First load for today, this is the second load from the yard with all the broken trees. and the great Wall grows again I have a great picture of the massive pile of limbs across the street from the first house, but this site gives a security error every time I try to load it,
Third load of wood for the day, I'm definitely going to feel this tomorrow. Had a guy try to hire me to do some tree work, but I don't climb trees...
Not sure what is going on, some pictures load just fine, others get this error message . Is it a file size issue ?
Huge maple limb that came down in the storm, notice the diameter of the cut face on the tree Didn't take much to make a full load Adding oil to the new splitter engine, is this how you get it into vertical mode?
Predator hydraulic pump, long and skinny DHT pump is much shorter and fatter. Also note that the DHT has a real return filter the predator only has a very coarse filter on the inlet, inside of the tank Side by side , the engines appear almost identical. The predator is a clone of a Honda, and apparently so is the Loncin engine on the DHT. The only extras seem to be some emissions stuff on the DHT to make it California legal. the DHT engine is bolted hard to the frame, while the predator engine is on rubber shock mounts. This seems to make the DHT vibrate loose parts more, but I wear 3M radio/Bluetooth headphones anyway so it really doesn't matter (I also tend to sing along, good thing the splitter is loud ) the biggest difference I noticed was the DHT hydraulic pump is noisy, I've never heard the pump on the predator unless it was stuck.
Predator tires are not DOT rated, while DHT claim to be, they look identical to me, including the lettering on the sidewalls Filled with hydraulic oil, gas and engine oil, brand new splitter fired up on the first pull, and runs strong. Of course I had to try out splitting vertically, found it really is the best way to deal with the huge rounds I tend to collect scrounging Couldn't get a picture of the pile of splits the DHT cranked out, my kids were in stacking mode, they get $5/cord they stack, they earned $10 Saturday. This rack to the right was empty before they started stacking. Three full pallets equal a cord in my calculations.
The first rack on the left holds my sixth cord for next year, so every cord after this is wood for two winters from now, and I'm still working on wood I scrounged last year, haven't even touched the scrounges from this year. this is the other side of the second rack, now that the snow is finally gone, my son can't wait to finish this one off, I'm gonna have to split a big pile up on Monday so he can keep busy during the week after school.
The biggest thing I noticed about the DHT is that the ram, and tank get hot, almost too hot to touch with the bare hand, I never noticed the predator getting warm to a noticeable point, of course the predator isn't moving the ram as much, because it stopped between each stroke, while the DHT has to retract before the next splitting stroke. Happy Easter everyone! We had a great Sunday, even had a new family show up at church today.
Now that the snow is gone, we're back on the monster maple. My son has a hard time dragging the wood up the hill to the trailer, so I brought the DHT over and split the wood on site. This made his job much easier Only one load for today, but it is ready to be stacked It just about killed us, but we got the DHT back up the bank, it probably would be fine, but it's new, and I won't be able to get back there until the weekend. Makes a nice pile after unloading the trailer
Left some wood for next time , luckily it's in a spot nobody would poach, even if they knew it was there I drag a bunch of stuff along on top of this, but this is the important stuff, chaps, helmet, gloves and both saw bags. A video about the chainsaw bag
I made an Instructable about my simple pallet firewood rack, it's entered in a contest right now on the instructables site. Check out the site if you are a DIY type of person
My son is expected to do it, the 7 year old likes to do it so she can work with daddy . She got a scratch on her arm from the wood, and a bandaid. The rest of the day she acted like she couldn't move her arm because of the bandage
Instructables liked my contest entry enough to make it a featured project on the front page of the website
So I sold my second wood splitter in 6 years today. My first one was a bit terrifying to use, often grabbing big rounds and spinning them, giving me visions of getting wrapped up in the screw myself. I bought it, not running, for about $100, put a new coil on it, ran it for a few years, then sold it running for $300. The one I sold today is my predator, it's split about 25 cords of wood in three years, and still going strong. Now the minister of financial matters in my house is happy, and I expect to be happy with this DHT splitter for the rest of my life .
Saturday, splitter back in place, and plenty of wood waiting to be split. While I love this splitter, I really miss my old one sometimes. The wedge is a quarter inch thicker in cross section, than the wedge my predator had, and behind that it gets much wider. Even though this machine is rated for 2 tons more (yes I know these numbers are inflated) than the predator . the predator almost never got stopped by a round because of the skinny wedge. Big stuff like this would have been no issue on the predator, this maple round stopped it cold. No wonder so many have 27 and 32 ton splitters, that extra grunt could save me from nibbling around the edges like this
So much for spring ... the rack to the right was full March first, still burning at night, and some days, all day. A cord an almost a half this spring. Atlas Showa gloves are my go to gloves for every chore, not just firewood, this is the second one I've worn out, and always this spot on the right glove
