tony Knight

FYI, this PDF relates to the above wedge.

Cheers

Tony

Attached Files

4604_08e.pdf (229.3 KB, 71 views)

Willard Holmen

It almost looks like the tool was originally designed for something else, maybe auto body, ware house work for example.

My little experience I have with with using bottle hydraulic jacks for tipping trees is don't use them on a windy day especially with gusts of head winds. I blew out a couple of oil seals resulting in a ruined jack from all that leverage pressure when the wind starts rocking the tree.
For a reliable tree jack the prices start at around $2000.

Tony Knight

G'day HolmanTree,
I use a bottle jack/jacks on and off when required. I use good quality 20 ton jacks and well within their capacity, any time I believe theres a risk of the loading exceeding the jacks rating or relief point I will use a second jack to reduce the load (also use a second if I think theres a need to distribute the weight across the back cut and not in one place opposite the face). I also drive wedges as the jack extends as a further safety precaution. I have never had a problem with this system. I am also critical of the environment, if I feel conditions expose me to risk then I'll pull up or rig a bull rope if the location allows.

Cheers

Tony

sun64

I have often thought about using auto repair hydraulic jacks, ie the ones with a porta power and a set of fingers that open hydraulicly.
I am not sure it they would be strong enough though.
I usually either use my tractor and bucket against the tree or a large rope, snatch strap, chain etc for what I do here.
I am not a professional feller but have removed a few tricky trees with what I have this way.
Regards sun64

Tony Knight

I had the same idea, using a porta power and spreading wedge, the only ones I have found have a max 10 ton rating, not enough by far for lift on a tree with a reasonable DBH.

Cheers


Tony