When is best time to split wood?

[markkelly]

Should cut it and split it right after the tree has fallen or what some time?

[tyb525]

I cut and split as soon as I can, that way the wood can start drying faster. However, you could cut it into rounds after you fell the tree, stack those rounds, and split them whenever is convenient for you.

[Ianab]

Some species split much easier when green, others seem to split easier when dry.

If it's easy to split when green, then do it then, and the smaller pieces will dry faster.

Ian

[Al_Smith]

Certain woods such as hickory or any of the maples will rot from the inside out if not split in a timely fashion .Oak can take a lot of weather in the the round,log or split .

[doctorb]

I have read that black locust should be split when green, as it's supposedly easier.  No confirmation on that.  I don't think there's ever a good time to split elm. ;D

[thecfarm]

Put Elm out behind the woodshed in stove wood length for a year,unsplit. We only had splitting mauls and iron wedges to split wood with when I was growing up.. A year later we could split it. Was still kinda stringee,but we could split it. Also if splitting wood after it drys some,look for cracks on the end of the stove wood length piece,if splitting by hand. I went and bought a wood splitter and don't have to "read"the end any more.

[clww]

Split it as soon as you have the rounds bucked to length. Also, the colder it is outdoors, the better.

[zopi]

When it is not 110 degrees out....

[Bro. Noble]

Wood splits easiest when it's frozen.

[Holmes]

Wood splits easiest when it's frozen.

Specially elm  !!!

[SwampDonkey]

Wood splits easiest when it's frozen.

Green and frozen was always easiest when we split hard maple, beech and yellow birch. If not too twisting and crotched a piece it will often split with one or maybe three thuds. When these species were dryer and left in the round stovewood length they were misery to split. A lot of wood of those three species has been split around here. ;D My father always seemed to split it dry and pound and pound and pound, couldn't tell an old Scot noth'n. :D Today as I was working on a lot next door to a fellow cutting his firewood, he was cutting down the trees, bucking and splitting as he went and tossing into the truck bed.

[chevytaHOE5674]

I usually split when it isn't hot out and when I'm not busy with other stuff on the farm. So that usually means late fall, winter, or early spring.

Fall and winter are the best because there are no bugs, don't hardly work up a sweat, wood splits easier, and its just a nice time of year to be outside. haha

[Al_Smith]

 Most of my life I swung a 5 pound axe at firewood .It was only about 2-3 years ago I finally got around to building a splitter .As far as I'm concerned that's the only way to deal with elm .That or get a stove with a huge door and dump it in whole or rip it to size with a saw .They used to make wagon tongues out of that stuff because it is so tough .It will bend where oak will break and split apart .It doesn't split with an axe or maul any better at 10 below that it does at 80 degress ,it's just tough all the time .

[Bro. Noble]

It doesn't split with an axe or maul any better at 10 below that it does at 80 degress ,it's just tough all the time .

Well, sems like contrariness is in the air tonight so I'll just join in ;)

Now elm might be different north of the border,  but it sure as heck splits easier here when it's frozen-----axe or woodsplitter, don't make no nevermind.  Do you have sycamore there?  Now that's hard splittin.

[John Mc]

Bro. Noble -

Are you talking about American Elm, or some other type. I've never tried sycamore - don't know that I have any in my neck of the woods, but there isn't much around here that splits tougher than American Elm - with maul or splitter.

[Bro. Noble]

American elm is about a thing of the past here :( although I can remember trying to split it.  Most of ours is red elm and it is about as bad as American elm except that it's often shaky so part of the splitting is already done.  We also have Chinese elm and winged elm.  Chinese elm is mostly a yard tree and I don't remember ever trying to split any.  I've never seen winged elm big enough to need splitting.  I believe Sycamore is worse than elm.  Anymore,  if it's to big for me to lift, I let it rot in the woods.  If I can lift it, it will fit in my furnace ;D

[SwampDonkey]

Bro_Noble, not many folks even try to split American Elm in these parts. My uncle had a huge one they took down in the yard and his uncle had one as well. Both but logs were sawed on each tree by other interests, but all the rest was hauled back on the hill to rot.  ;)

A cousin of mine came and borrowed dads tractor mounted splitter. This is a heavy duty splitter, but it came back ......umm  ..... with modifications after trying to split a monster of an elm, growing in the field, that they had cut down.  Nope, folks would just rather not deal with it. ;D

[Al_Smith]

You won't find much American elm ever get much over 12-15 inchs and then rarely at all .

[SwampDonkey]

I would agree Al, but also depends on if it's managed for disease to. The city of Frederiction still has 70% of it's elms since the disease was discovered and the trees managed for. They are now planting disease resistant white elms (Valley Forge) in the city. But most of the old mature ones in the country side are dead or very lucky. In forest condition they can survive because of diversity. The neighbors had one we measured at 6 feet above ground because of a huge burl below, and it was 11 feet in circumference or 42 inches in diameter. But the woodlot was logged and the combination of damage and likely disease afterward, the tree died (1988). I had visited the site 5 years ago and that huge tree was just about all soil then. They break down fast in our climate.

[doctorb]

How about slippery elm?  Largest round is about 20". As I am not ready to haul out the splitter just yet, it's gonna "cure" for a while before it turns to firewood.

[Busy Beaver Lumber]

Get a powerful enough splitter and it does not matter what you split or when you split it. I have this Huskee 35 ton splitter and have never had a log it will not split. These are actually made by Speeco and sold at Tractor Supply. Some times when it encounters a particularly knarly piece, it will litterally slice through knots. I could not be happier with how well it performs. Tons of power with the 15hp motor and very quick cycle times.

I will offer up a word of caution about splitting frozen wood with a log splitter. It does not happen often, but it has happened to me enough times that it is worth mentioning. When splitting frozen logs, I have had several split with such force that it literally shot one or both pieces off of the splitter. On one occasion, I had a decent size piece of oak fly over 50 feet when it left the spliiter. Another time I had a piece shoot off and aim right at my face. Fortunately I had my husquavarna logging helmet on becasue it hit the face shield with such force that it ripped the helmet right off my head. With out the helmet, I am sure I would be missing a few teeth and have received a broken nose as well.

[two tired]

the best time is when maw-in-law showes up with overnight case,  just kidding.

[WH_Conley]

Hey, that's my splitter. I am happy for the money. Haven't found anything it wouldn't split yet.

[SwampDonkey]

Just stepped outside for a breath of air to smell the smoke of an evening wood fire at the neighbor's house. I didn't think it was cold, 65 out with humidity and it feels like the tropics to me with a SE wind blowing.  I'd die from heat exhaustion if I had to build a fire here. Good grief. : Seen a bat out there to, so I'm staying inside. ;D I scared two bats last week from the barn, came out from the siding around a window. I would never guess bats would stay around the buildings here because I'm not near open water, a long way from it.

[John Mc]

I will offer up a word of caution about splitting frozen wood with a log splitter. It does not happen often, but it has happened to me enough times that it is worth mentioning. When splitting frozen logs, I have had several split with such force that it literally shot one or both pieces off of the splitter. On one occasion, I had a decent size piece of oak fly over 50 feet when it left the spliiter.

Actually, that sounds as though you have some air in your hydraulic lines...

John Mc

[upsnake]

John MC- Why is that? 

I have had a couple of pieces so far (not frozen) that have kind of "popped" apart when splitting, took one right in the gut. Ouch . Hahah

[John Mc]

"Popping apart" is one thing. Shooting 50 feet is quite another. Hydraulic fluid is not compressible, so once the log starts to give, the pressure should be off until the ram moves further forward into the log. Since most splitters move relatively slowly, it's the rare piece of wood that will get thrown from the splitter.

If you have air in the lines or cylinder, that will compress under load. If a log "lets go" the air expands, shooting the log out. The air acts like a spring under load. I've had it happen a couple of times on a friend's splitter. Topped off the oil, cycled the cylinder a few times and tightened up a loose hydraulic connection, and the problem went away.

[shelbycharger400]

i remember as a kid around 5 or 6, parents takin down a 4 ft dia red elm,  the trunk was cut into 16 in wide ,  basically the Wheels sat behind the woodpile for ?, til i was 18-19 then got torched whole at a buddys house. lol they were solid and heavy as u know what.

i run red elm through the splitter.  just have to take small bites at a time til its a lil bit smaller.    Maple is way harder than the red elm

[upsnake]

John  MC -- Makes sense. Thanks  8)

[Busy Beaver Lumber]

Nope, no air in the lines, just a piece of wood with a lot of tension in it that popped almost immediately when the ram touched it. That one log did it several times, but once the first piece shot off, I was more alert when it did it a second time and the second piece only went about 5 feet.

[SwampDonkey]

Busy, I know you split a mountain of wood. But, I've never seen wood fly off a splitter like that. Any I've split just drops to the ground. I suppose a piece could slip if the ends are cut on a slant by a dull saw. The knife on a splitter is usually canted toward the ram to reduce the chance of it popping up when rammed and to start the split easier. The one we use does not go at the wood piece fast just slow and easy. We don't have an automatic return, but to get around that all we did was use a chain with a spring on it. As soon as you release the handle the spring pulls back on the handle.

[Al_Smith]

That so called 35 ton Huskee splitter has a 5 inch cylinder .I've used one exactly like that and it's not fast .It does have some power but typicaly like most things marketed under that name the tonnage rating is exagerated just a wee bit .

I have a home built with a 5 inch and I'd put it at around 22-25 tons or about the same as Timber Wolf rates theirs .Mind you that's more than enough grunt .

Now I can't remember the praticulars on that Huskee but it should have a set of bleeders on the cylinder to allow the air to be vented .If that cylinder has a tendency to "spring " forward radidly I would suspect trapped air .

[Busy Beaver Lumber]

Swamp

You are correct about us splitting a ton of wood. We go through somewhere around 150 to 200 cords a year.

Frozen wood that pops off the splitter with a vengance is certainly not the norm, but it does happen enough that I am mindfull of the possibility that it can, and has occured. Logs with large knots are also something to watch out for, as I have had some knots shatter from the force of the splitter and throw pieces of the knots in various directions. When you split enough wood, sooner or later, some piece is going to behave in a manor you don't expect and suprise the daylights out of you. Of the tens of thousands of pieces I have split in my life, I would agree with you that 99.9% of them simply split as expected and fall to the ground, but the 0.1% that don't will definately pucker your butt.

I have split a log that was solid at both ends, only to find out it had a bee hive with about 50 unhappy bees still alive and very ticked off. After the bees cleared, it took some real looking to find their enterance in and out as it was behind a flap of bark. Another 20 inch diameter log had a metal electric box fully encased in the log.

There is no air in my hydraulic lines and the cylinder is not lunging foward.

So far as Al_Smith's comment that it is not a fast splitter, it has a 15 second cycle time, and that is if you let it go all the way back and all the way foward. For me that is fast enough. If I were looking to get a faster cycle time and increased output, I would buy a firewood processor. For a price of $1600 bucks, it is a pretty darn good splitter with all the power I have ever needed to split any log I presented to it.

[John Mc]

There is no air in my hydraulic lines and the cylinder is not lunging foward.

It doesn't take much to start throwing logs, and the cylinder doesn't lunge forward very far (the one I had experience with was moving less than 1/2")

From what I've seen, if ti happens once, it usually happens several times, until the air bubble works its way out. So if yu are not seeing it all that often, then you may well be right... it may be something other than an air bubble. I've never had it happen when it was not an air bubble, but then I only split about 1/10 as much wood in a year as you do.

John Mc

[lumberjake]

I used to split about 350 to 400 cords a year with a comercial log splitter from iron and oak. The cycle time was around 8-10 seconds and was a faster than average splittler with a lift arm and a adjustable 4 way wedge.  I too had some frozen wood "pop" pretty crazy off the splitter, usually the smaller straight grain wood pops faster but some times when i got into some crotch pieces they exploded pretty fiercely. But as for splitting green or dry, i prefer green because now that we have a processor and we're around 800 cords a year, it's less mess at the machine. Green wood holds bark better than logs that have laid for a few months. We usually split the logs as soon as they get into our yard except the dead logs or logs with the bark pretty much off we stock pile. I would split it as fast as you can so it dries faster unless you have a kiln then it doesnt really matter.

[LeeB]

My favorite time is whenever I have enough extra cash on hand to get someone else to do it.  :D

[Al_Smith]

   

.


So far as Al_Smith's comment that it is not a fast splitter, it has a 15 second cycle time, and that is if you let it go all the way back and all the way foward. For me that is fast enough. 

Now don't get me wrong I didn't say it was slow as a snail .It basically runs at the same speed as a standard 4 inch cylinder splitter .Of course with the larger cylinder and larger volume pump the speed remains the same and the tonnage is higher .

FWIW my homebuilt has a 5 inch cylinder 11 HP engine and 16 gpm pump .The engine is set for 2800 RPM the relief at 1800.It runs the same speed as my buddys so called 28 ton Huskie splitter with a 4 inch and 8HP engine running at 3600 .Splits more uses less fuel and at the end of the day you could fry an egg on my buddys cylinder while mine is just warm to the touch .

[Randy88]

Whenever the kids get on my nerves and I send them out to split some wood, today I ran the skid steer and splitter some to get what was piled up out of my way that and it was raining out and I didn't want to do anything else so I ran the skid steer in the rain all afternoon splitting wood while sitting in the cab, otherwise its whenever we have time to do it, no matter the weather. 

[hisliptree3]

i recently fell an oak tree. i split it and hauled it right away. i also covered it for quick use, when im ready for it.

[doctorb]

Don't cover it completely.  It holds the moisture in and delays drying.  Let air get to it.

[mkjones32]

I have one of the 22 Ton Speeco's and am very happy with it.  Another word of caution if your a taller person some of the smaller logs can split apart with force and you could take a shot in the privates  >:(  Time for a break after that.

[Al_Smith]

Well geeze you have to get out of the line of fire unless you want to sing soprano .I prefer bass myself .I sing  solo,so low people can't hear me . ;D

[CRThomas]

Some species split much easier when green, others seem to split easier when dry.

If it's easy to split when green, then do it then, and the smaller pieces will dry faster.

Ian

I split and bag as soon as I can. But I am always behind but all my wood is in chucks 16 inch long so it drys good in one hot dry summer. Ash will beat you to death when it's dry. My grand daughter won't split ash she said hurt her. But I work with my wood 24 7's because that's all I do. I have about 3 years supply. With out gathering any more but I will. I have three storage places. The good wood at home and the other places the oak walnut pecan. My fruit woods were I can keep and eye on it. The stealing should start any day now. Dave said they already got a couple truck loads will he was a way on the week hot wire his loader. That something we live with in this area. CRT

[King of the woods]

I have found red oak splits quite well in fall or winter.Since oak tends to hold it's moisture for a long time it really splits easy when it is frozen! I dropped a 60 ft oak over a year ago and just began to buck it, it is so full of moisture it is difficult to get the rounds out of the woods by hand!

[garret]

Time to split is when there's nothing better to do or when wife giving me an earful.  Can't hear her over the log splitter engine.

IMO, when hand splitting, green woods split easiest.  This is certainly the case for ash, red oak, locust, maple.  Sycamore has my vote for toughest.  Grain like plywood.  Best to just let it lay.

[bandmiller2]

I would prefer to have a pile of am. elm to burn over all others. It burns like coal but its an SOB to split the large chunks. Large chunks you cut cookies. I haul when I can get wood, and split when I can. Any hyd. splitter will launch an occasional piece just don't get down range. If you heat with wood you deserve a decent splitter, the savings in oil will pay for it quickly, same with a good saw.  Frank C.

[36 coupe]

Splitting wood does not help drying.....Wood drys from the ends.

[beenthere]

Splitting wood does not help drying.....Wood drys from the ends.

Somewhat close to right.

Wood does dry from the ends, but it also dries from the surface (just more slowly than from the ends). The drying is slower from the surface if the bark is on, vs. a split face without bark.

So splitting has to help drying, as there is more surface area exposed to the air for any given block of wood split vs. unsplit.

[timberlinetree]

Best time to split wood is when the kids are around to help :D

[Woodcutter_Mo]

I had some really hard splitting black jack a while back I decided to try later, the other day was in the single digit temps and pretty much 1 whack with the maul and it just blew apart. Really frozen wood splits best a lot of times.

[Nate379]

When it is not 110 degrees out....

Or -30* and the house is freezing!

[LittleJohn]

...when the family is over and I have lots of help moving firewood :D ;D

Most family members will work for good home cooked food and a few beers afterwards

[kevin19343]

The best time to split wood is between 8:00 and noon. That way you've got the rest of the day to yourself.  ;D

[bartman]

We usually take the splitter with us into the woods and do all the splitting there. That way you can leave the mess there and stack a tighter load in the truck or trailer.

[whitepine2]

  Best time to split is when you darn well feel like it but better when frozen.

[CRThomas]

Should cut it and split it right after the tree has fallen or what some time?

This is just some test run I took and split some Oak in my kiln got it down to 15 % took it out side and set it in the open let it rain on it off and on for three days. Took my two testers and checked the wood 12 hours later the moister was at 17 on the ends split the sticks all the wood was 15 % from the center out to a quarter inch of the out side. So I am still not going cover my wood.