Cutting Down a Tree With a Chainsaw and a Jack, Ever Seen This Before?

This is one way to make sure you can control which direction a tree falls when you cut it down.

Using a chainsaw, a couple of wedges and a bottle jack, this crew – obviously experienced in this technique – puts this tree exactly where they want it. First the chainsaw operator cuts a wedge out of one side of the tree, and that’s fairly common in most tree-felling videos we’ve seen. But what they do next is unique, though we suspect when this video gets around, others will be giving it a try. After cutting out the first wedge, the chainsaw operator “draws” a line around the tree to mark the height for the jack to be inserted. He then cuts out an opening perfectly sized for the jack, which is then inserted and pumped, sending the tree falling exactly where the crew wanted it.

While this technique may add a little time to the cutting process, this level of control over where the tree lands is easily worth the extra time. The whole video is three and a half minutes, so it clearly doesn’t add much time.

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