Wood splitter design

[JoshNZ]

I'm starting a build on a wood splitter here next week, it'll be a simple 3pt linkage tractor mount with vertical beam and spool valve beside operator there somewhere.

I also want to have some kind of lifter attachment but I have been toying with the idea of making it a conveyor chain, rather than the classic lifting table. I'm thinking a ramp that would fold down from the operator table and set on the ground beside it (attached via hinge) and two or three conveyor chains driven by a hydraulic motor.

My thinking is, it is just as useful as a lifter table to use on your own, if you setup the foot on the bottom of it right and had chains low enough you could roll rings up beside it then let them topple onto the chains, and haul them up with the lever. But my main reason for thought is, we usually have another set of hands helping out when having a wood day, it would be great for someone to be able to line up rings in a que that the operator can pull on with a lever as he/she needs.

I can't find any examples of it been done, any reason why not?.

I was going to put the question to you larger sawmill guys, if it's not a silly idea, what kind of chain/guides would be most readily available/affordable? Obviously it will have an incline so needs teeth of some sort on the chain. And what kind of guides would one use for a weight bearing situation like that? I see plenty of profiled uhmw guides around but none who's specs mention if this is suitable for weight on the chains above it. I figure this is a small version of a sawmill chain/green chain/log loader whatever.

[Hilltop366]

This popped up on youtube today.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8UKPUUCFUw


I have messed with the idea of a vertical splitter but I picked up a old horizontal splitter the other day that I will try to improve.

My thought was to use a pair of 2"x6" x¼" tubing for the beam and some flat steel for the wedge, the wedge would be connected to a long piece of flat steel that ran in-between the 2x6 so I could mount the hyd cylinder behind the beam instead of sticking up above the wedge. 

A quick search for "vertical wood splitter" came up with a "superaxe" which is very similar to what I was trying to describe.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tF1-M2UNiw

[mike_belben]

Im not sure im following your chained log lift josh.. Can you sketch it?  Is the chain in a loop or singled in tension like a cogged cable?  Is the motor stationary and pulling the chain to raise it or is the motor on the lift and climbing an anchored chain like a gear rack?  


Any why?  What does it do for you that a cylinder lift cant?  Rams are incredibly cheap and powerful at the linear force that a deck lift requires.  A winch is next on my list if hydraulics are out.  Id build a jib crane with a winch and tongs personally.  Automotive spindle, hub and rim for the swing.

[Hilltop366]

I think he is looking at a conveyer idea for a continuous supply of blocks to the splitter operator. 

Not sure how much hyd volume your tractor has but I will say that my 3ph mount splitter that runs on my tractor hydraulics is rather slow. It has a 4" cylinder and I usually run it at 1700rpm which should be around 5 gal per min or 20L per min, the only way to speed it up would be to run the engine faster which seems like a waste of power and fuel or a smaller cylinder which is one of the reasons why I bought the second hand gas splitter (portability is the main reason).

I will mention that my brother has a tractor mount splitter that has a 3" cylinder and it is faster than my splitter it is also on a smaller tractor.

[mike_belben]

Oh okay maybe thats the ticket.. A powered roller table lift ? 

 

[Crusarius]

Josh, your pretty young right? Isn't it time to start popping out kids? Before you know it they will be doing all the splitting  or they could be the feed chain.

[JoshNZ]

That processor is definitely getting work done! Bit more than I need...

I'll sketch it for you later Mike, maybe I don't need to now but yup, think a ~7ft steel framed ramp that folds down, end hits the ground next to your pile of rings, and has chains on it that loop, shaft with sprockets at each end and a hydraulic motor. A simple conveyor belt, but chains, so it doesn't tear when you put 200kgs of rings on it.

You wouldn't use the splitting ram and ramp at the same time, so no issue with flow.

I've been going back and forth about whether to suck on the tractors hydraulics, or take power off and drive my own pump. I have a t4 newholland here which has pretty decent flow rate, I've borrowed a vertical splitter off a family friend and run it on it and it's a pretty swift setup. Bigger machine than that "super axe" and much better built.
The t4 is one of the orchard workhorses so it would only get mounted when needed, then removed when finished. Which isn't that bigger deal.

I also have a fleet of 8 MF tractors, little 40hp Perkins diesels that sit around all year waiting for harvest. Useless flow rate but if I setup a 3pt machine I could pto from an MF, pulley up to pump speed and add a reservoir. It could sit on this tractor all year round. When people want to borrow it they can take the whole thing as long as they want. And I could pulley up so it's tickling away at 1000rpm or so, they run on the smell of an oily rag.

I've been looking around at pumps, plenty going secondhand at the moment, in the 65-80L/min range (17-21gal/m). At 80L my math says a 5" OD ram will do a 20" stroke in 3.6seconds. Set it all at an easy going 3000psi and that's a 20ton setup.

Kids will come soon enough haa not done making something of myself yet.

[Hilltop366]

That processor is definitely getting work done! Bit more than I need...

Yes, was mainly posting it for the conveyer idea.

The separate pump idea should work. I have seen a bunch of home made ones around here like that, I think that they were stepping up the speed using chain and sprockets to avoid the belt tension problems, the splitters are probably 30 plus years old so it can't be too bad of a idea. Another option would be to over size the pump a bit to reduce the required shaft speed.

The conveyer could be belt driven as well by using the belt as a clutch but would need some type of oneway clutch or pawl to keep it from coasting backwards.

[JoshNZ]

I already picked up a hydraulic motor this week. Saw it listed on our local auction site for $60 bucks ~40US. Put a bid in at that and no-one else bid. Didn't know what I was gonna do with it but a good find at that price I think.

I've been entertaining the idea of adding hydraulics to my mill or starting again on a bigger hydraulic machine. So have been jumping on deals like that that come up, with a quick browse during morning coffee. I've got a small collection of rams/pumps/hoses sitting there now.

[thecfarm]

Hilltop, I like that idea of the lift, Simple!!

[mike_belben]

20GPM at 3k psi off a sub 2k rpm is big roller chain territory.. Or big cogged belt but chain way cheaper.  

My best advice, dont hotrod hydraulic flow.  You spend a ton of money to hit a big number then you cant use the thing because the valves are too fast and touchy so it smashes into stuff if you sneeze. Plus the engine governor is up and down hard with every stroke.. Sorta annoying.  I mean if all youre moving is a splitter ram and youve got Horsetorques to spare sure go 20+ gpm at 3k.  But anything else is gonna need flow restrictors to control smoothly or its a catapult.  


Is rings a kiwi term for bucked log pieces before splitting? We call them rounds. 

[JoshNZ]

It never has to reach 3k psi I just meant lower the relief valve down to that so nothing is working too hard.

Yeah I could restrict flow or run through diverter that wastes half back to tank or size the sprockets that run the belt right so it's all under control.

Getting back to my main question.. would I just run the chains on uhmw guides?

Rings/rounds/whatever yup I dunno what we call them. Don't stay whatever they are very long haha.

[mike_belben]

A delrin, nylon, UMHW or acetal skid would work well.  Commercial cutting boards.  In the USA "kittredge" is a good search term to find them.. They made stainless industrial food grade equipment for a long time. 


I bet you could get a good solid hardwood to last quite a while if greased though. 

[JoshNZ]

That's a good idea Mike I bet you're right. Easy to swap out after building if not.

Is there a commonly used toothed chain I'd be better off sourcing that anyone knows of, pricewise?

[doc henderson]

a few good ideas are on the table so not sure what you are going to settle on but I used detachable link ag chain for mine.  I think #40.  got the cogs online, and used a gear reduced tarp motor for the power. so it was reversible, and could be free standing with a 12 V power source.

firewood conveyor in Firewood and Wood Heating (forestryforum.com)

[JoshNZ]

What attachments do the links have to grip the wood doc?

[doc henderson]

I got the chain at tractor supply and may have ordered the links with the uprights online.  they had two stamped bits turned up, and that worked fine but some would skip over a link and get caught by the next one.  so I welded a 2 x 4 inch paddle on the face of the 2 uprights, and it stood taller and caught the wood.  it also made the link and uprights more stable and strong.  if you read my thread, it would get stuck on thin wood on the edge, but then I trimmed the bottom side of the side supports round so it could clear it.  I can see if I have links I can photograph

[JoshNZ]

There is a store that do nothing but chain over in the city I'll ask them for a quote on whatever they suggest. I've seen chain with a spike as part of the link, I think that'd be ideal if they happened to have that. Anything from an agressive half inch single spike to that below



 

[york]

DSCF0731 - YouTube

[mike_belben]

i like his return stroke resplit ontop the pusher box.  that saves half a stroke each time.  

note the round tube welded in between the legs of his live deck rails.  if you have anything thats boingy and need to join two planes into one real rigid mass, round tube bracing is the absolute best.  it will cancel out any torsion between the planes it is joining and the flimsiness factor goes away.  big diameter is more important than thick wall.  i use exhaust pipe all the time for that. 

[jmur1]

That is a very innovative concept York!

jmur1

[21incher]

When I designed  and built  my splitter I tried to keep it cheap and just  used a 4 inch  cylinder and old 12 hp kholer tractor  motor with  a 2 stage pump. When I first tested  it it was very slow because of a poor wedge design. I just used a tapered wedge and the pump would kick down almost  immediately slowing the splitting to a crawl. I then redesigned the wedge to a 2 angle wedge that cut close to 25% off the splitting  cycle time by keeping  the pump from kicking down so quickly. Well wasn't  satisfied  with that so I designed  a new edge with  a shallow  knife edge and separate shorter off center 2 stage blocks. That really  sped it up and kept the pump from kicking down early. Last thing I tried was elevating the chunk 2 inches off the base plate with blocks about  8 inches apart  to get less pinching  on the wedge. Well that really sped the cycle time up and basically  all my splitting is now done without having the pump kick down and normally everything is split using under 800 psi on my pressure gauge. I found  the wedge is a great place to start if you are working on speeding up a low flow system. I used bearing brass for my slide block liners because plastics would not last when I took into account for off center stresses from knots and cross grain. This is what my final wedge looks like and there is a provision for the 4 way knife.


 
This is the splitter. I used a winch for the loading platform to save money


 

 
Here you can see the log is slightly elevated.  Over 10 years I  haven't encountered anything under 24 inches long I couldn't  split. I have several  videos about it splitting  on my YouTube channel.

[mike_belben]

Clever use of gear rack

[JoshNZ]

Thanks for the links and ideas guys, very helpful.

I drew the whole lot today and sent off to the plasma cutters. Really going the luxury route this time.

I forget what I've said here already but I've decided to run it off the tractor and connect to 3pt linkage. I wrestled for days about how to gear up from a PTO crusing at ~300rpm to an external pump, but gave up on it. I'm just going to suck on the tractor aux and will go from there. Also just using a 4" OD ram now too.

There are lots of PTO step up boxes but they are all around 4:1 and designed for 540rpm. Like heck I'm going to sit there splitting with a tractor at wide open throttle.
300 doesn't sound like that much less but it is 55%. Nearly half flow. Best idea I could come up with was a right angle mower gearbox 2:1 driving a 4:1 step up gearbox, then a big pump. But it's a lot of money to spend to do the job slightly quicker on a different tractor... Chains and pulleys doing 10:1 was expensive and taking the pith too.

So it's gone back to a pretty basic bones model now unfortunately, I'll build on it and develop a I go.

[mike_belben]

nothing wrong with using the remotes. atleast that pump on there is dialed in for what the engine likes.  

trying to run stuff at a low rpm and high pressure, high flow, is tough on parts.  big load pulses.  high rpm might sound bad to our ears but it spreads more of the work across more piston pulses so each ox in the yokes is tasked with a smaller step, so to speak.