Lifting a big ass tiki!

Help! My hubby has finished carving a huge tiki. This thing is about 6 ft tall and about 5 ft around. It weights approximately 800 lbs. Can someone tell me how the hell we can stand this thing up straight?

You start by spreading the word about your Big TIKI Party. Have guests bring
beer, food and muscle. When enough people are there,just ask them to stant it up if they are men enough.
I'm sure it will be standing in no time.
don't forget to SEND Us Pictures.

Well, that's about as heavy as I've done. The log as dropped off to me standing up on end, I tipped it over and that was it! I had to carve it cause that wasn't going anywhere. And that my folks is how the WORLD'S LARGEST TIKI MUG was born. Seriously though, I am a one man team, so a trick I've done is get this thing going on progressively larger logs(use as rollers)with the head towards you and rolling away from you. Then use controlled momentum(sp?) and leverage to ease the base down and stand on end. I do this when out in the middle of a field. Ah hell, rent an engine hoist from Pep Boys and jack it up. For God's sake be carefull and use your strongest too, Your brain! good luck.....five feet around?

I lifted Cookolossu (my biggest) by myself using a similar method to Chiki's by rolling the tiki onto a large pipe. Roll the tiki until the pipe is under the middle, then lever (see-saw)the tiki to one side and add still larger pipes or logs underneath, until you get about a foot or two of leverage. That last heave-ho is the biggest and will take all the strenghth you can muster, literally. I eventually got him standing. Aside from the fact that my balls now drag 12 feet behind me when I walk, I came out fine.

you could rent a tractor
I'm gonna buy me one this year hopefully....the bigger the tiki the better

Actually the best way to move it is to Keep carving on it until it is light enough to hoist.
Are there any trees around ? Are you going to dig a hole and set it into so it will remain standing? How did the log get to where it is Now and is that gizmo still available?
Seriously, let us know what you have to work with and we will get it stood up.

Now I'm gonna have to help Jungletrader finish that Neverending Sandwich

The first thing that comes to my mind is a roll bed tow truck. That may not be able to get where the tiki is, but it has all the power to pull the ting into any position.

Are you just righting it, or moving it too?

To right it, bolt a 2X4 to the ground at the base to act as a stop. Lever or jack the thing up a bit so a rope can be put around the top. Somehow you have to make sure the rope does not just slip down, so getting it leaned up enough would be good. Maybe a bolt in the thing. Then with people on either side to keep it going straight, pull it forward and up on end. You just want to make sure it does not continue on over, which a huge trick in itself! 800 pounds is a lot, but 800 pounds moving becomes a ton real quick! A lot of planning will be needed...

Just think like an ancient Egyptian ,Inca or them chaps that did the Moais .

OK, this is the deal. Yes the tiki is 5 ft around. And we have other tree stumps that are bigger!!! What happened was the hubby wanted to carve some tiki's but we didn't have the materials. He was talking to a neighborhood gardner and the gardner said that he was always cutting down palm trees and that it was very expensive to dispose of them at the dump. My husband thought "perfect" and told him that whenever he cut down palm trees, to just bring them over....boy did they ever! We have four stumps that are 5 ft around about six ft high. We have another stump I kid you not, the freakin' thing is about 7 ft around. I can't even imagine how tall and old that tree was before it was chopped down. I was thinking about making a tiki bench out of it! We had to tell them to stop bringing the stumps because they were bringing them faster then we could carve them and our back yard was getting a little too crowded. This is something we do for fun and when we have free time, so it takes a few months just to complete one tiki and them being so huge doesn't help. We're going to try some of these methods to get this baby up.

I would love to post a pic of the tiki but don't know how. Can someone give me the 4-1-1 as to post a pic? Please! Thanks! :)

Look up in the "Help/FAQ" in the top right corner of this page and click on it.
go down to "Loading andEmbedding Images" line and there will be the steps.

Good luck and Thanks

[ Edited by: Benzart on 2004-01-26 07:00 ]

When we brought home our 13 foot Kona Kai Tiki we used the Benzart method. That is, we told a bunch of friends to come to our "Raise the Tiki Party", promised them food and tropical drinks, then put them to work!

We got the thing home in a 24 foot Ryder truck. It got in there via a front-loader, but we were thinking ahead and tied furniture dollies to him. We got him out of the truck, then wheeled him from the alley into the backyard. Once in the yard, we tied ropes to the top, we had three people on top of the garage pulling the ropes, and the rest lifting and pushing him up from the ground. (I don't know how necessary the folks up on the garage were, but it was good to have them up there to stabilize the Tiki).

We had already prepared a cement pad for him to sit on and it seems to have worked out fine. In fact we were surprised how quickly and easily he stood up with enough people. We think the Tiki is carved from pondersosa pine and we estimated his weight at between 1500 and 2000 pounds.

Here are a couple of photos:
http://www.pegboardchicago.com/backyard.html

Do you mean it is 5 feet around, or diameter?

The other thing I am thinking is that once it is upright, it will be easier to move. So, getting it standing is more important than standing exactly where you want. Well, within reason.

There is a device I have used several times called a "Spanish Windlass" I learned about it when I was in Boy Scouts.

It allowed me and some other skinny kids to pull up a 1000 pound tower which was 40 feet tall, and two of us to easily drag around huge rocks over 500 pounds.

You need two large (5-7 foot) sticks or logs lashed into "T" shape and some flexable "low strech" rope, cable or chain that will not break when loaded. Tie a rope from the object you want to move to some immoveble object. Insert the base of the T in the slack rope and twist it. Now one person holds the base of the T level and allows it to turn and everyone else cranks the arms of the T around so the rope is wound onto the shaft from both directions.

http://www.inquiry.net/outdoor/skills/b-p/windlass.htm

Two adults can easily pull a car out of ditch like this. You should easily be able to stand up a 800 pound tiki if you can rig it right.

[ Edited by: captnkirk on 2004-01-27 20:17 ]

thats the cuelest thing since pb&j, I was seriously going to go buy a hand crank wench tommorow to escavate some huge palms, but I love using old skool techniques, so I'll try this.

I had a lot of fantasies about bring home one or all of these to put in my yard:

So I have mentally tried to figure out thes logistics a lot. Just getting them on a truck, and I don't think I actually got to the part where I stood them up...

*On 2004-01-26 10:06, boutiki wrote:*When we brought home our 13 foot Kona Kai Tiki we used the Benzart method....Here are a couple of photos: http://www.pegboardchicago.com/backyard.html

great pics! but that tiki looks cold in the snow - better get him a scarf!

[ Edited by: Futura Girl on 2004-01-28 15:43 ]

Those really look interesting, any chance of some close-up shots. I'd love to see the detail.
Thanks.

The whole series of pics with close ups and more is HERE

double Wow, Thanks por that Post, what incredible carving...