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From Ox to Helitug

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From Ox to Helitug From Ox to Helitug THE LOGGER'S main aim a hundred years ago was to deliver logs to the millpond at least cost and with little attention to the remaining trees, fire hazard, and the slopes he left naked. Now we are concerned about sustained yield, soil erosion, and water yield. Logging therefore has changed. Logging has several operations. A tree is felled, the process of separating it from its stump. It is limbed and bucked, operations that include removing limbs and cutting the tree into logs or bolts. Logs or bolts are then yarded or skidded to the mill or to a transportation route. A hundred years ago driving logs, or transport by water, was in common use to carry logs long distances to the millsite. Later railroad logging was introduced. Then huge trucks became the main method of transport. Some methods of the past are still used, but most log- ging operations are now highly mechanized. The virgin forests a century ago were logged by rugged, reckless men. They used the ax and crosscut saw for felling, limbing, and bucking, which now are done largely with chainsaws powered by gasoline or electricity, but still with the help of the ax. Logging once depended on horse and oxen as motive power for skidding logs. To reduce ground friction, the logging wheel, a forerunner of the present logging arch, was invented. The horse and oxen eventu- ally gave way to steam-driven cable skidders. Ground skidding was improved by the invention of high-lead and high-line skidding, whereby the logs were partly or wholly raised off the ground. Then, as the centers of logging moved to the West and South, came the gasoline- and diesel-driven engines for skidders and trac- tors. The logging arch replaced the logging wheel. The use of chokers or cable loops with special quick-coupling devices were used to bunch logs for skidding. Another means used then and now to carry logs to main transport routes is the timber flume, which usu- ally is V-shaped in cross section. Water is used to lubricate the flume. Flumes may be hundreds to thousands of feet long. Oldtimers used cant hooks and peavies for rolling logs and guid- ing logs in the water. Brute strength gave way to levers and winches for hoisting logs. The parbuckle and crosshaul for loading logs has given way to mechanized loaders for handling logs or bunches of logs. Truck loaders today may be self-loaders or expen- sive but highly efíicient individual loading units. The long haul ó 14907 0-62-18 257 m:u^'^-. K ' ' ... Felling a tamarack with a powersaw on Flalhead National Forest in Montana. Bucking a Sitka spruce on Tongass National Forest in Alaska. ■^s - \ 'r I ■J^;Jkf^t Ground skidding Douglas-fir with a steam donkey in Oregon in 1918. Skidding with a skyline crane in Colorado in 1955. '} If m 1^ tî -.^ i .^-'.' i ■ ■ "■i 0^' \ï> ■ täjf*'.-, ■ ^ ■ ' 'fifi - H^^^^^^K^VHI ■ '\ ■ ( > ^■^^irfV 1^ ■X-'*- 1 uj:i^fe»> 1it;,. -ífc. ^ . v" •^ ifOH^HiyÉfe^^^^ ^K-. .-».- ■^^^é^ ■*^ ''';^ « m m■4 ^ '^^ " 1 ,^,^ ^ 1 M^Mi*"" " r •*?e:> - ■■ ' ' Y^^ 1 k _. VHHBI ^ ^^-^ tíe^ HS^SSï^S't.fr ^ ^2iÉÍ ^^^P^^lr^ ^ •• River drivers use peavies to break a logjam at Carricli Pitch in Maine. from woods and mill has evolved from sled or wagon to water transport, to railroads, and to trucks as main vehicles. Even yet all of these methods are used. The white-water boys were one of the first of the special breed of men, the loggers. They decked logs at stream edge and then discharged or rolled them into the stream when waterflows were adequate. Flash-dams sometimes were con- structed to back water for release during drives. Stream driving was hazardous. Nimble-footed men with pikes or peavies guided the flow and broke up logjams. This process has not changed much over the years, except that the safety helmet and life preserver have been introduced, symbolic of present-day concern for personal safety. Railroad logging was introduced as the center of logging moved westward and southward from New England. Logs were skidded to railside by cable skidders and loaded on rail cars. Hundreds of 260 miles of roadbed and wooden trestles were built. Specially designed steam engines were built to give traction. Log hauling is different from other transport in that the uphill pull is usually empty. In mountain country, curves were made sharp to cut down cost of roadbed and to help in braking trains on steep grades. The modern era of logging is characterized by a movement to log hauling by truck or truck and trailer. Special roads and trucks are used in many off-highway hauls to handle loads up to 125 tons gross vehi- cle weight. One operation uses trucks with bunks 16 feet wide and an empty weight greater than is allowed on highways in most States. Main-haul logging roads often are built to higher load capacity than main transcontinental highways. New cable systems are being introduced to handle logging on steep mountains. Helicopters are being built to handle high-capacity loads. Lighter-than-air craft have been proposed. Pulp chips may be transported by pipelines from forest to mill. Helitug logging is being considered—the use of helicopter to tow balloon-lofted logs from stump to mill. The future may be symbolized by the distance we have progressed from the era when boards and timbers were pit sawn or hewn and carried by hand to place of use. Today automa- tion is a word of hope to the timber industry. (J-J- Byrne) Loading lodgepole pine pulpwood bolts, Targhee National Forest, Idaho. »"ÏTIÎV ûtAT MORTHEW .
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