Beech score baby! FBMP came through. Super nice guy. I talked to him a while and told him he should keep some of it. He has a fireplace and has some rounds stacked but nothing split as of yet. He said I looked real professional with all my gear. Hahaha. Beautiful stuff. Took 10 rounds home that I bucked onsite to 16". Will go back for more Tuesday. Now I'm off to the Marriott to get the rest of the poplar. The Stihl performed great. I did have to switch the chain out after I got dirt once....and also one time the carb wasn't reacting to the throttle....it almost sounded like a muted rev.....but I shut it off and started it again and it came back. The peavey and the cant hook came in real handy. Marked the logs with my magnetic measuring stick and went to town on that beech!!
If i remember the beech ive had before, it was "fun" to split by hand. If i were you, i think I'd try busting it real soon while its wet...seemed worse when it had had time to dry a bit
Last time I gave up pretty fast by hand and went to the splitter.... I will see how it goes this time around. Man it is so satisfying sharpening your own chains and then seeing the performance in the saw come through. Dulled 2 chains in the dirt. First one wasn't bad. This second one was hit worse. Second pic shows the damage to the teeth.
Nice looking beech. Looks straight with no limbs and if so it should split easy. It’s rare to find one like that around here unfortunately It can be nasty when it’s twisted and full of knots
Noodles on the Beech seems kinda soapy, only way I can think to describe it and it noodle really well.
Some nice rounds. Great score LOTF! It should hand split nice if done before ends start to check. Of course you have the hydro for back up! Chains didnt look bad at all IMO!
Yeah I'm going to split it on Monday. No log splitter usage on Sundays and instead of pushing myself too much today I ended up just sharpening the 2 chains I dulled. They didn't look so bad but what I meant was I hit dirt....so they just didn't cut...the tooth was kind of bent down slightly. I didn't take a good picture of it.
I figured out what happened with the throttle not responding - it ended being a small wood chip or something that was binding the sprocket to the point where the chain was not moving at all. I didn't do the push-into-a-round-and-then-pull method but used a file to free the sprocket. Hopefully the bar is ok. It happened twice today. Otherwise the 028 was a beast. I couldn't believe how big the chips were flying off the beech log whilst bucking.
When the chips start to build up under the cover I just let the saw hang straight down and rev it a little...that usually clears things out...if its too jammed up to move then try to get the chain moving by pulling or pushing the bar across a log while pushing down (for better "traction") until it will go when you hit the throttle.
Yeah sorry I wasn't clear it was build up on the nose end of the bar at the bar sprocket not under the cover.....With me holding just the bar and chain I could not move the chain at all so I knew it was bar sprocket that was stuck. End up just going back and forth with a file and it broke free.
I'm not liking it........I'm LOVING IT BABY! Thanks to everyone who helped me getting it up and running. I appreciate all the input (even if I don't listen to it! Haha!) So I ended up splitting all 10 rounds of the beech today by hand. It wasn't that bad because this score was straight grained with a few knots here and there.....but overall I'd say it was something like splitting sugar maple.....Not as easy as red/black oak for me or black locust.....but not too bad indeed. Last pic is of the poplar - had to use just one wedge and sledge and a few taps for that but it was easy compared to trying to whack at it with the x27 which just sunk in. Once split in half I was able to use the x27.
I compare beech and sugar maple in terms of splitting ease. Did you get the rest LOTF? That poplar looks better than i thought it would.
Yeah I agree with the beech and sugar maple for sure..... I'm going back on Tuesday for the beech......and waiting for the skid steer for the rest of the poplar. That popular is pretty clean, almost artisanal one could say.
Most of the tree was off the ground, and the part that was on the ground was all rotted so I started from that point on. And the bark just peeled off in huge sheets on the log....which made trying to pick up those 22" monstrosities a bit on the hard side.
