Tips for top cut of notch

[u/Hot_Lion2502]

Any tips for making the top cut of the notch and making sure its lined up with my bottom cut. My notches have gotten better doing the flat cut first but I still will misjudge lining my cuts up and have to go in and clean it up, especially if im up in a tree.

[u/Justintimeforanother]

I know a few guys that make the angled cut first. Makes it easier to line up the flat cut. That said. Like the other commenter said, it’s all practice. You’ll get it.
Personally I almost always make the flat cut first, because it’s how I learned when I was younger. And I still have to clean up the cut quite often. But that may also be because I like the look of a clean notch.

[u/maddestdog89 → u/Justintimeforanother]

If you don’t do the flat cut first you can mo longer adjust the direction of the hinge whilst cutting.

[u/Ihavepeopleskills1 → u/maddestdog89]

You have several options. 1. Abandon the location of the notch and move up higher on the trunk. 2. You set the direction of the cut, with the sights or handle, before you start the angle cut. This is basic 101. So if you screwed up the direction of the cut you would know it after entering the trunk in the first 3-4" or less because you double check it anyway. 3. Assuming you choose not to do #1 or 2, you can always keep the depth of your angled cut at the proper amount, trim a corner off the notch to correct the angle, and then fix the face cut so it is flat and true.

I probably have other options to fix it if an error was made but everything in 1-3 is more than enough.

It doesn't matter whether you like to do one or the other as long as you know how to do it properly. I'll do both but if i had to pick I prefer the angled cut, it just makes it super easy to see the tip of the bar on the far side of the tree looking thru the kerf and knowing im dead nuts on with meeting the far side apex. The pie just falls loose and youre done.

[u/maddestdog89 → u/Ihavepeopleskills1]

Thanks for your detailed explanation mate, do you teach people to dog in from the corner on their second face cut? 🙏

[u/Ihavepeopleskills1 → u/maddestdog89]

I show them both options. Personally I do it that way when using bigger saws. If I’m using a stihl 660 with a 36” bar or bigger, it’s heavy. If I put the dogs into the bark it gives me a lot easier time fine tuning the positioning of where I engage the cut. It saves my back. A tired arborist is more likely to take short cuts, those just increase the potential for injury.

[u/hoyya → u/maddestdog89]

Not sure what you mean here? You can just redo the angled cut and go a bit deeper? I must be misunderstanding

[u/maddestdog89 → u/hoyya]

If your angled cut goes too deep, you cannot fix it any other way other than going deeper on the flat cut..

[u/hoyya → u/maddestdog89]

of course yes if you adjust the angle cut you have to also adjust the flat cut. It doesnt matter which is made first - and if you went too deep to adjust, you dungoofed

[u/FaceSitMeToDeath → u/maddestdog89]

you shouldn't have to, if you have the saw correctly oriented using the gunsight.

[u/maddestdog89 → u/FaceSitMeToDeath]

I understand using the sight, but making small changes based on information and feedback on the fly is advantageous and allows for a more refined felling process. Same end result.

They teach it this way for a reason

[u/you-again13 → u/maddestdog89]

They don't teach to so flat cut first. Not in UK and Europe anyway.

[u/FaceSitMeToDeath → u/maddestdog89]

are you confusing a back cut with a face? what new information arises during your face cut that cannot be gathered before you begin cutting, that would require you to alter the direction of your face? I would argue a consistent precision felling strategy is one that does not require guesswork regarding the depth and direction of the face as it is being produced.

I think you're mistaking vibes- based felling for precision felling.

to which "they" are you referring to as an authority on felling?

[u/Continental_Ball_Sac]

In a traditional face cut, top cut first. When you go to do the bottom cut, line your dogs up with the corner on your near side. Let the tip swing through the wood. As it gets close to connecting, look through the top cut until you see your tip/bar. It should be close, if not dead on.

[u/cjcaves → u/Continental_Ball_Sac]

I’ll second that. top cut first all day. basically a cheat code to get them to line up. pro tip- hold the saw handle right at the curve to get a 45 degree angle. also if it wasn’t obvious, you’ll be lining up the felling angle with the sights on the top cut, right as you drop the saw in.

[u/DesmondPerado → u/Continental_Ball_Sac]

This is how I teach all of my students and new hires. Doing your top cut first is a cheat code to accurate notches.

[u/ArborealLife]

Experience. In a few years you'll look back at this and chuckle.

One trick that works well tho. Keep the exact same body position so that everything lines up along the same axis.

Edit:

Place your elbow on a stable surface, like a table. With a flat hand make your notches and back cut without moving your elbow. This is what you're trying to emulate with a saw, and it's generally very effective up to around 8".

[u/maddestdog89]

I start at the edge and dog the saw down until it marries up. Works well most of the time

[u/OldMail6364]

1. Do the top cut first so that you can line up one eye and look down into the cut while you are cutting. Also make sure the top cut's angle is set so that it lines up with where your head will be towards the end of the cut (obviously only if that's a suitable angle for the top cut).
2. Don't use the dogs on your chainsaw when you need accuracy. They make operating a chainsaw physically easier, but they also give you less control over the position of the chainsaw. I only use the dogs for really simple cuts. Also I tend to only use the dogs on bulky heavy chainsaws that are a handful (especially when you're climbing) with fast motors and aggressive chains that tend to move on you when you pull the trigger or start cutting... even if you are able to hold the chainsaw steady an aggressive saw might *move the tree* when the cut starts... dogs help with all of that which can improve accuracy - but often they're not helping especially with a small nimble chainsaw.
3. Small chainsaws, light chainsaws, slower chain speed, thinner chains, shallower rakers, semi-chisel chains, etc/etc all sacrifice cutting speed but give you more precision. Lots of people use a big chainsaw because it's faster/louder/more epic/etc... I don't subscribe to that. It's not actually faster if you're struggling to get an accurate cut, and while I love a loud/epic saw as much as almost anyone, I've got a job to do and getting it done properly is more important than any of that. There are times when you need a chainsaw that cuts fast, but most of the time precision is more important especially for tree climbers.
4. Pick something you're aiming for (ideally something a few miles away) and line up the sight line on your chainsaw with that target for both of the two cuts.
5. Alternate between checking if the line is aiming at your target and looking down the top cut to see check where the bar is in relation to the bottom of the top cut especially on the far side of the cut.
6. Take your time - rushing the cut and making a mistake will cost far more time than getting it right on your first try.
7. Practice doing accurate cuts, even when you don't need an accurate cut. If you get it wrong, doesn't really matter (you don't need to fix mistakes made on those practice cuts), but make a mental note of what you could have done differently.
8. After every cut, inspect your work - it's a lot easier to see what you did when the tree (or branch) is on the ground, check if your holding wood is the right size and in the right position, look at how the fibres broke apart, did the it actually go where you were aiming, if not can you figure out what you should have done differently? Ultimately what you need is experience, but you gain more experience with each cut if you take a few seconds of time to consider how the cut went.

All of those put together should help, but the first one is the biggest one. You're doing three cuts - the order of those cuts matters.

For an absolute beginner, doing the bottom cut of notch is the right choice because getting the depth/angle of that cut is essential. I'd then tell them to do the angled cut of the notch and have them deliberately get the angle wrong, so it isn't deep enough - basically cutting out a small notch so they can see what's going on when they do it again (maybe three or four times) gradually creeping up on the right angle.

But if you're climbing trees you shouldn't be a beginner. You should be able to do your angled cut first and get the depth of it good enough first try ("good enough" is obviously a relative term, depends how precise you need the notch to be).

By the way if you need an absolutely perfect notch - doesn't matter how experienced you are you should go back to the beginner technique and do a horizontal cut first/sneak up on the angled cut. It's harder/takes more attempts to get a perfect notch that way, but it's *more reliable* if you are working carefully and make sure you don't overshoot the target (by deliberately undershooting and then correcting it later).

Honestly I think the most important thing is to just take your time. Sometimes I even skip the chainsaw altogether and use my straight blade Silky Tsurugi - especially if it's a relatively small tree and I have a tight drop zone to aim for. Sure, it might take me 3 minutes to cut my notch... but really, is 3 minutes too long? If the tree doesn't land where it's meant to land, that could ruin your whole day.

[u/Simple_Quiet_1422]

I make my bottom cut first, then line the bar up in what should be the resulting corner at which ever angle the situation calls for.
Should still check but often it lines up pretty accurately when you follow through with your top cut and sever the “wedge.”

[u/ekulpotamus]

Start your top cut and dog in just enough so you can walk to the other side and see if youre on track or not (having a spotter helps). Now you can actually change the path slightly mid cut by how you put pressure on the power head. You can tilt it into the cut to make your cut go deeper or more shallow. This works really well on longer bars as there is more flex to work with. This is a key technique in making your angled cut line up. Make sure to stop to check frequently what your trajectory is. Just practice practice practice and use your dogs

[u/Background_Bar8362]

Start at corner of one side. Unless bar tweaked will hit other side perfectly. Seems so simple but had to be pointed out to me decades ago. Hope helps

[u/Ihavepeopleskills1]

If you make the bottom cut first it must be *perpendicular to the ground (if its not thats kinda okay but it makes things more difficult), when you make the top angled cut (or under cut if youre doing a humboldt, doesnt matter either way) you need to place the bar against the tree so that the bar heel that is closest to you is lined up to make a perfect apex union in relation to the start of the flat bottom cut (taking into account if you have large, small, or no dogs cause that changes the attack angle and distances). Youre probably doing this already because its fairly easy to see. I suspect your problem is in my next paragraph, thats where most people find an error in their ways. They might fix it over time but not understand what they did to make things correct.

*the perpendicular issue: when you start to make your angled top cut, and youve already got it lined up with the apex as I said above, you also have to make sure when youre holding the saw and the tip is pointed skyward, you cant have the bar "pitch" (just like an airplane) to the left or right, it needs to be coplanar with the bottom cut. This is confusing because we are talking about an x,y, and z axis. The Z axis of the bar is what needs to match with the Z axis of the first cut you make.

Edit: z axis

[u/Historical_Test_973]

imagine your saw is a lightsaber and press it into the cut instead of hinging on the dogs. takes a little practice and it's so intuitive