Electric log splitter

[doctorb]

John Mc-
I like the countersunk bolt idea.  I think I'll get the cradle to protect my tires and my toes.
Dcotorb

[WH_Conley]

A little trick I have found is that when the splitter stalls on a tough piece of wood is, if you have a helper. Have one person hold the lever in the splitting position, even if it is by passing, take a sledge hammer and strike the end of the plate or wedge, whichever you have. Not on the cylinder end. Would be on the foot in the previous picture. Something about the shock gives it a little extra umph.

[John Mc]

One last thing that has been very helpful in running my logsplitter. I picked up some "Timber Tongs" from my local Husqvarna dealer for about $30. (You can also find them here from Bailey's: 8" Timber Tongs) They are great for handling round wood. I don't have to bend down much at all to pick up most of my round wood. Even though these are 8" tongs, they generally pick up anything up to about 12". Really saves my back when doing much of this. They make a larger size tong, but I liked the size of these.

Several people in my landowner cooperative, tried my tongs, and ended up buying a set for themselves. Pretty foolproof. The only thing I've ever done to them is sharpen the tips, which helps the grip on smooth-barked logs like beech or birch.

John Mc

[John Mc]

John Mc-
I like the countersunk bolt idea.  I think I'll get the cradle to protect my tires and my toes.
Dcotorb

It was not an issue on smaller logs since the curve of the log made it miss the bolt head, but it's helped a lot on larger ones. I actually sent the idea in to Ramsplitter and had a conversation with Doug about it. He was going to look in to it. I could not find any of the bolts I replaced it with in a galvanized finish, so I just used plain ones... something I'm sure I'll regret if I ever need to take it apart (I don't think I put "Never-Seize" on them either).

John Mc

[Magicman]

The tapered wedge on the larger units is an interesting concept.

[Dean186]

Here is an image of the tapered wedge on my Timber Wolf HV2.

[Magicman]

That wasn't the taper that I was referring to.  Check this link:  http://www.ramsplitter.com/hv25c.jpg

[Bill Gaiche]

MM, The taper thing works. I built a splitter about 20 yrs ago and I made a tapered wedge for it. It starts the split at a easier rate and helps pull the log down to the frame at the same time. bg

[Dean186]

Yes, I now see to what you are referring.  I thought you meant the taper in the supporting plate that lifts the log up and away from the flat support plate and into the splitting surface of the wedge.

[Dean186]

Back to the topic of electric splitters, I like the idea of an electric log splitter and I gave a lot of thought to the Super Slit with the 1 ½ hp electric motor option.  To me, the biggest advantage to that splitter would have been the electric motor option.   If it's wired for 220 volt it should work well.  I never ran across anyone on the forums that had the Super Split with the electric motor.

In the end, with all things consider, I decided on a gas power hydraulic splitter.

[Al_Smith]

Couple of things on the topic .First in addition to a homemade splitter that has a 16 GPM pump,5 inch cylinder and 11 Hp engine I also have a little electric .

The electric has a 3.5 inch cylinder and 3450 RPM 240 volt motor with a 5 GPM single stage pump .The motor being a cheapo 3450 RPM thing is erroniously rated at 5 HP when it should actually be 2.8 .Now keep in mind the ratings between gasoline and electric vary so much that in reality  electric is really about twice what gas is .Argue about that  you want .At any rate that little splitter will split just about anything but of course much slower than the larger splitter .

I keep the little splitter in my garage in winter to split up stuff I kind of overlooked while running the big splitter. Mrs Smith gets a little perturbed if the wood gets too large for her ya know .So cutting to the chase ,electric is not a bad option at all .

[maple flats]

I've not seen a ramsplit but I really liked the supersplit I saw at Sawlex in WV. Supersplit offered both gas and electric units and a big work table/platform. I'm planning on getting a Supersplit in a year or 2. The cycle time is so much faster, return is almost instantaneous. To see a video I think it was www.supersplit.com 
Between my house wood and the maple evaporator (evaporator wood gets split wrist sized) I burn as much as 15 - 20 full cord, (4 for the house and the rest for maple. Thus I want a FAST unit.
For safety, pay full attention all the time, don't get careless.

[cowpie]

   I heat my place up north with wood and got a 6ton electric spliter after the wife told me the splitter was broke (her)!!!  I just split my wood with a axe maple/ash mostly. Since retiring and spending more time in camp this little splitter works great. It splits log,s 20" long and advertised 16" in diam. I have split log,s way bigger than that it works great. Had it for 3 season,s now without a problem. It,s made by DR. Since i stay up ther so much im burning a lot more wood these day.s havent touched the axe since i got it.

[John Mc]

DR factory is about 5 miles from where I live in Vermont. They're a good company. They're decent little splitters, and easily portable. Nobody's going to make a living with one, but that's not what they were intended for. I looked at one, but they were a bit light for my purposes.

[PlicketyCat]

We recently bought a 5-ton electric Homelite splitter. Homelite is not my favorite manufacturer, but they were on sale at Lowes and we were in a hurry. So far, I think it's a great $200 investment... certainly saves several thousand needing to get rotator cuff surgery down the road after splitting 10 cords by hand every year, or having to go to the ER with an axe wound to the shin!

The Homelite runs just fine on our little Honda 2000 generator, which sips the gas as compared to the larger splitters with their own engines that I looked at. So far the gnarliest log I've put on it was a 16" spruce round (recommended limit is 10") that was three trees grown together, and it was frozen solid. I was actually happy that the splitter was right on the ground because I sure couldn't lift that sucker by my little ol' self but could walk/roll/spin it over to the splitter and tip it into the guides with a little leverage. The motor whined a little bit, and I had to kick a few of the really knotty splits apart, but I would never have been able to split it by hand with a maul.

It's not super-fast, but we clocked about a cord in just over an hour... which isn't so bad all things considered.

[John Mc]

We recently bought a 5-ton electric Homelite splitter ...
It's not super-fast, but we clocked about a cord in just over an hour... which isn't so bad all things considered.

Was this a full cord (4 ft x 4 ft x 8 ft), or a face cord? I'd always figured a face cord an hour was doing well with one of those splitters (depending on diameter -- larger logs would need to be split more than once.) A FULL cord an hour with the typical 4 or 5 ton electric splitter would be pretty DanG good -- at that rate, it doesn't take long to earn back it's $200.

John Mc

[PlicketyCat]

We recently bought a 5-ton electric Homelite splitter ...
It's not super-fast, but we clocked about a cord in just over an hour... which isn't so bad all things considered.

Was this a full cord (4 ft x 4 ft x 8 ft), or a face cord? I'd always figured a face cord an hour was doing well with one of those splitters (depending on diameter -- larger logs would need to be split more than once.) A FULL cord an hour with the typical 4 or 5 ton electric splitter would be pretty DanG good -- at that rate, it doesn't take long to earn back it's $200.

John Mc

That was a full pickup load, so closer to a loose-stacked full cord... but some of that was branches that didn't need splitting, so maybe closer to a 1/2-2/3 a full cord. I think at that rate, it'll only take 4 or 5 cords to make back our investment... and that's including the gas for the chainsaws, truck and generator

[John Mc]

I always figured a full-sized pickup load was about 1/2 cord, if neatly stacked, about level with the top of the sides. Mini-pickup I figure about 1/3 cord. Significantly less if it's just tossed in, rather than stacked.

On the other hand, I usually use a trailer, so haven't loaded a lot of pickups lately.

[Mooseherder]

I've always thought a pickup load was 1/3 of a full cord. ???
I'll have to check this out some day. ;)

[doctorb]

Mooseherder-

I agree - Even a pick-up truck with extended side walls doesn't hold a full cord.  Most pick-ups have trouble stacking wood 4 feet high.  Most pick-up truck beds are not 8 feet long.  They probably are 4 feet wide, maybe a tad more.  My dad always told me that if you're buying a full cord of wood, and it's delivered in a pickup, you should not be paying a full cord price.

Doctorb

[LeeB]

In my neck of the woods, a full pickup load is a rick, or 1/3 of a cord.

[Dean186]

I agree with the comments above on the amount of wood one can place in a typical truck.  Another thing to consider is, if the truck has a cord of oak in it, then it has a approximately 4,000 lbs in it.  Which would be another limit for most trucks.

With that said; Below is a photo of my 3/4 ton diesel with load leveler air shocks and loaded with 1.4 cords of pine.  But observe, full size bed, wood is stacked above the cab of the truck, and wood extends out past the tail gate.  Measuring 5 x 9 x 4 and weighing about 4,500 lb  (3,000 lbs x 1.4).



I would be impressed with anyone tackling that load of wood with a small electric splitter, regardless of the amount of time it took.  Actually more impressed, than if you just split it by hand, no offense intended.

[Brucer]

The big stuff on your truck might be a problem for my 4-ton electric. I'd probably have to use a mall to split them in half first. But I was surprised at how fast two people can push stuff through the electric splitter.

[PlicketyCat]

Yeah, our 3/4 ton full size's bed measures 8'x4'x4', and we had it stacked in there well above the waterline. I'd say it was probably 2/3 cords... heavy enough to put a hurt on our 6" lift suspension in any case. One of these days I'll actually get around to neatly stacking our wood so I can tell exactly how much we have instead of just eyeballing it.  :-[ 

We only have a few really large rounds of birch and a bit more that are spruce, the rest is mostly halves and smaller stuff that goes through the splitter easy, especially frozen. It takes a long time to get a really fat tree up here (and no oak here either!), so we end up with a lot of 3 & 6" culls and branches.

[Dean186]

Yeah, our 3/4 ton full size's bed measures 8'x4'x4', and we had it stacked in there well above the waterline. I'd say it was probably 2/3 cords...

I believe you probably had 2/3 of a cord, since you stated wood was stacked well above the top of bed.

Remember in the calculations, that full size truck beds are 4 foot between wheel wells and are 5 foot across the top of bed.  In my photo and calculation one would need to subtract for wheel well area, so I may of had less than 1.4 cords.