"Worlds fastest firewood splitter"

shaggs

Hi all, check this out, came across it on youtube.

Therrin

Gee... I wonder what that guy would have to say about one-handing the saw and single tie-in points, let alone some of our other PPE.

Tree Machine

Nice link!

Streyken and I have some ideas to share as this thread rolls along.

"Worlds fastest firewood splitter" is a great thread title. It can be taken a number of ways, making each way of "fastest" it's own, unique way of being fast

Then there are the 'fastest classes', hydraulic motorized, non-hydraulic motorized and the non-motorized altogether class.

I encourage everyone to share their 'fast' methods, as well as tricks not involving the splitter that make processing firewood faster or easier.

Here's part 2 of the .

newguy18

the video was removed by the user.i don't know if i'd want my hands that close to that thing.lol then again unless I looked to see missing fingers I probabley wouldn't notice.

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old schooler

shaggs

Good thinking TM. Although I hope none of the ideas involve the "firewood flywheel"!!!
Possibly the fastest firewood pocessor would be the american CHOMPER. Nice n unique. Although I wonder about its use with seriuos hardwoods.

Tree Machine

You're right, new.

Searching for that piece, it is indeed gone..... Here is a pic from the video that opened this thread.



A big, spinning flywheel with a wedge welded onto it. Nice. Not especially safe, not portable, but in its own right an awesome idea. It's 'cycle time' is the amount of time it takes for that wheel to do one revolution, about one second? That is fast, and surprisingly is now our new industry standard to where the bar has been raised.

There are other ways of being fast, Though. There just are. Additionally, fast ain't everything, but is usually seen as an advantage.

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Ace Master

Did he have missing fingers,''The Worlds fastest finger splitter"

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Website: The Mt Dandenong Ranges Tree Specialists

YouTube: Ace Tree Master

Tree Machine

Yea, Ace. No on is going to defend the safeness factor of the big, rotating drum.

While fumbling around on youtube, looking for part two of the 'splitter wheel', I saw the titles of a number of other wood splitter videos, because if you watch one, it lines you up a bunch of other related ones.

I summon the readership to sift through those videos and copy and return here with their links.

Click on the icon, just above, to paste in the link and it is done.

Please , though, write an introduction to the splitter video you found, let us know what will be seen and your summary on it.


I'll start.

Here is a video of another splitter that ALSO claims to be the world's fastest splitter, and all things considred, just may very well be.

This splitter is designed on a dual-flywheel concept, really, really interesting. It may shock you out of your hydraulic ways.

I found two videos on this. The first one is three minutes, the second one, just under 7 minutes.

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Streyken

Seems to have the power. Wonder how it would handle these attachments?

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Trimmin' bush and caring for flowers is good 'n' all...
but sometimes ya gotta let the big wood fly and pound the garden.

Streyken

Hey TM, this look familiar? With a few minor mods and vertical placement...

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Trimmin' bush and caring for flowers is good 'n' all...
but sometimes ya gotta let the big wood fly and pound the garden.

Tree Machine

Is that the legendary gravity wedge?

newguy18

Portable Generators, Heaters + Wood Stoves, Snow Blowers, Pressure Washers | Northern Tool + Equipment they have wood spliters,4 way wedges and even a pair of gaffs.

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old schooler

Streyken

It's an addon like the ones above, but with a base plate and holder spikes added, this is fairly close to what I had in mind.

If we were to flip it over and go for top block placement, I think we'd need a series of grip-teeth on top instead of just a flat smooth surface.

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Trimmin' bush and caring for flowers is good 'n' all...
but sometimes ya gotta let the big wood fly and pound the garden.

Eric Frei

I've never ever split wood!

But turned on many air conditioners.

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Ace Master

Tree Machine
The World's Fastest Way Of Splitting Wood
This splits it very quick but into too many small pieces i think so.

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Website: The Mt Dandenong Ranges Tree Specialists

YouTube: Ace Tree Master

Sean Freeman

Ace your link doesn't work

Eric Frei

Yes it does, I fixed it!

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shaggs

Hey Stryken
Any pics or vids of your wedges in action?
What size engine/ram/pump you run? The wedges look good

Streyken

These pics are from the net, they are add-ons for existing splitters. I don't use a hydraulic splitter, but Tree Machine and I have been talking a bit about what really would be the fastest splitter. The idea being that one block could split another as soon as it hit the ground.

I do a lot of bucking, given the types of trees and terrain I work around. Often I'll get a rock placed in the hole the blocks create, in the hope that it'll half the block. We thought that placing a splitting device (with another block either on or under the device) in the drop zone may be a feasible experiment.

This obviously wouldn't be a universally applicable device (terrain, block size, proximity to structures, drop height, etc.), but when it is an option, what a time saver it would be.

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Trimmin' bush and caring for flowers is good 'n' all...
but sometimes ya gotta let the big wood fly and pound the garden.

Tree Machine

I am much the same, lots and lots of aerial blocking. Rarely do I get to just fell a pole.

On the big blocks, my firewood guys often want me to quarter them, which means ripping them in half, then ripping the halves in half. This creates mountains of mozza sawdust, uses a lot of extra fuel, wear and tear on saw, chain and the extra time in the cutting and additional cleanup in places other than where the initial mess was made. Not such a good deal for the treeguy at this point. But, I don't want them getting hurt trying to load massive blocks so suck it up, or get creative.

Streyken and I were thinkin, if one was to fall directly upon another, and a specially designed splitter wedge was on top of the grounded block, well, hey.
You see how THIS can be the fastest splitter.

The issue of the obvious safety concern, left aside for a moment, we then ak ourselves, "Could this work?"

Theoretically, yes. But in actual practice.......

Underwor

That video is one that I shot a year ago. Don't know how it ended up on you-Tube. Here is the original brochure that the University extension service put out on how to build this splitter. It does work slick, but I am sure it does not have the Underwriter's Laboratory seal of approval on safety.

http://165.234.175.12/photos/splitter.jpg

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Bob Underwood, Associate Professor of Forestry
ND School of Forestry
Minot State University - Bottineau Campus
Bottineau, North Dakota

newguy18

Whataya mean it just screams saftey.

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old schooler

Eric Frei

You did a good job Bob.

That guy operating ... you got a story for us?

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Tree Machine

Yea, thanks Bob. From the standpoint of the world's fastest splitter, that unique and ingenius contraption is impressive. Let's say, if my firewood guys had that splitter wheel, life would be a better place. Much, much faster than your average hydraulic splitter.

Hydraulic is nice, safe for what it is (if used properly) and you have power which gives you your 'speed', but to make that system speedier (aside from the hydrauliuc lifter arms standpoint or mult-wedges) you have to do one of two things;
either move your hands faster (because the ram speed is all the speed you get) OR figure out how to split on both the fore and the aft stroke. This could easily double the speed and production of efficiency on a hydraulic ram/wedge system.


This company from Ontario, Canada has that system figured out.
Here is a link to their video files and here to the homepage of the Split-Fire website.




Don't worry. Streyken and I have more to share on our in-house project. We just need to acknowledge all the other 'fast' splitters out there so we know where the fast-bar is set.

Explosives, although appealing, don't have that universal reach (or shouldn't) and although one may seem overly conservative in this statement, generally speaking, explosives shouldn't be used to split firewood.
It's TRUE!

Just think of the mess outside of the zone you'll have to clean up, the running back and forth between explosions and such. Not so efficient.

Now, stump removal on the other hand......

Therrin

Hah, I laughed pretty good when I read the line "now stump removal on the other hand..."

I've actually blasted 4 stumps. 2 of them were in actual neighborhoods.
The one guy, I asked him if anyone would call the cops, and he said the people next door and behind were druggies and gang bangers, said that they don't call the cops, but if anything, havin stuff blow up in his back yard would keep them at bay!!

In case anyone's interested....

I used a 24" long, 1 1/2" wide boring bit with a big impact drill. Drilled a series of 4 holes which angled down towards the center and just under the root ball. Used 1" schedule 40 pvc pipe, 12" long each. Glued an end cap on each one of the 4. Used a course black powder to fill most of the tube, then a finer powder for the last 2 inches at the top. Drilled two small holes in the other pipe cap.
Used an Estes model rocket igniter piece stuck down in the finer powder, with the two metal leads running out through the holes in the last cap. Glued the end on and the "device" was finished. Had 4 of them, 12" long, each with 2 leads running out one end.

Pushed them into the holes half way, connected up all the wires to a central circuit, then *GENTLY* pushed the the rest of the way down with a wooden dowel. Took a rubber "horse mat" (1" thick, 6' x 6' rubber mat) and threw it over the top of the stump. Went behind a brick wall about 6' away, hollered for CLEAR several times and connected the leads.

Only ended up doin 4 stumps because the first time I did it was so great Could feel the shockwave rippling through my body, felt cool. All kinds of stuff came raining down outta the air. The stumps would shatter into 3 of 4 sections and be shoved completely up out of the ground. Easy enough to throw a chain around them and drag them out by then.

On one of the projects, I had this old chipper runnin in the backyard. I did a series of 4 blasts, and on the last one, the neighbor came and peeeked over the wall. I'd be standing next to the chipper and with a wave I mentioned how the damn thing kept "backfiring" to which he nodded skeptically and went back in his house!!

Underwor

The operator is a real Turtle Mt. Hillbilly. He has always been a little different I am told, but I think he probably got worse after a few years living in Pennsylvania. (that should stir someone up!!) He is very inventive, although there are many of this type splitter scattered around the state. He has two extra wheels on hand if you would like to have him build you one like this. As you can see by the instructions I posted, it originally ran off of a 1 1/2 HP stationary engine. Did you notice the white stripe he painted around the wheel to show where the wedge would be hitting.

I will try to get some pictures of his extended pontoon boat that he uses to set and remove docks on the lake. It has a crane on tracks down the center so he can pick up a doc, pull it onto the boat and then when he gets to shore, reach up on the shore a ways to set it down. Quite a contraption.

Right now he is probably putting the chains on his 1 1/2 ton truck so he can haul rocks for rip rap along the lake. He piles them on until they start dribbling over the sides and then takes off across the lake once it freezes good. It is up to about 6" thick now so ice fishing has started. We don't start driving the pickups out on it until about a foot of ice. Some will go on at 10".

See you all later.

__________________
Bob Underwood, Associate Professor of Forestry
ND School of Forestry
Minot State University - Bottineau Campus
Bottineau, North Dakota

Eric Frei

Now that's efficient, only a baby 1.5hp engine.

I like stories of ole wise folk like that, hats off to them. That pioneering spirit I suppose, dont complain about how hard done by they are etc.

On the other hand you have the obnoxious city dweller, demanding, rude, abrupt, no time for anything and even when they cut YOU OFF they give you the dirty finger. City folk have lost the plot I reckon, if there's no $'s in it to be made they piss you off.

The ole fella made that, shares the idea, help ya build it, sell ya wood etc ... that's what communities are all about, not how can I sue him for making that!

Good on ya Bob, and hope you get some fish when ya on the ice, I know you like it and from pics I seen it's quite an event with plenty of show ponies.

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Derek

Hey guys. Sorry to revive a three month old thread, but we just found this and it made the boss' day. He's walking around the office now grinning from ear to ear about being famous on the internet.

I'm one of four people who regularly run that particular splitter. The fourth, after staring at it for three months and avoiding it, finally got curious and tried it. His comment: "it's not nearly as bad as it looks." As much as it looks like a widowmaker, it's strangely far safer than the hydraulic splitter sitting beside it.

I'd be happy to answer any questions about the device, or provide more pictures (or video) if people are still curious about it. This fall I added an extra safety feature - ran a second kill switch off the engine and mounted it at the splitting platform. Mostly, it's to keep from burning the belts when a log gets stuck such that it can't be yanked like Rick did in the video.

Additionally, the blue trackhoe you can see in one of the video shots? When the bucket comes off, that's our log loader. It's got a grapple on the end, so we don't have to have our tree guys chop the things into smaller blocks Anything too large to put into the wheel, we halve first in the hydraulic spliiter. I do in fact have video of that running...

-- Derek Jacobs
Woodchuck
Rick's Home and Cabin Care

Done it

It looks pretty safe to me compaired to what a lot of guys still do here. The firewood guy I use to sell to had a circular saw mounted on an old A maybe T model Ford flat top, father/son business. Son closed up a few years ago aged 60 something, about 10 years after his dad died, mainly because of council redevopment. Last I heard he started up again. THEY BOTH had all their fingers. That yard started in mid 1940's.

Eric Frei

Yeah, whatever you got Derek post it, pics etc.

People love this stuff, the older and crazier the better for some.

So you guys build any others? Like sell any of them?

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