Unpopular opinion: I stopped booming down with the load block and my cable stopped birdcaging
A 30 year operator named Ray pulled me aside at a job in Gary, Indiana and said I was booming down with the block too close to the tip on my 60 ton. I figured he was old school and brushed it off for about 4 months. Then I got two birdcages in one month on a 3/4 inch wire rope, which is about $1,800 a spool and a whole day of downtime. Ray showed me how the block weight whipping on the boom tip is what does it, so now I keep a good 10 to 15 feet between the block and the sheave when I travel or boom down. Haven't had a single birdcage in 14 months since. Any of you run a different gap depending on boom length, or is 10 to 15 feet pretty standard for you too?