Andrew's Pitchfork

[notouch 10]

Andrew's Pitchfork is interesting because it's based on sound principles similar to Market Profile and Volume Spread Analysis, namely standard deviation and reversion to the mean. You'll see on the chart that we seem to have rejected the upper line sharply so the chances are we'll see a return to the middle line or even the lower line before moving higher.

 

[Soultrader 12]

Very interesting. I never used them before. How do you draw them? Is it like fibs.. taking the swing low and swing high?

[notouch 10]

Similar to Fibs but you need 3 points, ABC, as marked below.

 

[Soultrader 12]

Ok. Thank you notouch. With pitchforks are you looking at the middle line as possible retracement/support area? Or is this a tool to measure if prices are overextended?

[notouch 10]

Both I think. You would look for price to be rejected at the upper line and then revert to the middle line. It should find support at the middle line but if it goes through the next area of support is the lower line.

[TinGull 10]

Interesting stuff with the fork. The YM liked to ride the tines today....

[walterw 10]

Interesting stuff with the fork. The YM liked to ride the tines today....

 

Nice Keltner there Tin, could you share what inputs do they have, are they simple or exponential ? thanks Walter.

[TinGull 10]

Sure thing.

 

Its a 21 period triangular moving average with 1.5 deviations for the bands.

[walterw 10]

Thanks Tin ¡¡

[notouch 10]

Pretty severe rejection today above the upper trend line of the pitchfork. Almost a shooting star daily candlestick. Now is the time I'm thinking of taking profits on my YM longs and re-estabishing them after a decent pullback. It was still an up day though so we'll see what happens tomorrow.

 

[Nick1984 10]

The pattern looks nice on that particular chart but could you provide an example of that over a different timeframe? Reason I ask is because it looks like its only reasonably doable if there has been a relatively significant retracement.

[notouch 10]

It's true that you need a relatively significant retracement because you need to draw the pitchfork from a swing low to a swing high and then to the next swing low, which should be a retracement.

 

Interestingly we closed above the pitchfork. If we pull away from it then the upper line should act as a lower support line.

[notouch 10]

Came down exactly to the 50% line. Pretty impressive I'm sure you'll agree. If today's candle closes in the top half of yesterday's body then that's what Nison calls a piercing pattern - a bullish pattern. It's easy to get caught up in the emotion of day to day trading so it's useful to look back at past analysis.

 

[Reaver 10]

notouch,

 

great posts- where would you recommend learning more about pitchforks? Any books, etc?

 

Thanks!

[notouch 10]

I'm glad you bumped this thread. You can see from the chart how accurate it's been - giving excellent signals when used in combination with candlestick analysis. It looks like it's heading for the lower support line and will be interesting to see how it develops.

 

As for books I can't remember any specifically. I think I just got my information from general technical analysis books and websites.

 

[Reaver 10]

I found some good info at http://www.medianline.com

 

Don't ban me! I mean well! The guy apparently sells a book, but what attracted me is that it seems you can get a transcribed version of the original Alan Andrews course on the site for free.....I figured it was good info.

[BlowFish 10]

Tim's Book is good and the old medianline site was excellent. I'm not sure everything got transferred over but he had loads of interesting charts trades and discussions. I still have a folder somewhere with prints of all the charts he posted. I he has had personal issues recently but in the past he has been extraordinarily generous with his time and knowledge.

 

Gordon at http://www.pitchforkprimer.com/ is good to. If you want to learn it more or less as Andrews taught it, he's your man. He will give as much of his time as you need to get each point.

 

Abnother pretty good source of pitchfork stuff is Mikula's "The Best Trendline Methods of Alan Andrews." http://www.mikulaforecasting.com/books/aabook.htm

 

I spent quite a long time (close to a year I guess) studying pitchforks and they certainly have merit. I prefer to use simple trend lines and channels at the moment. (A regular trend channel is identical to a modified Shiff pitchfork for those that are interested). Every now and then if the price action looks like it warrants it I'll throw a regular pitchfork on.

 

Oh I guess I should mention Jim Kane too he's really a Fibonacci guy (one of the best, imo again) He wrote a book "Kane Trading On: Median line and Fibonacci Synergy". http://www.kanetrading.com/books/books.html Its kind of different to 'mainstream' but interesting none the less. There are probably pre-requisite books of his too. I bought the boxed set of the whole lot and did not regret it. Actually I did not regret any of the above purchases.

 

Sometimes I scare myself how much time and money I have spent learning this trading lark....If i think a method has merit I tend to try and track down everything that has ever been published about it. Doesn't necessarily help with my trading but I have a keen interest in the whole arena.

[Reaver 10]

I am the same way Blowfish....If I would have spent this much money on fixing a car or something I would have flipped out...but for some reason it's okay for me to have spent it on trading stuff. ha ha

 

Something's wrong with me, I know it.

 

I have some good ebooks I can post if James is okay with it. They are about Pitchforks, and all kinds of stuff.