Time to admit it....

My name is James Dean. And I have a firewood hoarding problem.

The sycamore and sweetgum was split with a hydraulic splitter today.

Sweetgum never again. I was lucky if I got a sizable split.... most were chunks just torn off like a beer can. It was starting to decay.

All in all I got a hell of a lot of splits today. I burned a little of my pallet wood and some of the freshly split sycamore and wow does sycamore burn great. It's only been drying a week or so and was still mildly green when I hand split a few rounds but it burns incredibly well. No hissing or smoldering.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N920A using Tapatalk

 

Yea
Gum is toughest wood to split
(If you even call it splitting)

 

Sorta like string cheese, tears apart rather than splits. I call it full cycle wood.

 

I'd rather let that crap lay and rot!! That's right, I said it. lol

 

Hah you won’t even burn it outside?

 

Lol, too much energy wasted to get it home. I'm an admitted elm and gum snob! Maybe it would be ok for cookie cuttin'?

 

Maybe at least to get good cookie in there to keep it doing its thing for the night!

 

Good idea
Cut it in 3-4” thick cookies
When burning it, mix with real wood

 

Elm I'll burn, gum, which is scarce around here I'd let rot. Same with Willow & Cottonwood.

 

I've never dealt with gum. I'll let Willow and cottonwood rot as well. Elm, it's a pain to split, but it looks way easier to split than gum. Elm burns great though. Sometimes, if your lucky, elm will actually pop and not need a full stroke of the hydros.

 

For me sweetgum never splits in nice pieces. A nice big half round usually tears into two connected pains in the butt. Then trying to split it again I usually end up four pieces of torn, unsplittable ugliness. Anyway it still burns. Hord On

 

Willow? I won't burn it in the OWB! Tried once and despised it! Straight to the firepit, it goes. I had a tree in the yard at the cottage so it was either the firepit or haul it away somewhere.....

 

Red elm/slippery elm splits rather easily IMHO!!!

 

It's only a problem if you admit it
I have split a bunch of Black Gum and feel your pain nasty stuff to split!

 

Man, I'm glad I don't have to deal with any of that. No gum, willow, elm or sycamore on my property, and I wouldn't touch it if I was scrounging.

I do have some poplar (aspen? not tulip) and cottonwood and I won't bother with those again either. All it does is take up valuable space in the stacks.

 

Maybe I am not splitting sweetgum. Tree with spiky leaves and spiky balls with seeds?

 

Maybe there are different types of sweetgum and some are worst than others?

 

Like these? Sweetgum according to Google. None in NH.