Firewood Splitting

rusty6 · Jan 11, 2020

I helped my brother and nephew saw firewood again last weekend. I did not shoot any video as I have done several times already.
But my nephew put together a series of still shots showing them splitting some of the bigger, tough blocks using the hydraulic splitter that they built. Its a lot
easier than the axe I used to work with years ago.
Splitting Firewood

Gene Dotson · Jan 12, 2020

Been doing some wood splitting too. What I have is from dead standing oak, hickory and wild cherry. Oak and hickory were both over 20 inches in diameter. Have to roll the blocks over and split with sledge and wedge into quarters to be able to get them onto the splitter. Been so wet here I have to wait for freezing morning to get through the mud to the woods. Got 3 pretty good sized piles in the woods waiting to haul to the barn.

coshoo · Jan 12, 2020

Many splitters can be switched from horizontal to vertical by pulling a pin. Then you can just roll the big rounds over to the splitter and don't have to use the sledge and wedges.

flembo · Jan 12, 2020

I cut and split 2 dead Beach trees a few weeks ago both over 20", I had to use a chain and grapple hook on the bucket of the 1710 to lift the blocks onto the splitter. It was slow but it saved my back.

JF in MI · Jan 12, 2020

You call those 'bigger, tougher'? This is my tractor powered home made splitter.

caterpillar guy · Jan 12, 2020

Better yet hanging on the loader arms and set it on the block. Then split.

JD in da UP · Jan 12, 2020

Less of a cardio workout than hand splitting and no overheating. I?m usually cutting and splitting firewood in the winter. Out of the wind, winter isn?t so bad. What kind of hardwood were you splitting there? No sense having a great big splitter if you don?t have great big wood to split.

rusty6 · Jan 12, 2020

(quoted from post at 06:25:45 01/12/20) You call those 'bigger, tougher'? This is my tractor powered home made splitter.

Those are some huge blocks you show in the photo. Only once have I seen any that big here and it was back in 83 when we had to take down some ancient black poplars that were at risk of falling and damaging a church and other buildings. Normally we don't see any trees here that a 16 inch chain saw won't handle. A lot of the firewood (poplar) we cut is small enough that it does not even need splitting to fit in the stove. My brother likes building things so he built this splitter probably over ten years ago.

Traditional Farmer · Jan 12, 2020

Thats the way my splitter works.I'm working on a couple Red Oaks now that are over 40" in diameter on the butt end that blew down last Spring.

TWilliams · Jan 12, 2020

We use a loader with pallet forks to load 18-20' lengths of wood onto farm wagons Haul them into our home farm. I have a heavy homemade 3 point hitch splitter. We saw up the load of wood into stove lengths and position the splitter next to and at the same level as the wagon so that we can simply roll the sawed lengths onto the splitter. We position another wagon on the opposite side of the splitter so that we can toss the split pieces onto it. No bending over, no lifting big chunks of wood. Can split a load of wood in no time.
Thought I had a pic of the setup, but couldn't find any. But here's a load of red oak from a few years ago. A storm took it down, it was starting to rot at ground level. Some of the pieces were so big I used a wedge and sledge hammer to quarter them so I could manage them on the splitter. That was some nice clean stove wood.

dpendzic · Jan 12, 2020

Nice! how many tons splitting force is that setup? Nowadays i use a 23 ton splitter from northern tool but when i was 16 i built a splitter using the hydraulic ram on my Cat R2 and built the jig it fit into and set it up on the track---never calculated how many tons it developed

rusty6 · Jan 12, 2020

(quoted from post at 04:47:45 01/12/20) Been so wet here I have to wait for freezing morning to get through the mud to the woods. Got 3 pretty good sized piles in the woods waiting to haul to the barn.

No worries with mud here Gene. Our ground has been frozen solid as cement since late November and will likely stay that way til the end of March. About all we have here for wood is poplar, some tame maple and spruce. The odd willow grows big enough to cut too. This is a photo from 1983 I think. We were cutting down those huge black poplars by the church and hauling them away. More than a load on the old Dodge. Those are only the branches showing. The main trunk was closer to 4 foot diameter.

Bret4207 · Jan 13, 2020

(quoted from post at 10:25:45 01/12/20) You call those 'bigger, tougher'? This is my tractor powered home made splitter.
<img src="https://www.yesterdaystractors.com/cvphotos/cvphoto2002.jpg">

What species? Looks like Basswood.

Firewood Splitting

rusty6

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Gene Dotson

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coshoo

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flembo

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JF in MI

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caterpillar guy

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JD in da UP

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rusty6

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Traditional Farmer

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TWilliams

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dpendzic

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rusty6

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Bret4207

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