Firewood processor

   / Firewood processor #1  

mx842

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The first project after I get my building done is to build a firewood processor. I've found a bunch of sites showing the basic layout but they don't give out much detail on the nuts and bolts inner workings. I'm always looking for anything hydraulic that I can use for different things I might want to build and what I am looking for now is a cylinder to use for the splitter part of the machine. The ones that are shown on the different sites seem to split well but as I said don't give many details of the type and size cylinder they use. Also I was wondering what size pump do most of these things use to run all the different parts of the machine. I come across pumps all the time and have a few laying around but they are small and I don't think they would supply the volume needed to run the whole processor. I was just wondering what to look for when I'm out looking for stuff to use for this type machine. Thanks....
 
   / Firewood processor #2  
your asking for a lot of math. and then asking for response times or rather how fast the machine actually does something.

the cylinder diameter is needed to figure out how much force the cylinder can produce. if cylinder is used with a wedge to split firewood, or move a lift arms up to load a log on the table.

GPM from pump is combination of RPM's of engine and how fast it turns the hyd pump.

GPM and cylinder diameter can be used to figure out how fast the cylinder extends / contracts.

HP of engine also plays a roll into it all or i should HP, torque, RPMs of engine all plays into the roll of it all.. some goes to max pressure / force pump can produce, while some of it is directly dependent on cylinder diameter.

if there is a conveyer belt, that is more math. and gets added into engine HP. and pulleys / gears. to do convert between torque and speed.

if there is some sort of saw blade, or chain saw blade, or band saw blade to cut logs into sizeable lengths before being split, that has its own set of math. and HP requirements and depends on how it is setup to run.

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hyd pumps, normally have some sort of pump curve. for how many RPM's PSI it produces and GPM of hyd fluid it creates.

a larger cylinder diameter can produce more force vs a smaller diameter cylinder if using same GPM and pump and engine. trade off larger diameter cylinder will take longer to extend / contract. vs smaller diameter cylinder.

you say whole processor, but you are not running everything on the processor at the same time, you operate the lift arms and are done, you operate a saw and are done, you operate the splitter and are done. other words you are just operating one thing on the wood processor at a single time and not all together. because of this, the GPM, engine HP, torque, RPMS, and given cylinder. only need spec'ed to what ever job requires the GPM / engine HP. and everything else will be less.

exception to above, is firewood processor has a conveyer belt, the conveyer belt will most likely be running all the time, so add requirements for it, for what ever is noted above. for final choices.
 
   / Firewood processor
  • Thread Starter
#3  
Thanks for your response and yes I know my question was rather vague. All I'm interested in at this point is what to look for when I'm out and about. My main objective is to have a machine that will split what ever drops in the splitting hopper. As far as a power source I can use pretty much anything because I'll need to find that also. I have an old inline 250, 6 cylinder chevy engine I could use but was thinking more on the line of something around 35 hp might be better and easy enough to find.

I have watched many of these machines work and they all seem to work well but it's hard to tell what the inner working are composed of with respect to pump size. This doesn't have to be exact science for me because most all of my builds are a work in progress and it seems I'm always changing this or that to make it better but as hydraulics are quite expensive I want to get that part pretty close form the start.

I was more hoping someone that had one of these things would chime in with what their setup was composed of but that's not saying your feedback is not appreciated. Thanks!
 
   / Firewood processor #4  
A 35 HP engine can turn a pump producing 17 GPM and a pressure of 3000 psi

So, as some have said, you have to add up the GPM's used at max operation and compute the HP required to power the unit.

You could have one large pump powering all valves, or have multiple pump's on one engine powering each valve.

You also have to know the hyd motor size to get the job done.

Once you know the cu in and GPM of the motor, you will know the motor rpm.

If you know the cu in, and the psi, you will know the torque of the motor.
 
 
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