Thread: Winter Firewood take2

Greetings All,
Another year has passed and here we are again gathering firewood for next winter. This year things are going to be a bit different. I was becoming increasingly concerned about the trees along our front boundary. Planted about 30 years ago they had become close to the road and power lines and had escaped my level of competence to fell. So a contractor was engaged to fell the trees and clean up the area. He arrived last Wednesday with an enormous digger with all sorts of attachments and after a little less than four days the job was done, well his job was anyway. Trunks and big branches have been stacked in a big pile ready for me to cut, split and stack. This may take some time.


As you can see my trusty 50 plus year old wheelbarrow is ready with chain saws (out of shot) and splitting axe. My son will help, and take some of the firewood. He has suggested hiring a log splitter and offering to pay for it which should come in handy when we get to the big logs in the bottom of the pile.
Wish me luck. Grandpamac.

if you get a heap ringed up...then hire log splitter for the day....have everything ready to go and THREE people lined up.
one,preferably fit strong fella to place rings on log splitter bench.
two probably you,to operate splitter,turn ring,split,turn split,move split....
three to take split pieces off the tray once you have split them,and chuck them onto pile.
it is way faster with three people....with two the splitter has to stop to chuck wood/clear bench or the lifter has to go around you to other side of bench and clear wood then back past you to place next ring on bench.
once you have used a splitter for a day,you wont go back to axe for any more than the odd ring or six.

As they say, the great thing about firewood is it gets you warm twice, during splitting and during burning! Good luck with the splitting and seasoning, but I'm sure you'll be fine.

I should be getting more wood in too, always somethign else to do though....

Note from a guy with a 100 acre gum forest: ring and split quickly. Or just leave alone till you are ready to ring and split. Ring and wait four months to split and you are in for trouble, 35 tonne hydraulic log splitter no go trouble.
But you'll already know this

Originally Posted by XR500

Note from a guy with a 100 acre gum forest: ring and split quickly. Or just leave alone till you are ready to ring and split. Ring and wait four months to split and you are in for trouble, 35 tonne hydraulic log splitter no go trouble.
But you'll already know this

you should try some old ash....never seen grain like it,looks like the wavy hair on bun of a red setter.one block can have grain running in 4 diferent directions. green or dry makes no diference to how it splits,or wont...

Elm is in the same boat

Originally Posted by XR500

Note from a guy with a 100 acre gum forest: ring and split quickly. Or just leave alone till you are ready to ring and split. Ring and wait four months to split and you are in for trouble, 35 tonne hydraulic log splitter no go trouble.
But you'll already know this

Greetings XR500,
I am cutting all the easy stuff first as it is easy to split. Cut for one tank split stack repeat is the process. Satisfying as well as you see the stack steadily growing, an important thing for an old codger. My son had a run in with a standing dead gum of some sort. Felling and cutting was easy but splitting not at all. Great firewood though.
Regards Grandpamac.

There is an easier and more exciting way to split the stuff, but you don't want neighbours within a couple of km

Originally Posted by hamsav

The last load of gum I scored for free was twisted to buggery and had been down for years ,being a bit green I ringed it all up and dragged it home . Got to splitting the bigger rings (12 - 20 inches dia ) ......I have never had a logsplitter axe bounce back like that ,wound up ripping them all with saw. I put the round on its side and do 2 evenly spaced verticle cuts almost right thru, then turn the round 90deg and do 2 more verticle cuts this time right thru and if you do it right the 2 not right thru cuts can be split open , leaves you with 9 bits of wood . It stacks real good too. We bunch the sawdust up into bags ,it come off the saw in long strands but anyhow stuff the bag of sawdust into the log burner and spark er up .

Greetings Hamsav,
Its the luck of the draw with gum. Some like E Nitens are hard to split even green. The dead tree my son had trouble with which I think was E Fastigata was tough. Another standing dead gum I cut years ago was dead easy to split. There are between 300 and 600 Eucalypt species, depending who you talk to so you are never too sure what will happen next. They all burn pretty well though.
Regards Grandpamac.

Swinging an axe/using a splitter is a lot of double handling for one person

Let the saw do all the work

You need horsepower and a 35 degree cutter with 30 thou deep rakers

The blocks burn through the night easily

Originally Posted by 7mmsaum

Swinging an axe/using a splitter is a lot of double handling for one person

Let the saw do all the work

You need horsepower and a 35 degree cutter with 30 thou deep rakers

The blocks burn through the night easily



Attachment 166596

Greetings 7mmSAUM,
The blue look and spiral nature of the bark suggests your tree may be one of the southern blue gums, quite common in Hawkes Bay. A lot of them are dogs to split. The smaller branches and logs on top of my heap are splitting easily at the moment but I am sure that more drastic means will be needed later.
Regards Grandpamac.

Originally Posted by grandpamac

Greetings 7mmSAUM,
The blue look and spiral nature of the bark suggests your tree may be one of the southern blue gums, quite common in Hawkes Bay. A lot of them are dogs to split. The smaller branches and logs on top of my heap are splitting easily at the moment but I am sure that more drastic means will be needed later.
Regards Grandpamac.

Your right I even no where that tree is.

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Originally Posted by 7mmsaum

Swinging an axe/using a splitter is a lot of double handling for one person

Let the saw do all the work

You need horsepower and a 35 degree cutter with 30 thou deep rakers

The blocks burn through the night easily



Attachment 166596

Some of my gums are a metre plus in dia. They start laughing at me if I approach them with a 62cc saw in my hands. But come at them with the 395 and 36" bar, plus the atom attachment on the 50cc saw and a couple of plugs of jelly, and they start quivering big time

Originally Posted by XR500

Some of my gums are a metre plus in dia. They start laughing at me if I approach them with a 62cc saw in my hands. But come at them with the 395 and 36" bar, plus the atom attachment on the 50cc saw and a couple of plugs of jelly, and they start quivering big time

You got two 395’s?


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One of each: 394 and 395. 394 has slightly more grunt down low than the 395, so teamed up on the 48" double ender bar with 404 semi skip its the berries