Now that I have this winter's firewood pile stashed in the garage, I'm thinking about next winter. Now I never mind spliting wood. Since I was about 12, I split wood for my grandparents, parents, or myself. My grandparents heated with wood back then, and I did it to help.
We don't heat the house with wood, but the fireplace is a high efficiency type that contributes to lowering the heat bill. It can hold several good size logs at once. I tell everyone that the fireplace is the wifes foundry. By spring, every grate we use is just gone. The webbing or bars are just gone. Not warped or sagging, just gone. So anyway...
We burn alot of wood. And I'm not a 14 year old kid who wants to split wood for hours on Sunday to supplement wrestling training.
I want a wood splitter, but I dont want to spend $2,000 either. Some of the ones at the discount stores would do the job, but I can't see spending that much money for something that, to me, does not appear to be built for log term use. Some of the more commercial type units look nice, but WOW are they expen$$ive! And I don't want one that tips vertical. To high center of gravety at highway speeds.
I have rear hydraulics on the tractor but dont want to be limited to using it with just the tractor. Want to be able to pull it with the garden tractor or ATV. Last spring I helped a friend take down a tree in his backyard in town. A big oak. Could not get the tractor in the backyard, that incident is what made me think. It would have been real nice to have a splitter, but if it was on the tractor - I would have been S.O.L.
Also, as other threads here have explained, if the splitter is on the tractor, you are limited what you can do with the tractor while splitting.
So now I'm thinking build one. My list of requirements are:
--It's own power. Independent of the tractor. I've got a 5 hp horizontal shaft or a 16 hp vertical that I can use.
--At least 25 tons splitting force. I get alot of elm, ash, fenceline oak. Don't want any problems with stringy blocks or crotches. Bud works for an excavating company and they have many rams. Need to see what he turns up with before I decide on a pump or motor.
--Big wheels. I don't like seeing small wheels rolling down the highway at 70 mph. Need a trip to the scrap yard for this stuff.
--Cycle time of 15 - 16 seconds. Again, ram selection will be a factor here.
--Horizontal only. Don't like the ones that flip down. A hydro cradle for the big logs would be nice, no a neccesity.
--A table for the split logs. After the ram pushes the log through the wedge, they would slide onto a table ready to stack. This would be hinged and would fold up out of the way during travel or when not needed.
I'm starting to assemble my list of materials. I'm guessing I can put one together that will almost outperform the woodprocessor ones at the price of an el cheapo from the discount stores.
The scrounging begins now. I want this ready to use before February.