- Hey everyone, my name is Matt.
Welcome to my backyard.
We're actually going to be leaving today
because if a lot of you follow along,
I just finished up building
this bad boy right here.
And today we are going to
hopefully put this thing
to use for the very first time.
Super, super excited.
So my buddy, Brandon, sent me a picture
of a tree he's removing,
and he said it literally
has my name on it.
So we're gonna go watch the removal.
And then when the tree actually
gets down to the trunk,
we'll see if we can
get it onto this thing.
Should be pretty big.
So it's white oak.
It looks like it's about
four feet in diameter
and it's about 12 feet long.
So it should be up in the,
oh, 7,000 pound range,
somewhere in there.
I'll have a better idea
once it's on the ground,
and I can get some real
measurements on it.
So let's load up and head out.
I'm excited.
So we're at a church today.
This is where Brandon has this job at.
There is this white oak tree back here
that has some significant die back.
Has, it looks like maybe
it got struck by lightning
or something at some point,
but we'll get a better view
of the canopy in a bit,
but there is a ton of die back.
There's a whole crew of
people here in the church.
They're going to help remove the wood,
repurpose a lot of it.
And then hopefully the
main trunk will be solid
and hauled back to my place.
(chainsaw buzzing)
(chainsaws buzzing)
(chainsaw buzzing)
(chainsaw buzzing)
- [Man] I've gotta get going.
(chainsaw buzzing)
- [Man] All right.
(indistinct)
(chainsaw buzzing)
- [Man] Down here stacking,
he's up there working.
(men laughing)
Just lounge around the lawn
and have a snack and whatever.
(chainsaw buzzing)
- [Man] Don't think it
can stay right there.
(chainsaw buzzing)
- [Matt] So I am, unfortunately
out of time today.
I got to take off.
It's my son's birthday tonight.
I gotta go celebrate that.
But Brandon made a lot
of progress so far today.
He's only been up there for a few hours.
And what I love about this is
this church has a daycare center.
And they're going to be
repurposing so much of this tree.
So they've already taken
chunks into the daycare area
for the kids to jump on
and play on and climb on.
They got balance beams and all
kinds of stuff for the kids.
And they also are collecting
all of the significant
like twiggy branch stuff,
so this pile over here.
That's for the kids so they can build
their own little like forts
and shelters or whatever.
So really cool childcare program here.
I just love it.
As a father of three young kids
that makes me really happy.
So hopefully somebody will be able
to get some footage of
the tree coming down.
Otherwise I will see you tomorrow,
and we'll grab a few logs.
So instead of dropping
the tree last night,
they just spent some time
doing some cleanup work.
And first thing Brandon's gonna do today
is get this thing on the ground.
And then we'll see about loading it.
Probably gonna end up taking
this section here will
be the base section.
And then we'll grab another
log like that as well.
So it'd be like a two tripper.
(chainsaw buzzing)
- [Man] It all looks solid.
(chainsaw buzzing)
- [Crowd] Timber.
(crowd clapping)
Timber, yeah.
Timber, yeah.
(chainsaw buzzing)
(indistinct)
- Can I give you that?
- I think so.
There we go.
I have to tell you, I am super,
super ecstatic right now.
This went so well.
So, no issues getting this thing up here.
That was the thing I
was least worried about.
Getting it back here, this
thing tows so smoothly.
It is insane how well this trailer
handles this kind of load.
The estimated weight on this thing
with the log weight calculators
puts it at 7,700 pounds.
I'm just gonna call it eight.
(Matt laughing)
Just to make it a nice even number.
Four, four tons, so
that's a lot of weight.
Sorta throw some numbers at you.
We are 37 inches in the
narrow area here on this end.
The other end is 52 inches.
That's pretty big.
And total length is 11 feet.
So that's a really good size log.
This is exactly what this
trailer was designed to do.
Pick up large urban trees like this guy,
and it did it so well.
I'm so happy.
This is a dream trailer for me.
It is 100% designed for doing this.
No compromises anywhere else
to make it do more than one thing,
for this is his primary function.
And because of that, it
does its primary thing
super, super well.
So on this end, you may
have already noticed
I have some blue stain here,
that is embedded metal.
So somewhere in this location,
down that way in the tree,
there is some piece of
iron or steel in there.
A nail, screw, bolt, who knows what.
We'll find out what it is.
Not super worried about it.
One thing it does tell me though,
is that it is somewhere in this log
because these stains are not
on the other end of the log.
If that metal was higher in the tree
above where this was cut off,
that stain would be present
in both ends of this log.
So we have two probably
larger things over here
and something small over
there, not a big deal.
I do have some fracturing here.
Also not a huge deal.
This is gonna be a really
nice character slab log.
Can't wait to get it on the saw.
So it has been a few weeks.
I'm out here today.
I'm gonna grab the upper
section of this tree,
this guy here.
So I'm gonna get a chain underneath it
and just pull up on the trailer.
It's a, you know, a lot
smaller than the other one,
diameter wise, but it does
have a lot more nubbins.
So we'll see how that goes.
There we go.
(engine rumbling)
I have to say, I am super thrilled
that, you know, it actually worked.
That's the best part of building something
that's custom made for a task,
is actually using it for the first time
and finding out that it works exactly
or even better than you
had actually anticipated.
So even going down the road
with this giant thing on here,
I had no problem towing it behind me.
The trailer follows steadily behind me,
and it was very different
compared to my old trailer.
It was a lot smoother and just
felt a lot safer in general.
So, super happy.
I got both these back here.
Very quick pickup, which was super nice.
So a big thank you to Brandon
and the folks that Overhead Spirit of Hope
for inviting me over to watch the removal
and then taking this back here with me.
I'm gonna be giving a
few of the slabs back
so they can make a table or
something for the church there,
which should be pretty nice.
So look for the sawing video for this guy
and that guy in the near future.
So that's gonna do it for this one.
I have a trailer that works
and it's a little bit more
scratched than it used to be,
which feels good.
It can't be a showroom trailer.
It has to be actually used for something.
So that's gonna do it for this one.
Thank you as always for watching,
I greatly appreciate it.
If you have any questions
or comments on the trailer,
the sawmill or anything back in the shop,
please feel free to leave me a comment.
As always, I'll be happy to answer
any questions you might have
and until next time, happy woodworking.
