I cannot thank Joe enough. His rig made light work of the largest pieces of it. Had I known I was going to use that setup I’d have left the big stuff all 4’ long and everything smaller longer . I’m now spoiled, will have to get myself one of those. One needs to have goals. Thanks again, Joe! Let me know when I can return the favor.
My pleasure Joe. Nice meeting you. Like I said, it’s a great excuse to buy a welder. We all need excuses
My wife helped me load the rest of what was cut in 3 loads. The last photo is a shot of the pile from above. I definitely missed having Access to Joe’s winch and dump, but we managed. Having my wife help seems like it could be step 1 in some sort of master plan. I don’t know step 2 yet though.
My five year old daughter wanted to help, but these logs were too heavy for her and we were too busy to supervise her use of her new 12” bow saw. Once she’s used to it I could let her cut some smaller limbs up and help me more. She loves helping me, wood, and saws and I want to encourage all that.
I've had a few big scores like that, it was easier to bring the splitter to the site and use the trailer to bring the splits home. now you've got your work cut out for you!
I’m working on getting a splitter. I think the plan it to rent one for a day or two and see how fast I can split, if it goes quickly we cannot justify buying one yet.
My wife agreed that it does not make sense to rent since we would have to work all day to make the most of it each time and we could not do it at our own pace. She surprised me by suggesting a huge one. I guess by the weekend I may have a new gigantic splitter to deal with this... I’ve been adding to the pile Joe helped me with. I also have all this in back...
Now all you have to do is explain those tires and axles aren't really good for highway use so one of those trailers like the other Joe has is also needed equipment.
That would be awesome if she’d go for it , but I’m just working on getting new springs and shackles the rest is ok for the $200 I paid and I don’t want to press my luck. I think it’s an old Jeep frame or something with a 3500lb trailer axle. All but the loads Joe did were moved in that trailer or a small amount early on in the back of the Sequoia.
and Summer is not a fun season to split wood, let alone all day! Quite an accumulation of rounds and some quality splits to come out of those.
The most recent wood was from a friend in Madison, very easy, already cut in (slightly shorter than ideal) rounds and I could drive right up to it. It was a dream compared to dragging stuff though the woods in this heat. The only thing better will be if my tree service contact comes through and dumps 4’ logs on my lawn.
Congrats! Do you have one picked out already? If not, just FYI...bigger is not always better when it comes to splitters...a 20-25 ton splitter will split 99.99% of the wood that most people will ever encounter...bigger than that, they just get heavier (harder to move by hand) more expensive, and often times, slower cycle times (unless you are going with a high dollar commercial model) Heck, many guys using those 5-7 ton electric splitters only occasionally find stuff that won't split for them. Make sure you get one that can split in both vertical and horizontal mode...vertical is nice for quartering up those huge rounds that most mere mortals can't (shouldn't) lift up onto the beam.
Thanks! It’s picked out and held for us pending assembly. I had one I was thinking would be adequate, but a bit slow, and she surprised me by picking/ suggesting one that was larger and has significantly increased speed(40% faster ), force, and a more reliable engine. It does weigh more, but is towable. It is more expensive than I thought she would agree to, but doable. It does vertical or horizontal and has a log catcher to hold medium logs up on the beam. I have a trailer dolly that I use when I need to move my trailer by hand so it should easily handle the weight of a log splitter if I need to move it around a lot and I can also hook it up to the garden tractor with the dolly if needed.