Having never had to deal with the thorns like that, I can see why you'd steer clear of thorny locust. Elm, with hydro's splits at least. Yeah it can stall out a smaller splitter. But it's clean wood, and no real chance of getting splinters if wearing gloves.
When I have "had" to deal with them, you make real sure to pick up all the thorns as they will go through equipment/tractor tires like nothing. Great BTU's in the wood but labor intensive. Big clumps get handled with a pitch fork, normally straight to a fire or dump trailer. I'll clean the tree at the bottom and lift it to a burn pile to clean IF I decide to get the wood. Sometimes time wise it just isn't worth it. Other than being a full cycle split, I've never had much problem with elm. Just adds a little time to the equation.
leoht yup sugar gum that was it.. worse than red gum! been a decade or so since I split some.. I find it good for frustration and workin up a thirst for some crownies!
I don't have a wide variety of wood but elm and wet cottonwood are my picks too. I mumble a saying to myself whenever I run into a nasty splitting piece of any variety..."hit it like it's elm"
There has been a couple of post here about maple that defied being split. The reason I own a woodsplitter today is because of maple. I loaded up the maple pieces and took them to the pawnshop that had a splitter for sale and told them if it would split these pieces I would buy it . It struggled but it got them split. I had a good grudge burn with those pieces. The splitter now is one of my prized possessions.
How is it once you get past the thorns on that honey locust? The toughest I have tackled so far is apple wood from my Macintosh tree in the back yard. I trimmed off branches as large as 8 inches in diameter and couldn't even touch them with sledge and wedges. Heck, there was no way to even start a wedge in some of the crotches.
I've burnt and split lots of elm, its no different than most hardwoods. Some are knotty some are twisted. Some hard stuff to split imo is dried crotches of beech cherry oak maple that I huck into the I'm not messing with it now pile.
It's been a while since I drank a crownie, this is my beer of choice. Don't drink and split! Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
There's a few around here one in my parents front yard for instance that I pruned out years ago and ended up getting a thorn from a falling branch stuck almost 3/4 through the knuckle joint on my left middle finger. Pulling it out was interesting as well as the BB size lump that formed on top of the joint and is a permanent thing. The thornless variety on the other hand grow on the other side of the road and I got the chance to make some firewood out of one fairly red wood that smelled like... you guessed it honey and it split great!
Especially considering the BTU value and the fact that they are both extremely heavy when cut fresh because they are so sopping wet, i have decided that if I have a chance at cotton wood or Willow, I will be leaving them to rot. Elm is a pain but at least it's decent for burning. Hack berry can be a mess to.
American Elm The only reason to buy a splitter Fence lines full of standing dead year after year burn some sell some
I'm surprised about the consensus on sweet gum. I've got lots of those in my woods (trying to weed them out as I can). I had a pretty big one snap off at the trunk during an ice storm a couple of years ago and was actually split when I first started collecting firewood. I thought it was one of the easier ones I've delt with so far. They grow pretty straight here and the wood is very brittle (which is probably why it snapped off under the ice). Spit no problem with my maul. Maybe it's a different variety here in North Carolina? I'll have to confirm the tree, but there is one here that is almost impossible to split without hydraulics. I think it's hickory, but oh my God. When I do get it split, the grain is wavy and it looks like it fractures more than splits. I know it when I hit it. It goes into the "splitter" pile!
