I spent a couple of hours this morning splitting wood. It's frozen of course and it split easier than normal. It was Chestnut Oak and Red Oak. It split more cleanly with less strings holding the peices together, and poped apart with one swing of the maul.
Splitting frozen wood
- Thread starter Pine Knot
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I split some oak over the weekend and will be back at it this evening and look forward to it popping apart.
lol Nothing like burying a maul and having to work to get it out! When it's frozen though it's all good!
lol Nothing like burying a maul and having to work to get it out! When it's frozen though it's all good!
Ummm . . . frozen or not, your maul shouldn't stick in Oak . . . Wait!! You one of those guys using an axe to plit wood?? :sick:
I Made Fire! said:
Do NOT attempt to split knots nor crotches. You'll wear yerself out, and they burn hot and hard so don't waste 'um.
I had some twisted-grain, knotty pieces f White Oak left over from this fall, and tried again to split them this week. They were frozen solid and I was able to split them this time. They didn't exactly pop apart, but i was able to split them after a few whack, whereas this summer I couldn't split them at all.
I was splitting some frozen honey locust the other day np, but a single hit on a frozen green piece of white pine and the pine shattered like a block of ice :-O I will wait for it to thaw before I try the pine again as about 20 little pieces littered the driveway from the part I hit.
Tips and tricks with knots and stuff... They won't split cleanly anyway. Cut them into shorts and burn them in the shoulders.
Matt
Matt
Just read somewhere that it's a myth that frozen wood splits easier. They tested both methods and found no measurable difference.
Which has actually been my own experience....
...not!
Must have tested with a mechanical (slow and powerful) splitter. But with a maul or axe (ya, I'm an axe man), frozen wood's the way to go.
Which has actually been my own experience....
...not!
Must have tested with a mechanical (slow and powerful) splitter. But with a maul or axe (ya, I'm an axe man), frozen wood's the way to go.
EatenByLimestone said:
If I encounter a tough knot, I put the round or split on its side and hit the center of the know with my Fiskars. It works.
I was out the last couple 3 days processing standing dead. All split real easy because they were frozen but I'm just doing the easy takes...8" diameter and smaller, no elm that I could ID anyway bark was off.
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