Thread: Leg protection below the knee ?

Originally Posted by BobL

These are nearly all home owner injures using very small saws.
For professional tree loppers they could also be using a top handle saw.

As I said above "
And sometimes they are also up a ladder and cutting above their heads.
All good!

What happens is. if there far is not @90º to the branch, using only one hand results in a lack of downward pressure and the usually blunt chain fails to bite and skates long the branch onto the left hand.

The most dangerous piece of equipment I own is a modern top handle chainsaw. I got -and still pull out and work on occasion for the real big stuff where torque is more important then any other factor- old bangers with no chain brake and manual oilers and think nothing of using one hand to continuously pump an oiler. I consider that perfectly safe.
But that little MS192T - that thing scares me. It's also the only saw thats ever bit me - and it was exactly what Bob said sorta: holding a branch to steady it down inside a culvert lopping off foot long sections so the water would wash them away. 1 cut, two cut, three cut, thumb cut. Just barely but still cut.

People never quite realize it but big saws are mostly safer then little saws. Power to bite with and inertia to reduce kickback risk, and longer bars which means it all happens a foot further away from your face. Homeowner saws are inherently more dangerous then big heavy saws because of these factors.

Originally Posted by John.G

People never quite realize it but big saws are mostly safer then little saws. Power to bite with and inertia to reduce kickback risk, and longer bars which means it all happens a foot further away from your face. Homeowner saws are inherently more dangerous then big heavy saws because of these factors.

Bigger saws are also somewhat self selecting. A friend of mine told me his 60 something year old dad (who had some health issues) had bought a "big chainsaw" but couldn't start it and could I take a look at it. I asked the mate what the CC of the saw was and he said he didn't know. The dad brought the saw around to me and it turned out to be a 62? cc eBay saw. I started it in about 3 pulls. When the dad saw how I started it he he said, I don't think I will be able to do that, and sure enough he couldn't do it.

One of the older (75+ year old) blokes at the mens shed also told me he had bought a BIG chainsaw on eBay but he couldn't start it and even his 50 something year old son couldn't start it. I also asked him what cc it was and he didn't know, and to bring it into the shed and I would take a look at it. That saw turned out to be a 50cc saw with the kill switch wired backwards. After fixing the switch it started easily and after demonstrating it to the owner he did manage to start it but I could see he was struggling. The owner didn't take the saw home and a few days later the owner told me he had donated the saw to the mens shed. I told the shed asset manager not to put the saw on the loan register and if anyone asked about a chainsaw I would go and do the work for them if it was not too big a job and have done this once so far.

I actually think the most important safety tool with a chainsaw is your eyes.

Look at the log as its lying between those other trees and see if its under pressure. Never mind pinching a bar - I watched a guy get both legs broken because a log was under tension sideways and he stood on the wrong side to cut it off and when it broke.

Look at where the saw will go if it kicks back. Legs/face/torso there, maybe you need to stand somewhere else.

Look up, see whats in the crown that might fall down on you if you start wedging. See the vines running back into another tree that might just drag it down too. I've been there a couple of times, wrapped up in the wait-a-while thats been dragged over from surrounding trees and there was the time I wound up on my hands and knees in the fork of a big dead head with an 076 running under my chest... I could hear it coming through the trees above me but couldnt see it to know where to go. Got lucky that time.

Look at the root system of the tree before you cut. Cut through any buttress or root swell in the hinge area on the side you're going to be standing. I've been lifted up and swatted back like a rag doll when the root running out between my feet tore off and went with the log rather then staying with the stump.

One of my problems with modern chainsaw training is they give people a set of rules that are mostly true. But some of the rules they tell them in their chainsaw 101 course will increase risk in some situations: The standard recipe of "30% front and 10% hinge" assumes that pine fells like eucalypt fells like rainforest species and that the tree is solid and healthy and thats a fallacy. The standard "walk away from the falling tree at 45 degrees down your prepared escape route" assumes you're in an open forest/parkland situation. There is too much emphasis at the basic level on "do it this way" and not enough emphasis on recognizing the risks that make exceptions to the rule. Every tree is different - assuming you can safely fall them all in the same way is dumb. I'm not saying that Joe average homeowner or weekend warrior should be trained in advanced technique stuff - but i am saying that they should be aware that some situations call for better techniques and that sometimes the smart thing is to call in someone who has them.

OT here but it bugs me.

Originally Posted by John.G

Except in the tropics where the most common cause of severe injury was dehydration related to wearing PPE in hot weather.

Yeah, I've had that argument many times over with office johnny OH&S "experts" who have never worked a day of their life in 35C and 90+ % humidity or in 45C out west on the black soil plains etc. They still insist that a Surveyor must wear a flouro safety vest with retro reflective tape plus a hard hat even when there isn't another human being or machine within 5km of the surveyor. Dehydration can kill very quickly in certain environments, and wearing that crap to mindlessly comply with an atrocious "risk assessment" does nothing to prevent it.

Originally Posted by John.G

I actually think the most important safety tool with a chainsaw is your eyes.

Look at the log ....
but i am saying that they should be aware that some situations call for better techniques and that sometimes the smart thing is to call in someone who has them.

OT here but it bugs me.

Well said mate. I've rescued a couple of chainsaw instructors who have embarrassed themselves. One with a hollow box even after we warned him that most in the area only have a solid 50 mm or less outer circumference; another taking on a rainforest tree on top of Mt Misery behind Bloomfield - jambed two saws and didn't know what to do. Take saw off bar - doh! Then use spare bar & chain - doh! Don't walk away and leave it for some one else to sort out. And a few more stupid stories.

Getting back to the leg protection - in over 35 years as a field surveyor I rarely wore gaiters / chaps, even though we worked in all environments from Central QLD through to the Torres Straits and into NT & WA. In later years we wore the Stihl chaps but by the time they were mandated our environmental guys wanted chainsaws, brush hooks, axes taken off us and replaced with saceteurs.

Originally Posted by John.G

I actually think the most important safety tool with a chainsaw is your eyes..

Talking about eyes, of the 2000 odd injuries to the head reported in the US in the 2009 - 2013 study, around half of these were to eyes. This is understandable when I see so many operators with no eye protection. This is so basic its ridiculous, same with ear muffs. I doubt most DIYers who do the odd bit of pruning are exposed to prolonged enough noise from a chainsaw to suffer much ongoing ear loss but those that cut firewood might. Dad spent most of his tree felling life with axes and cross cuts and really only had 7 years on saws. He wore ear plugs for most of that time but he still effectively lost all his hearing in one ear and most of it in the other.

Did you say something Bob? Speak up man.... bloody chainsaws and bulldozers and my old girls snoring have left me deaf as a post.

Seriously... i hear ya. But I'm as bad as any of them. Hearings been gone for years, well except for them crickets which never shut up but I can hardly blame chainsaws alone.... been a pro roo shooter, shot firer, earthmoving contractor, and sawmiller... take your pick which did it but I mostly lip read and avoid phones and crowds like the plague.

The mesh eye shields suit helmet are a fail up here. Okay in forest country but they get hung up in vines in the scrub. And I never could find a set of safety glasses that wouldnt either fall off or fog up. I dont actually know how anyone gets injured in the eye working a chainsaw - are they in there staring at the woodchips falling out or something? Anyway I know the risks and some like these I take and some - steelcaps and helmet - I dont. Sure and my hearing cant get much worse anyway.

Originally Posted by John.G

The mesh eye shields suit helmet are a fail up here. Okay in forest country but they get hung up in vines in the scrub. And I never could find a set of safety glasses that wouldnt either fall off or fog up. I dont actually know how anyone gets injured in the eye working a chainsaw - are they in there staring at the woodchips falling out or something?

The first day I used the 076 on the mill the aux oiler cap (a 3/4" brass BSP end cap) vibrated its way off the oiler and fell onto the chain which sent it flying so that it hit me right between the eyes. Fortunate;y I was wearing full face shield but it still felt like a fair whack and knocked me backwards a few steps.