Award time again AKA: tree service freebies part 2

Ok, since I got my bike on the road again after changing the fuel pump gasket, I had time to work on the pile of silver maple tonight.


I cut nearly all the pieces to length. I just have a couple more big trunk pieces to noodle and or cut down. I also moved any pieces that were on the grass so the grass could recover.

I'll cut the free other pieces up this weekend, and split and move it all. This is the front yard. I want to keep the wife happy

 

How I left it last night....



I'm glad I cut and moved that last night. You can see where the halved big trunk pieces were, and the start of the grass getting killed.
I got new bolts on the splitter ram after I sheared one off and bent the hell out of the other on the same side.

So....

 

Ok, done for the night.

I cut and noodled all of the pieces into the right size.



Here's a pic of the setup.

I split up a couple of the big beasts, and enough normal sized rounds to fill the trailer. That's about 2/3 of a cord.



There's 12 gargantuan rounds/ chunks left, those will probably fill a trailer load by themselves.

 

I added a few splits this morning to make the first trailer a full 2/3 cord. It's much easier for me to get an accurate cord count.

Next load split....

 

Pile is growing... First load piled, 2nd in the trailer.


After that load was dropped off..

The pile grew more....


Third trailer load. Plus a view of what's left.


Taking a little break. Rehydrating with some cold blackberry sweet tea. It's goooooood, even though it's diet and almost no carbs.

It's 72° with a nice light wind from the north. This is about my limit for wood making temperature. Any warmer and it's a no go.

Now, my neighbor, the cool ones, texted my wife that they will have wood for me too. I'm guessing it's their Norway maple in their front yard. It's in rough shape, and would make better firewood than shade right now.

 

Big chunky splits! I did the same thing with the Box Elder I just worked up

 

Yes, big chunky splits.

 

Helluva wood score Horkn!! I’ve been through a bunch of silver maple lately. Easy wood to work for sure. Make hay while the sun shines! (well, not on those high heat index days..)

 

I'm already at 2 cord piled. There may be 2 trailer loads left.

This is a yard Bird tree, and the Biggie's already have sheared one bolt that I just replaced on the ram. Some pieces are trying to do their best elm impression.

My wife have me a hose bath to cool me off. I made sure the sprayer was on "mist"

Dinner time, then back at it.

 

Nice pile of wood. Your going to save lots of gas having wood dropped off and your neighbor hooking you up.

 

I'm out of gas in the splitter, and physically.

I got 1 more load taken over to the pile, and piled. I also got all the big chunks off of the grass, and all split and in the trailer. There will be 1 more full trailer load to take to the pile, plus a little more.

My phone battery died as I was going to take a pic of the load. It was the big chunks and trunk pieces. There was enough to get a good start on the next trailer load.

Here's the pile after the unpictured load was piled on it.

And here's the remainder of the big stuff


Notice the trailer is closer to full already. That's from the remaining trunk pieces.

Once I fill this trailer load, this will be 3.33 cords.

 

Awesome!

 

Yeah, I underestimated the amount in log piles.

 

That is a lot of work and a lot of nice firewood! Did you find that the big silver maple rounds wanted to split in a curve around a central core? I had trouble with some like that.

 

Yes, I had the same observation. The trunk pieces were gnarly, and bent or snapped a couple ram mount bolts.

Yeah, it is a lot of work, but this will get me ahead. If it seasons as well as I expect it to, I'll be able to use some of it this winter. We'll see. I still have several dead standing elm to cut down and get split, so I'm not relying on this wood for 18-19. Whatever I do, I won't be burning as much high btu wood when I don't need to. If I have to I have the gooder stuff, but if I can keep the gooder stuff for the next year, or further, then I will.

 

I'll find out in Fall if it's good enough. I'll split a couple bigger pieces and take a moisture meter reading.

 

Good job on the free wood my wine swilling, brat eating, living deep behind the cheddar curtain buddy!