It hapens most often in heavy leaners. Also some hardwoods are more prone to it. Hickory is one. I've seen Ash do it as well. Here is one way to prevent it: You dont have to use a humboldt face cut. There are other ways that mainly involve cutting a couple inches of both sides of the tree before you start your back cut.
And here I thought Barber-chairing was when an uprooted tree stood back up when enough of the tree was cut up, and the rootball pulled the remaining trunk back to vertical..... Learn something everyday here
This was a pretty good leaner I cut last year. No barber chair. The trunk of the tree was pretty solid and it came down with no issue.
Eric I'm not sure what the official term is for that. I call it oh chit! Here's an excellent video showing how to prevent barber chair from happening: Notice how he nips the side of the tree behind the face cut. This is pretty close to how I fall most trees. Except I don't bend my old behind over that far anymore!
No worries we were all there at some point. I got lucky and had an old timer to show me the ropes. The B.C. Faller videos are a good place to start. Most of them are on youtube now. It's mostly west cost falling, but a lot of it translates to other regions/terrain. If you are near a Game of Logging class I hear they are very good. You might consider checking one out.
Are there advantages/disadvantages to the different cuts. I have been doing the conventional cuts when felling a tree.
All I ever do is conventional cuts also. Once in awhile I will bore cut a tree but I do not use the others. The Humboldt will give you a flat cut at the bottom of the tree so that when you split it for firewood you have no angle cut there. I just cut them off flat anyways before splitting and throw the small piece I cut off into the ugly pile. I learned by watching the National Forest videos.
The Humbolt will allow the wedge you cut out to just fall away. Very handy when falling very large trees. The open face cut will do the same with the added benefit of not pulling the hinge while the tree falls. The stem stays connected to the stump all the way down.
I use the open face 99% of the time. That design allows the hinge to stay in control all the way to the ground or damm near close to it. I've never used a Humbolt. I will watch some videos to see what the purpose is but at first glance it looks no better than a conventional cut which once it closes it's going to break the hinge. Once the hinge breaks you've lost control, and usually when it breaks that's when it's going to pull fiber.
Humboldt is mostly a West coast commercial logging technique. In fact in some areas out there it's a stiff fine if you don't use it. Open face cut is the safest. I mostly use the conventional. Some habits die hard.
After a few thousand times doing it, I make a cleaner conventional face cut than I ever will open. To me that is safer than having the hinge stay intact all the way to the ground. The biggest safety factor is have your primary and secondary exit rout clear of debris and at a 45° angle leading away from your back cut and use it when the tree starts to go.
Up here Eric VW, when the root ball pulls it back up we call it a rocking chair or catapult. .. it's fun from a distance to see but a check your pants moment when cutting!
