nails?

[davey]

What is the general consensus on using nails to hold up tubing?

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

I use a few small stainless nails in tubing supports, but I use very few tubing supports. If you will install your tubing when it is warmer and pull it tight, it eliminates nearly all of the need for tubing supports except on 100 feet stretches or longer.

[mapleack]

Ideally I think that zero nails would be needed, I dont use them. That being said there are still some out in our woods, the combination of the old T's with nail holes and my fathers installation philosophy was a dangerous one! If the system is installed correctly, tightly and perhaps when cold, there shouldn't be any need for nails. If you're going to have several hundred taps or more on tubing, invest in a good two handed tubing tool. I know they seem rediculously expensive, but are worth every penny. If I have to span a large distance with 5/16 and there isnt much slope, I'll put it on wire just as I would a mainline.

[brookledge]

The use of nails is a preference type of thing. I use a few here and there but not many. If nobody used them there would not be tees with provisions for them. Where I do use them I use only the double headed type so that I can pull them out a little as necessary other wise the tree will grow over the nail and that is not a good thing. Now that there are more fittings available then there used to be such as end line fittings nails are not needed like there used to be.
When I first started with tubing there where only tees and taps and when you came to the last tree you didn't have much choice unless you wanted to have stale sap.
Keith

[Dave Y]

while the ideal set up would have no nails, most set ups aren't ideal. If you are going to use nails, use an aluminum nail that wont rust and do not drive it in the whole way. leave enuf exposed that it can be pulled.

[jemsklein]

see i have never used nails if it is a long run i put up metal wire with it and that really helps with saging put i think if you put a nail in a tree then if the t breaks of and you don't notice it then it will grow over it then in 40-80 years when you go cut it down for fire wood it will dual your chain saw lol

[maplecrest]

i have used nails, did not like them, used nylon baler twine to hold up tubing works fine, but in some situations i use a loop around a tree like the top loop, with a Y and a drop and another y to hook to the lat. i use the loop to adjust the height and how tight the line is.

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

I know this might sound funny, but black electrical tape works as a good and cheap tubing support especially for smaller trees. Wrap it around the tree and the line a few times and works good.

[Webers sugar camp]

We use 3/4' or 1' dry walls screws . they are easy on the tree and easy to remove each yeear. We tried nails but they sometimes broke off in the tree. No good

[maplehound]

I agree with Dave Y. Don't use them if at all possible but if you do find a need to use aluminum nails. They are soft enough that if left behind later they won't hurt most saw blades,( chainsaw or saw mill)

[H. Walker]

While on the topic of nails in trees, I was always told that copper nails in a tree will kill it. Anyone know, fact or fiction??

[Ahnohta]

copper nails - fiction, we tried years ago with many copper nails tree lived

but a chainsaw - fact

[Mac_Muz]

I am new here, but have worked some in the woods, cutting trees and building wire fences and the like.

I don't like finding nails in saw wood much.

BUT if you use a small board and short nails like roffing nails thru the board into the tree, as the tree grows it will push the board out for many years.

No nails then get trapped under bark, and what ever you like can be mounted to a small board very cheap.

If you don't remove the board, at least a cutter will know where to hunt nails.

As to copper I have no idea if copper nails harm trees. My guess would be it doesn't.

I use copper in making jewelery and buffing does release nasty dusts.. I wear a mask, but if I forget to wash my hands even though I wore cotton brown work gloves there is a nasty taste.

I have used copper roves on wooden boats, and horse tack. But I don't know if it will harm a livng tree.

[troes30]

ive never used a nail. years ago with the tubing that stretched a can see the point, but now with the rigid tubing you shouldn't have to. end rings work great for tightening your laterals. hook couplers on your mainline and end rings at the last tap. sounds easy but dont get me wrong i've pulled my fair share of tubing out of 3 feet of crust.

[hard maple]

absolutley no reason to pound nails into a tree.
Some of the new tees do not have a place for a nail for good reason.
Whenever I go around a tree it's with a rope or a tie down strap
The laterals get a fence post or a wire tie on long stretches(rarely)
"No hardware in the trees"
Nails, lag screws,turnbuckels
These seem to be a thing of the past, since new methods have evolved.

[Fred Henderson]

If you got to use a nail make it Alu.