BobRip
Elite Member
I recently purchased a Mini Splitter and of course was not totally satisfied with it. I have made several improvements and perhaps others have also.
The Mini Splitter is basically a vertical wedge log splitter that uses a hydraulic jack to drive the log up into the wedge. The hydraulic jack is a commercially available 12 ton jack that has an air driven hydraulic pump on the side. In other words compressed air drives an air motor which in turn drives a hydraulic pump which then drives the jack's hydraulic piston.
My main reason for purchasing this versus a more conventional log splitter is that it has a small foot print of about 16" X 11". Also the price of $350 seemed reasonable. It also has a force of 12 tons which is a lot more than many small electric log splitters. I was concerned about how fast and easy it was to split wood. The sales person stated that it is faster that a maul and slower than a gasoline log splitter.
After using the splitter for a couple of hours, I was less than thrilled. It did split just about everything that I tried, but with issues. As mentioned below.
1. The 6 inch stroke of the piston did not always fully split logs and it was often necessary to partially split the log, and then drop the head down as you let the jack down and try again. Sometimes it was necessary to turn the log over and split from the other end. This was particularly true on wet wood.
2. Some of the wood that I had was rotten on the outside and the wedge would not reach far enough across the log to split it. I ended up splitting these logs once or twice with a maul.
3. The piston release is done by opening a valve that is near the ground. You had to slip the jack handle over this each time and open the valve, wait for the piston to fully drop and close the valve. A lot of leaning involved.
4. The valve for supplying the compressed air kept falling to the ground and had to be picked up often. More leaning involved.
5. The wheels are about two inches in diameter and do not do well across the gravel in my splitting area. There is no convenient place to pull on when moving the unit.
6. If you have a large diameter log it is difficult to hold the log while setting the height of the wedge. This setting has to be done if the log you are splitting is longer or shorter than the previous log.
Summary: While the unit was able to split almost all of my logs, there were many operations that slowed down the process and put strain on the operator.
Does anyone else have one of these splitters? I have made several fixtures to help with these issues and will discuss them if anyone is interested. I would also like to hear of others work arounds.
The Mini Splitter is basically a vertical wedge log splitter that uses a hydraulic jack to drive the log up into the wedge. The hydraulic jack is a commercially available 12 ton jack that has an air driven hydraulic pump on the side. In other words compressed air drives an air motor which in turn drives a hydraulic pump which then drives the jack's hydraulic piston.
My main reason for purchasing this versus a more conventional log splitter is that it has a small foot print of about 16" X 11". Also the price of $350 seemed reasonable. It also has a force of 12 tons which is a lot more than many small electric log splitters. I was concerned about how fast and easy it was to split wood. The sales person stated that it is faster that a maul and slower than a gasoline log splitter.
After using the splitter for a couple of hours, I was less than thrilled. It did split just about everything that I tried, but with issues. As mentioned below.
1. The 6 inch stroke of the piston did not always fully split logs and it was often necessary to partially split the log, and then drop the head down as you let the jack down and try again. Sometimes it was necessary to turn the log over and split from the other end. This was particularly true on wet wood.
2. Some of the wood that I had was rotten on the outside and the wedge would not reach far enough across the log to split it. I ended up splitting these logs once or twice with a maul.
3. The piston release is done by opening a valve that is near the ground. You had to slip the jack handle over this each time and open the valve, wait for the piston to fully drop and close the valve. A lot of leaning involved.
4. The valve for supplying the compressed air kept falling to the ground and had to be picked up often. More leaning involved.
5. The wheels are about two inches in diameter and do not do well across the gravel in my splitting area. There is no convenient place to pull on when moving the unit.
6. If you have a large diameter log it is difficult to hold the log while setting the height of the wedge. This setting has to be done if the log you are splitting is longer or shorter than the previous log.
Summary: While the unit was able to split almost all of my logs, there were many operations that slowed down the process and put strain on the operator.
Does anyone else have one of these splitters? I have made several fixtures to help with these issues and will discuss them if anyone is interested. I would also like to hear of others work arounds.