Ive only been to the dump 3 times, and that resulted in one pickup of a little wood. My dump just has a small brush pile that you can only add to one week a month. Midwinter 's dump has a brush area bigger than my whole dump. Its fed by residents, as well as landscapers I believe. I would be there far more often if it wasnt an hour round trip just to check it.
The dump has wood of all sizes. There are huge tree trunks down to twigs. What I take has to be short enough to fit in my SUV, and light enough for me to pick up. I have used an improvised step to hoist a big round on to a short round, and then up into the car. Once I get it home, I pile it under a big white pine in the front yard. It stays pretty dry under there. Anything big that needs cutting, I cut under the pine tree, and smaller stuff I might cut in the driveway on a sawbuck. The backup in my processing flow is splitting. I like to do it, but it's time consuming. I spend an afternoon on it here and there. No job, so I can pick nice days! My favorite splitting location right now is on a path made from granite curbstones on the side of the house. I'll move rounds there with a handtruck. Then, I stack as I split. I'll have an empty 2x4 rack, or pallets and t-posts set up somewhere, and I'll hand-carry a couple of splits over. It gives me a little break from swinging the sledge.
So I've been trying to handle wood less and less. I've been working like this the past two years: 1. I cut the tree down. I try to process it right there if possible, but more likely I have to winch it to one of my roads or some open area nearby. I then process one of three ways: 1A. If it's under 6" (Saplings and branches) I try to cut them into 8' lengths and then I process to 2' lengths using my cordwood saw: 1B. If the diameter is larger than 22-ish inches, I cut rounds to 2' lengths and then split the rounds right where they're cut using my home-made splitter: 1C. (My favorite method) is if the diameter is >6" and <24-ish" I process the entire tree with my tractor powered Wood-Eze processor which takes entire tree lengths and cuts and 4-way splits the rounds it cuts. I just obtained this last spring and I love it! I am making improvements to it but it works great. 2. In either of the 3 methods above, I stack them right away on a 4x4 pallet and leave them right there to season. 3. Last year, I moved most of the pallets to a central location where I would grab them as I needed and bring them to the boiler... ...but this year I just go pluck them out of the woods and bring them right to the boiler a couple of pallets at a time. This is good because I only move the pallet once, but if we got buried with snow, getting some of my stacked pallets out of the woods may prove to be challenging. Time will tell. Either way I have to keep a list of pallets (they are numbered), when they were filled (so oldest gets burned first), and a map as to where they are on the property!
I'm a scrounger, so I can't split it right off my trailer. I have to get back to get the rest of it before someone else does! But to save time: I dump my rounds on the ground next to an empty rack. Once I have all of it, I bring the splitter right next to the pile, split, then stack it. I don't stack rounds, unstack, split, restack. Wastes too much time. Sometimes the rounds will wait weeks before they get split and stacked. Although I don't like the mess of a pile of rounds, I resist the temptation to stack them before they are split.
First, I obsessively check Craigslist 10 times a day, then contact people who put up wood on there sometimes within minutes of their post. Then I get there ASAP, typically after work by late afternoon, load up (pickup only, no trailer) get home and move the rounds next to the garage onto pallets where they stay sometimes for a few weeks until I get to splitting. I split closest to where it will be stacked. If not then I move splits around with a big wheel barrow. Ideal?...I dunno, but I make it work. You guys with the sweet tractors are making me a bit jealous but that's not happening in the burbs.
For the most part I buck onsite and then bring it home in the trailer. Its less mess this way. Then I stack the rounds on pallets along my fence line. I have sets of pallets (2 ricks ea) closer to the house for stuff ready for the stove. This is our first year on 100% wood so I'm experimenting with some ideas. Right now the plan is to try and build up enough wood to be 3-4 years ahead (lookin' like we'll only burn ~4 cords a year). I'm probably about 1.5 ahead now so I have some work to do. I may just split and stack as the pallets empty so I always have full pallets next to the house. The other option is to split and stack out by the fence line and just move the splits in as they empty. From a work perspective I think it's a wash.
Nice to hear all the different methods. I typically have a giant pile of rounds and a giant pile of splits and eventually the splits get stacked. It’s a damm mess. I need to get a simpler routine. As with many of you, when the opportunity arises, I’ve got multiple loads, so it usually ends up a big pile of rounds. I use a 1 ton dump truck. I feel like my best scenario is to dump the rounds and then split and toss into the dump then drive to the stacking area. As I kind of thought, doing all processes in smaller increments seems like the way to go for me. Ugh, I’ve probably got 5 cords to split and stack, and it ain’t gonna do it itself.
I suffer from procrastination disease sometimes, too. Best way for me to stop it was to find an hour here, hour there. Even two or three times a day if warranted, but small bites make it easier to avoid making excuses as to why I can't devote a full day to processing. A full day is great, but with a full time job, apartments to maintain, an active teenager, and a baby, it just doesn't happen too often.
Deer Meadow Farm Nice cordwood saw, seen one of these before and fear is such a small word. I just want to ask again as you say small branches and limbs, how much in diameter is this rated for?
My ideal processing layout would be that there is no more room for wood! I have never hit that point.
This is a great thread as we all do things slightly differently.... I focus on only picking it up off the ground one time only. When the tree is on the ground and bucked up, I have to pick it up to move it back home, but it never gets dumped on the ground again. Goes from the trailer to the splitter and from the splitter to the stack without going on the ground. Seems to work for me and my back.
My processing isn't ideal, but it is what I've got... We are improving our woods by removing the junkier trees, leaving saw logs and Sugar Maples. The wood gets skidded down off the hill to the processing area, which used to be a gravel pit. As you can see, I don't bother much with branches - they get left behind to rot back into the soil. I'm also leaving behind the gnarlier pieces. No noodling here - takes a bunch of time for what I get out of it. I rotate where the logs get piled among three spots - the other two spots will have stacks that are drying... The wood is cut to stove-length, split, and stacked right where the skid is dropped. We do no cleanup of sawdust, bark, or splitter scraps. The two pictures below are of the same season in the rotation... Finally, in the Fall of the season it will be burned, we move it into the woodsheds by trailer. This is the step I think will be improved next, probably with a pallet system like some of you have shown. I've avoided double-row stacking to speed drying, but as I get to and push beyond a three-year cycle that is less of an issue, and a pallet moved from the drying area into the woodshed would probably work fine.
How do you like the fiskars Pickaroon? Been contemplating picking one up to pull rounds out of the back of my truck.
It'll cut anything you can lift; you may have to hit it from both sides, but it's pretty good for cutting anything you want to throw at it. For me, 6" or so is comfortable for me to handle at 8' lengths. I cut to 24" so that gives me 4 chunks per length. I've cut larger diameters, but it starts to get cumbersome and I have other equipment to process larger diameters.
Perfect for pulling rounds from a truck or trailer. Since I got mine I don't have to climb in to my trailer to unload. I really like them. The Fiskars was my first pickaroon I have since purchased a Muller so I could compare the traditional style with the Fiskars. I prefer the Fiskers its lighter and seems to hook in better than the Muller. Plus you can't beat Fiskars warranty. Pull the trigger you will love it. Muller woodpick. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
I would say so! Looks like the bigger they get the vibration becomes a bit more and gets difficult to hold steady.
I use mine all the time to pull rounds from trailer to splitter then split into bucket then to stack.
