It's a good start

[LLigetfa]

Taking my time at bucking up the 12 cord... don't want to overdo it. Certainly not in the shape I was in when I worked construction.

I think I'm about half done. What do you think?

Here's the before picture of the 12 cord.

and here's what it looks like today.

Here are a couple of different angles.

 

[stejus]

Now that's a ton of wood. How much in total? I saw you said 12 cord, is this right?

 

[prairiefire]

looks awesome!! something about a stack of wood that makes you feel like you got something accomplished!! i noticed your pile of smaller diameter rounds to the left in the picture what do you do with it? split it ? kindling? use it as is ?nice work

 

[Brian VT]

To heck with stacking rounds. Stack it when it's split.
I know...you just want to run the saw.

 

[LLigetfa]

i noticed your pile of smaller diameter rounds to the left in the picture what do you do with it? split it ?

I split everything that can be split.

I just toss the smaller rounds cuz they are light enough to pick back up reaching and pulling apart the pile when it's time to split it. The larger rounds I stack to make them easier to lift the heavy rounds without over-reaching. There's nothing worse than trying to pull a heavy round off a precarious pile.

I run my splitter in horizontal mode so moving the heavy rounds from the stack to the beam is easier than picking them up off the ground. I put the biggest rounds on the bottom of the stack and drag those to the splitter in vertical mode.

 

[prairiefire]

i generally split everything that can be split too, most of my bigger rounds are the size of your small rounds i'm jealous. most of the bigger stuff around here is on the outer perimeter of peoples yardsites used as windbreaks not very often do they want to part with it. i mostly burn poplar because that's what i can get.

 

[North of 60]

Looks like money in the bank. Good effort Man. We have got to much snow this year to get to my piles of logs in the lower field. It would give me a chance to utilize my heated hand grips on the old 266.
Iam jealous.

 

[savageactor7]

Yup looks like your halfway done LLigetfa...perfect time to be doing that too. Do you think it'll be split by the end of March?

 

[Wet1]

Very nice!

How are you getting those logs down from the top? Looks a little dangerous if you're doing it by hand...

 

[fyrwoodguy]

is that a p100 partner your bucking with?

 

[Wet1]

I don't think it is based on that small picture.

 

[Lanningjw]

Can I aske you "what is your process" for cutting all this wood. I see in the pic that you have a 2 wheeler and the saw horses. Can you descibe how you do this job. Jim

 

[LLigetfa]

OK, I'll try to answer all the questions. The saw is a very old Partner R420, 65cc, 4hp.

The hand truck is to move the large bucked rounds. The measuring stick leaning against the pile has notches every 20 inches.

I use a 4 foot iron bar to dislodge the log pile while standing off to the side. The logs topple down onto two perpendicular logs setup as skids so I can buck without risk of hitting the ground with the chain.

The smaller logs (6 inch and under) I lift up into the sawbuck and the larger ones get bucked on the skids. The small stuff I toss in a pile, the bigger stuff I stack neatly for ease of access later. I split everything that can be split.

I will commence splitting once the snow has melted. I have a large piece of paper machine clothing (really strong stiff woven synthetic fabric) that I will put all the splits on to keep them off the ground. I will leave them out uncovered all Summer and move as much as will fit into my shed in the fall. I don't like to sweat so I do the work in the Winter, Spring, and Fall.

There's still some split wood there from last year under that mound of snow that needs to be moved to the shed and I will do that this Spring.

 

[smokinj]

nice system you got going on!

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Good work LLigetfa. You are right that now is a great time to be out there working on the wood; not in the summer. I just got started splitting but have only a couple hours worth done so far. We had a lot of rain over the weekend or I'd have more done.

 

[Lanningjw]

Thanks for showing, I am gonna have a bunch of this type of work coming up soon, but have never done it on this large of scale. How do you use the messuring stick for making your cuts. I am a city guy and this stuff is cool!
Jim

 

[LLigetfa]

How do you use the messuring stick for making your cuts.

When I tumble down the pile onto the 8 foot long skids, I straighten them all out so that their butts line up and the logs are close together. Essentially since the logs are 8 feet long, I end up with an 8 foot by 8 foot area of logs, on a single layer. I lay the measuring stick somewhere in the middle and use it as a visual guide to score lines every 20 inches with the nose of the bar and then just start bucking. As I buck them, I kick the rounds behind me so I can maintain a firm footing. I usually get about half the logs bucked before I run out of a place to stand and have to put down the saw and move the rounds by hand.

The 8 foot log is never evenly divisible by 20 inches so I kinda split the difference as I go, stealing an inch or so here and there rather than have a short chunk on the end. If the log is much shorter than 8 feet, I end up with a chunk.

When I use the sawbuck though, they all get cut to 20 inches so I end up with more small chunks that way.

 

[begreen]

Whoa. That's enough wood to last me several years. Very impressive! One thing I was wondering was has the log pile ever collapsed or started rolling apart unintentionally? I'd be nervous picking logs off that pile.

 

[LLigetfa]

Right now many of the logs are frozen together and so almost seem to defy gravity. I will not work under it when it is as precarious as you see in the second pic. I deliberately left it like that as we're expecting 10 inches of snow today and tomorrow so when I do tumble it down, much of the snow will be shaken off.

I NEVER climb the pile. I don't stand in front of it while trying to knock it down. I stand beside it to pry with the 4 foot iron bar and maintain an escape plan. I use the bar in such a way that a moving log won't "take" the bar and I am never at risk of losing control of it. It's much safer than using a cant hook, pickaroon, or pulp hook as they tend to hang onto the log and one might foolishly not let go of the tool.

 

[karri0n]

LLi,


You're a pro in my book.

 

[LLigetfa]

The wife was out snapping pics. Here's one of the wood processing area after the snowfall. There was a lot of drifting so the wind blew most of the snow off the tops of the piles and stack.

I busted my snow thrower cleaning it up and lost a bunch of bucking time fixing it. Then I busted my recoil and lost more time fixing that. Also had to take some time to pull the snow of my woodshed's metal roof an clear that away with the snow thrower. Didn't get a whole lot of bucking done.

Anyway, the wife did manage to get some evidence that I DID do some work yesterday. It got warm enough yesterday to work in a T-shirt. I did get a lot more done after this pic so the pile is about half of what you see here.

 

[jadm]

I am envious. Such a nice work space to keep everything in order. Simple tools to do the job with ease and efficiency.

Hard work that is 'real' - it will produce heat to keep you warm....so many jobs, my husbands in particular, are filled with time consuming paper work that is absolutely useless because nobody ever reads it and it takes hours to do....wasted energy. Your energy is not wasted but rewarded. You are a lucky man.

Wish I was 30 years younger and could still do that kind of physical work..

Thanks for the pictures. I will show them to my son when he gets up. Maybe someday he will benefit from your experience.....you know what they say, a picture is worth a thousand words.

 

[LLigetfa]

Wish I was 30 years younger and could still do that kind of physical work..

I wish I was 30 years younger too when I could do ten times as much work, go bar hopping until closing, and do it all again the next day. Now I work with computers and networks all day.

This is just my exercise program and hobby. I can certainly afford to heat with gas if I wanted to.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Yes, to be 30 years younger sometimes would help. It's not that us older folks can't do it any more, it is just that we don't work as hard nor as long...but we do get the job done. Or as I tell folks, "When there is snow on the roof, there is still fire in the furnace!"

My splitting job won't be quite as large as I cut only around 7 cords or so, I'll know when it is all stacked just how much was cut this winter. But it will take me some time to finish. Naturally, I hurt my back the last time out cutting so that so far I've only spent mostly an hour to a time splitting. But, that's fast enough to still give the exercise.

 

[LLigetfa]

I have all 12 cord bucked up now and just waiting for the snow to melt before I start splitting. I only sharpened my chain once about midway through but it could use a touch-up now even though it's still cutting well. I can easily buck up 12 cord on two filings. I used less than 2 gallons of gas and less than a half gallon of chain oil.

Next I'm going to keep track of how much gas my splitter uses as it has quite the thirst. A lot has to do with the fact I work alone so there's a lot of time it's just moving the oil at max RPM while I'm getting the next round or clearing away the splits. The throttle should be controlled by the hydraulic lever so that it could idle down when not working instead of always running flat out.