Building a firewood processor out of a wood splitter

Hi guys. Lots of familiar names here from other sites.. Thought you might like to see my wood splitter conversion.

I built the splitter from the ground up a few years ago with the intentions of making it into a processor someday. You can see my build thread here: http://www.tractorbynet.com/forums/build-yourself/219145-woodsplitter-build-timberwolf-clone.html . Its basicaly my take on a Timberwolf TW-5. Its a 22gpm Barnes pump, driven by a 14hp subaru, into a 5x24" cylinder. I dont think there would be much sense reposting it here, but will if you have any questions. Ill just throw up a couple in progress pics.

 

Nice work.

Does that pump move that big cylinder effectively?

 

So after using the basic machine for a couple years, I decided to do my conversion this year. I decided to go with a chainsaw based conversion to avoid all the expense of a hydraulic saw. All was built by me, including the winch.

This is the log tray. Made out of 1.25x.125 and 2.00x.125 square tubing. Its about 6' long.


Mockup of the chainsaw mount. Saw pivots on two pillowblocks


Closeup of the saw mount


Laying out for the winch. Its constructed from 1, 1.25 square, and 1/4 plate


The spool


Finished winch

 

More pics.. lol. I got a ton of them... But no sense cluttering up the thread too much.


Installed. looking down the log tray towards the infeed ramp. Ramp is folded up in transport position



Controls. I managed to reuse almost all the old hose by careful planing lol. The 3 spool is a new valve in order to be able to run the winch


Finished with the saw mounted. Length stop is just a chainsaw whip. A cheap and effective solution. I considered a rigid stop, but like the flexability of the whip.


A 13" log.


I did a speed test today. Considering the wood is an awful mix of oversize, undersize and server twists, not to mention I have a pretty badly sprained left arm, I did the black marked wood in this pic in a little over 2 hours. Not bad. It was a cord, give or take. That large log is over 28" at the fattest part. It didnt go through the processor but was done old skool, on the ground.

 

Thanks

Yup. Cycle time is pretty fast. Before it became a processor it could keep 2 or 3 guys real busy. Now I can make wood faster than it can be piled by a long shot. My Prince Autocycle valve is only working half the time and I havent had a chance to tweak it on the new setup (its real sensitive to pressures). When its working 100% its that much faster.

Its no CordKing.. But Im pretty happy. Mainly because its so much easier on the back, legs and arms as opposed to cutting off the pile. Not to mention its much safer, and I dont have to wear safety gear.

 

Thanks!

 

Scooby, some great pictures...you can tell you put a lot of pride in the work you do.
Couple questions; The cost vs. say a new processor similar in size as yours??
and any chance of getting a video of this thing in action??

thanks for sharing

 

Thanks. Im a tradesman, its been beat into me to try to do it right lol.

Cost wise, I have probably $3000-4,000 into it not counting my labour of course. And thats spread out over a few years. Just about all the steel in it is virgin. You could shave a ton of money if you scavenged metal for a while prior to building it. There is around $600 worth of steel in the processor conversion alone. Steel is getting foolish expensive now.

Id compare it to a Wallenstein WP830 which it is sort of based on. The Wallenstein WP830 is right at $10,000. http://www.woodwardcrossings.com/Pages/Pages_11-04/Farm/Wood_Processor.html

I shot a video of it in action, unfortunately it sucked. Ill have to re-shoot it.

 

x2 on a action video.

 

Well the retake vids arent much better than the originals.. Sorry. I suck at videography. I need a tripod ! I guess Ill post the crappy ones. Sorry in advance for the "Blair Witch" shakiness.

THis vid is real bad. Lots of shots of my boots.... Gets a bit better near the end. And this was after editing lol.



This one is a little better.

 

Nice job!


Any reason you chose such a large gear on the winch? I assume you used a motor spool on the winch motor so that it can free spool in neutral?

 

No motor spool. The idea was to be able to lock the winch to prevent the log from sliding back. In practice that doesnt happen. A motor spool would work fine and I may do the update next season. The motor is VERY hard to turn over manually though so getting it to freespool this way may not work.

The large gear was to lower the spool speed and increase the torque. Fullspeed on the motor is a fast walking speed on the winch. Helps with the cable winding up when being pulled out.

 

I was wondering how hard it is to free spool -- I'm planning to build a hydraulic winch but think I will use a loader valve. The work ports will be blocked in neutral but I can put it in 'float' to free spool.

I was planning to do a direct drive set up though with the smallest possible motor so I can hopefully pull the line without too much trouble.

 

DANG!! That's amazing, nice job!

Build me one, I'll pay for shipping!!

 

Job well done. You could have fun with that in the woods

 

That was a great video, nothing like seeing the fruits of your hard thought out brainstorm.
Work out a few kinks and send it out for production, easy street after that

 

Thanks... Shipping might be expensive, like $9000 expensive lol