Shutoff gate

We noticed that the rope is streching out quite a bit as it now sags in between each return wheel.  Josh (from Northeast Slopes) had mentioned that their new rope stretched out quite a bit at first.  They even had to splice it again.  Because of how portable our top wheel is we were able to avoid splicing the rope again by sliding the bull wheel back another 4' using come-alongs.

Jay ordered a simple $5 relay for the shutoff loop.  He wired it in and it worked!

We were short about 150' of wire to complete the loop to the top of the hill.  Mike said he had old telephone wire that we could use.  We went over to his house to see what he had.  Turns out it was still partially buried.  We used Jay's truck to try to pull the wire out.

Unfortunately we couldn't get a continuous piece of wire that added up to 150' without breaking it into pieces (ground was partially frozen).  Mike had a plan B though - a partially buried coil of wire out in the woods.  After a little hunting around Mike found it and it was exactly what needed.

After we got the wire laid out (and connected temporarily) we went to test it and the truc wouldn't start.  It became obvious that the truck battery quit on us so we swapped it out with Jay's truck battery (for now).

We also finished installing the stop gate at the top.  I brought two outlet plugs - one got mounted on a tree and the other on a post.  I pounded a pressure treated 2x6 into the ground to create the post.

An old extension cord with prongs on both ends was used to connect the loop and act as the emergency stop gate.

Jay fired up the tow and I held on to the rope and let it pull me through the gate a couple times.  Each time the rope stopped immediatley.  It was pretty slick to see it work so well.

We also started to install the safety fence around the drive and idle wheels to help keep dogs and kids away from moving parts.

The safety shutoff buttons that I had previously ordered (about $8 apiece) arrived in the mail.

We also got about 12" of new super fluffy but wet snow last night.  The snow came down in a span of 4.5 hrs.

I took the snow machine out around the yard to pack down the snow for the nordic ski loop.  It was fun as it was snowing pretty hard.

The weather forecast is calling for a large snowstorm by the end of the week.  Predictions for snow totals so far range from 10 to 30 inches.  If all goes well we'll be able to use the ski tow again soon.

Early winter glading

Since the snow had completely melted off it made sense to do some more glade cutting.  The bottom half of the hill didn't have any glades yet (which meant you had to ski the tow line instead).  We wanted to open it up quite a bit on the lower slopes to get skiers away from the tow line.  By cutting only pin cherries, striped maple and crowded beech sapplings it worked out fairly well with mostly yellow birch and sugar maples remaining.

Here are the new glades near the bottom of the tow.

From the same spot looking up at the tow line.

At first I was creating little islands untouched from any cutting but the striped maple and pin cherrys were crowding out trees with more timber value (such as yellow birch).  Because of that I ended up weeding out some of the unwanted saplings everywhere.

I'm looking forward to watching the forest mature and establish a larger upper canopy on the lower slopes.

Here is an old logging road.

Rain...

A fairly large weekend storm brought a lot of ice to the lower valleys especially around Lake Champlain.  The higher elevations on the other hand saw warmer temperatures (40-50's) along with wind and rain.  This made the snow melt - fast.  It's unfortunate to see the snow melt so quickly but it is better than getting damaging ice.  We took advantage of the melting snow to get the saftey shutoff wire laid out.

We decided to leave the wire on the ground instead of hanging it.  We ended up using old single pair telephone wire. 

Jay got started an hour earlier (I was still working on our backup generator).  When I arrived Jay had already finished installing the throttle.

 The throttle will allow us to maintain a steady speed (without having to have someone sit in the truck or place a brick on the gas pedal).

We also figured out which wire we needed to break in order to stop the engine.  We pulled the wire up to the top of the hill.  We were short 150' so we'll have to add that on later.  We plan to have 5 or so shutoff buttons on the hill to allow someone to stop the tow anywhere on the hill.

We closed a loop back to the truck from the first shutoff to test it.  We wanted to see if we can start and stop it off a loop (without having to install a relay).  It didn't work but hopefully by adding a relay it'll prevent a voltage drop on the loop in the truck.  Here is Jay working on the wire connection in the truck.

We also swapped out David's come-along so that we can return it to him (thanks David!). We replaced it with a more heavy duty come-along that's rated for 4 tons.

It works!

We recieved a little over a foot of cold fluffy dense snow.  It was just enough snow to test out the tow.  Here is a short video highlighting our opening day.

http://youtu.be/9_Veo6W_rhs

We didn't hook the rope up on the trees the day before the snow (we were mostly just tired/lazy and didn't want to have to hike back up).  We figured that it would be fine given the snow was going to be all powdery.

When we first engaged the drive wheel the next day the rope was slipping and not moving at all.  After manually pulling on the rope to loosen it up as well as giving the throttle some gas the rope started spinning.  Phew.  Since Jay didn't bring his skis I took the honors of first ride up the tow.  I quickly found out that breaking trail while holding onto a tow isn't exactly a walk in the park.  It was slow going at first until Jay gave it more gas and it got easier.  I even managed to get some air off the bumps!  I held on up to the half way point and skied back down next to the tow line.  I was completely out of breath when I got back to the bottom.  It got easier each time as it packed in.  I eventually held on all the way up to the top.  Kricky came over with Galen and took a couple runs too.  Jay raked some snow into the dips which made it a lot smoother and easier to ride the tow.

Now that we know the tow actually works we plan to mount a hand throttle somewhere on the exterior of "Roxy" (the official name Kricky gave our rope tow truck).  Most importantly we'll install safety shutoffs as well as an emergency stop gate at the top.

It was definitely an exciting day and Jay plans to bring his short and fat skis to try out the tow next time.

Tow tweaks and safety

The first big snowstorm of the season is expected to arrive tonight.  The weather forecast is calling for total accumulations of well over a foot of snow in our area.  If this is the case it should be just enough snow to ski!

We spent the afternoon making an adjustment to the bottom idle wheel to ensure that the rope tracks correctly under various tensions.  We added a pipe across the bottom of the last idle rim (before the rope heads up the hill).  It should help prevent the rope from jumping out of the wheel when someone grabs onto the rope (creating slack behind them).

We're realizing that we'll eventually need a counter weight pully system to take up the rope slack especially when there is more than one person riding the tow.  Another option (if we could somehow get a benched trail up to the top) is to park the truck at the top of the hill.  Having the truck at the top would eliminate the extra rope slack issue.  It would also allow us to not have to keep the rope under a lot of tension (which we currently do to help keep the extra slack down).  A rope with less tension might make it easier for folks to hold the rope up off the ground while riding up the tow.

We also pulled the top bull wheel back about 6' to help tension the rope.  I didn't get any pictures today as my phone camera ran out of battery supply.

I also picked up some more telephone wire and snow-fencing given to us by our good friends Ray and Cheryl Harvey.  The wire will be used to run a circuit for the safety shutoff switches as well as the top stop gate.  We also plan to fence off the bottom area around the truck to keep kids and dogs away from all of the moving parts.

Big weekend

Since the rope had already arrived, we were eager to get the rope up on the hill.  We used the tractor to load the rope into the truck.  Kricket and Galen drove the truck over to the backside near the VAST trail.  I drove the tractor down and met up with them and Jay to load the rope onto the tractor forks again.

I slowly backed my way down the steep VAST trail with the rope.  It went smoothly.

We tried to uncoil the rope using a 6" pvc pipe on the tractor forks.

It was difficult to work with since the rope didn't come with a spool.  It was clear that spooling the rope out (without a spool) wasn't going to work.  We didn't have a choice but to put it on the ground and feed it out the end.  Luckily it seemed to feed out easily.

We started pulling the rope up the hill.  It was fairly easy to pull at first.  After 100 ft or so it started to get a lot harder.  We quickly realized that it would be easier to hang it up on the return wheels as we climbed up the hill.  This made a big difference as it eliminated a lot of ground friction.  Bill arrived just as the going was starting to get really hard.  He started guiding the rope out of the coil as well as pulling the rope along at the bottom.  I ended up pulling the rope hand over hand below each return wheel as Jay hiked up the hill. It was hard work.

Here is Jay and Bill taking a break.

Once we got to the top it was really easy to pull the rope down the hill.  We tied the end of the rope around a stick for us to lean into.  With Jay and I on each side of the rope we litterally walked the rope straight down the hill.  When we were about 100' from the bottom Bill yelled up at us to stop.  Turned out we ended up with a bit of a kink in the rope coil..

It didnt take too long (about 5 minutes) to get the knots out.

Here it is - rope in place!

A good friend and neighbor, David Wiezalis, stopped over to lend a hand.

Jay fetched another 4x4 while David and I went and got more chains to finish securing the top bull wheel.

I was impressed that David seemed to know what tools he needed to bring today to help get the job done.  He brought spare pieces of climbing rope and a come-along.  We were able to tension the rope by tying one end off and wrapping the other end around the drive wheel.  Jay started the truck up and the wheel slowly tensioned the rope.  It worked out amazingly well as the rope was too heavy for us to pull tension by hand.  We used the climbing rope David brought to keep the rope tensioned up to a point until we had the rope fully spliced together.  I couldn't find my come-along so we borrowed David's to hold the tensioner wheel in place.  Here is David and Bill working on feeding the rope through the tensioner wheel.

Here is David, Jay and Bill.  We were pretty much done for the day as it was getting dark.

We were able to get the tensioner wheel in place (minus the legs) and Bill brought a short piece of the rope home with him to practice splicing the rope together.

The next day I hiked up the hill and installed hooks on the tree towers to hold the rope up off the ground when it's not in use (so it doesn't get buried under snow/ice).  I checked to see what it would be like to hold onto the rope.  It seemed to be the perfect diameter.

Looking down the tow line (rope is hooked up on trees here)

The bull wheel at the top fully secured.

Looking at the tow line near the top.

When Jay arrived he brought a sled full of stuff including a chainsaw, tools and gas for the truck.  He decided it would be easiest to slide down with it.

We started cutting down the high stumps on the tow line to help make it less bumpy.

Jay came up with a great idea to put logs under the rope at the high points so the rope didn't work its way into any dirt or rocks.

We also tried a few different techniques for holding the rope.  This was Jay's.

When Bill arrived he got right to splicing.

It took awhile as it was a bit complicated.

Once the rope was ready I brought Galen out with me (mom was off at a friend's baby shower) to see if our first test would be successful.  Jay's wife, Donna, also stopped by to help get the final adjustments done.

When we were ready Jay fired the truck up and nothing was moving - we quickly realized the rope was wrapped around the drive and tensioner wheel incorrectly.

Here is Jay, Bill and Donna flipping the rope around on the tensioner wheel.

Take 2...

Success!!!!!

We ended up tensioning the wheel back using the come-along quite a bit as the tow spun.  This made a big difference and got rid most of the slack that occured when Jay or Bill grabbed on the tow mimicking a skier's resistance.

Here is Bill looking up the tow line while it was spinning.

Galen and I watching the tow.  It was so cool to see it actually work!

Jay testing out the tow (holding on while running).

Here is a short video of the rope in action.

http://youtu.be/Jj9RhrexgWc