Tractors and wood! Show your pics

[John_Mc]

John_Mc - I had not thought about a hitch but now you have me thinking about one.
The Norse butt plate is flat so I suppose that would be a likely spot.

As long as the mounting does not interfere with the swinging butt plate that would probably work (isn't it Norse that has the swinging butt plate? I can't recall at the moment.)

Think about how high off the ground you want the hitch. Generally, I wanted mine mounted somewhat low (you can see some extra holes on the receiver mount in my photo. It's shown in an upper position. In actual use, I always mount it as low as it will go.) The lower you mount it, the higher you can raise your 3 pt hitch and still have whatever you are towing be reasonably level. This makes it easier to clear any waterbars or ditches you drive through. Too low and it may interfere with using your blade as a dozer, or getting it to dig in to provide an anchor on uneven ground, or you may not be able to raise your trailer's tongue as high as you would like as your tractor starts back up out of a ditch.

You can always use a receiver insert with some rise or drop to fine tune the height. I just wanted to avoid an extreme amount of height change with an insert, as this creates a longer lever for any load I'm hauling to crank on the receiver or winch. I set mine up to minimize any height change I anticipated needing.

 

[John_Mc]

Where do you store your hitch when not in use?

I have the swing type hitch and storage is almost as important as fresh home made donuts.

Nice idea on your hitch storage. My winch has a couple of upright pins one on each side. I believe they are intended for chain storage. When I'm just doing a couple of easy logs, I leave my receiver on the winch, remove the insert, and put the insert on one of those pins. I have not tried to put the receiver part on one of those pins - just take it off and put it on the floow of my tractor when I'm doing serious winching or skidding.

 

[Diggin It]

Note:

When your neighbor proudly proclaims "I have a sawmill now. If you need anything cut, just let me know". Check to see that does NOT mean:

• A rickety old home made trailer with
• A old worn out HF winch and
• Home made crane assembly to lift logs onto
• A rickety old worn out aluminum ladder and
• A old worn out boat trailer hand crank winch to pull
• An old worn out chain saw with
• An 18" bar and worn out chain that
• Will break before he gets 3" into the first cut.

Ya' know, just make sure of all that before you commit to loading an 800 pound log onto it hoping it doesn't all collapse.

 

[4570Man]

That tractor is awful shiny for 2000 hours!

200 hours.

 

[Loaderman22]

That Case had 4 cylinders had to be more 17hp, my riding lawnmower is 2 cylinder Briggs and thats 21hp.

I just want to know the thinking on buying a Farmall BN, or better yet who's brainstorm idea was it to make that contraption anyways, you got it right "contraption" was the right description. Might be ok to work in the garden with that offset steering wheel but it would drive me crazy, I heard that..........
International Farmall BN - YouTube

My uncle had an old farmall, with the steering wheel down the side, but I think it only had 1 centered seat. It also had the wide front end with a snowplow, and he would plow his long driveway with it. If the weather was nice, he'd take us kids for a wagon ride up through the woods. I don't remember him doing anything else with it, maybe mowing the field before he got the small riding lawn mower.

 

[Loaderman22]

I cut down a big ash almost 6 years ago now, let it sit for a year on log pile then decided to mill it before tolate. I didn't know what to do with it so sawed a big 20'x 10" x 12" out of it, then we stuck it under my sons deck in 2016 and there it sat, last month my son wanted to add a roof on his deck and wanted a 20' beam, instead cutting down the very few big trees left we pulled that ash out put it on saw deck and re-trimmed it and he used that to hold his porch roof up, he said it was still solid and little hard to nail to but filled the void. When I see that ash up there on his porch I said gee that should've went in your house that looks nice.

I remember 60 years ago my father use to make ax handles out of ash and sold them down the store, wonder why ash........

Up until a few years ago, all Baseball bats were made from ash, but then they started using hard maple. If you see a bat break, the majority of the time it would be a maple bat, the ash ones don't break as easy, but I guess the maple ones make the ball go a little further.

 

[Loaderman22]

Guys,

The totes are modified so they are relatively easy to load and unload: BTW using the cut down plastic bin avoids having to dispose of it, increases capacity. acts like a little drying oven when totes are stored in the sun, and provides protection from snow and rain. The bin is zip tied to the frame.

View attachment 666577

The processor is made by Dyna:

DYNA SC-12 XP Firewood Processor | DYNA Products

There are videos on the site of how they operate. The one I rented had a live deck that I loaded with the grapple attachment...easy peasy. It also had the diesel engine option and sipped fuel. About 10 gal over 15 hours. It comes with three sets of saw chains. It takes about 20 minutes to change a chain the first time if doing it alone...a third hand helps a lot...LOL

Like I said, I will never manually process firewood again. In a previous thread, I looked at buying a faster splitter with a stationary wedge. It did not make sense for me to invest $4000+ for a "good" splitter when I can do the whole job of cutting and splitting for less than $40 cord without breaking a sweat. or maintaining a saw and splitter. (BTW, a "loggers" cord is a stack of logs 100" long and 4x4 ft.). I use 7 cords per season, so my processing cost is $300/year including fuel for the processor and tractor. And the big plus...I can keep using wood fuel for many more years. The only real "work" this year was stacking splits into the totes...about an hour per tote working alone....30 minutes with a helper.

As to the issue mentioned by a poster of "bending over", there is minimal bending as the tote can be lifted up with the forks. The most bending is getting splits off the ground when the pile gets low. With a helper sitting on a stool, they can lift the splits up off the ground and hand them to the person stacking. Time to stack with a helper should be about .30 minutes per tote (.45 cord).

GG, yes the pretty lady is my fiancé!!! The photo was taken weeks ago after we had completed the processing work. Sadly, we learned three weeks ago she has cancer so we are praying for a good outcome. She was ticked that I would not let her help me stack any totes and felt sorry for me working in the heat alone. But she was recovering from biopsies, and it made no sense to push things.

View attachment 666583

I wish the best for you and her, my thoughts go out to her during this time....

 

[DieselBound]

shooterdon, I too hope things turn out for your gal. My wife was just proclaimed cancer-free after her second bout with cancer. The world really can stop when the Big C comes around...

I also use palletized containers for my wood. I shelled out a bit more and got ones that are stackable and collapsible. One side folds down, in half, making retrieval of wood easier. I figure I get about 1/3 cord per container: I stack them up to three high, in which case I can't overfill. I cart them to/from out on my property, which can be a bit rough in places: managing bigger loads would be less attractive (figure my ground can be pretty soft at times- more weight on the front isn't a good thing). Easy and quick to pull out from my woodshed and drop on my deck. One crate lasts 10 to 12 days. I'll be re-doing my deck and adding on a porch which might facilitate having two crates up at one time.

 

[shooterdon]

I wish the best for you and her, my thoughts go out to her during this time....

Thank you sir...you too DieselBound!!

Tomorrow we do in for the Chemo meeting. Not fun...not fun at all.

 

[Thomas]

Thank you sir...you too DieselBound!!

Tomorrow we do in for the Chemo meeting. Not fun...not fun at all.

Strong thoughts and pulling hard for your family.