Finally found a Tri-Axle load!

He was quite adept indeed with that grapple (or whatever the right term is).
He laid them right in a slot without knocking over that little tree.
This was the right occasion for a gratuity, for sure, in my opinion.
I wonder if it would be possible to move that little tree? It's pretty straight but I'm not sure i'd be able to dig it out enough where it would live. I wonder what kind of tree it is-somebody told me ash.

best time is when it is dormant. The root ball should be at the same depth at its new location as it is now. For the 1st 2 years after moving keep it well watered. Try to keep of the root ball intact to help prevent shock. So, yes it can be moved relatively easy.
Especially if you hire a landscaping company to come in with a tree spade, pretty neat equipment. Dont think you would need one as big as these:

http://www.optimaltreespades.com/

velvetfoot said:

He was quite adept indeed with that grapple (or whatever the right term is).
He laid them right in a slot without knocking over that little tree.
This was the right occasion for a gratuity, for sure, in my opinion.
I wonder if it would be possible to move that little tree? It's pretty straight but I'm not sure i'd be able to dig it out enough where it would live. I wonder what kind of tree it is-somebody told me ash.

Click to expand...

velvetfoot said:

He was quite adept indeed with that grapple (or whatever the right term is).
He laid them right in a slot without knocking over that little tree.
This was the right occasion for a gratuity, for sure, in my opinion.
I wonder if it would be possible to move that little tree? It's pretty straight but I'm not sure i'd be able to dig it out enough where it would live. I wonder what kind of tree it is-somebody told me ash.

Click to expand...

Those two little trees on either side and in front of your nice looking load look like beech to me. Its typical for them to still be hanging on to their leaves at this time of year, plus they are later growers in a woodland progression, typically showing up about the stage of woodland growth you have there.

I'll second the beech vote but I am no expert. They are good self seeders in my woodlot. Great firewood. It has very interesting silver smooth bark. If you grow it in the open it will really spread and take up a lot of space. That may not be a good thing.

Thanks for the tree id.
The next thing I'm thinking about (probably for a while at my rate) is how to attack the pile of wood.
I'm thinking from the top down.
The logs are leaning against trees on both sides.

velvetfoot said:

Thanks for the tree id.
The next thing I'm thinking about (probably for a while at my rate) is how to attack the pile of wood.
I'm thinking from the top down.
The logs are leaning against trees on both sides.

Click to expand...

Hey VF i take a chain and wrap it around the log and pull it out of the pile with pick up truck.

Thanks Bud, but I don't have a pickup. For a come-along, I don't have anything to attach it to.

Those are beech saplings. Probably not worth moving, but that's obviously a subjective judgment. Beech is susceptible to a bark scale disease that makes its future prospects rather questionable. But it's great firewood--about all I burn.

velvetfoot said:

Thanks Bud, but I don't have a pickup. For a come-along, I don't have anything to attach it to.

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That's when friend's come in to play,two case's of beer and burger's should do it. ;-P

I think pulling them off the top with a chain and a truck would be the easiest. Maybe rent one H.D or lowes.

Dumped loads are actually easier to work with since the ends are all poking out of the pile randomly and you can start at one end and work your way through the pile.

With piled loads, you need a cant hook or a big iron pry bar to knock the ones from the top down to the ground so you can cut them up more easily.

Just start at the bottom of the pile, working on individual logs or small groups of logs until you undermine the pile enough so that it collapses, preferably with you standing at a safe distance. That's where the pry bar or cant hook comes in handy.

When cutting logs sitting on bare ground, start cutting blocks about 3/4 of the way through from the top, then roll the logs with a cant hook, pry bar or by kicking them, and then cut through the remaining 1/4 of the log from the top, and with the top of the bar. That way you can keep your chain sharp longer. If you eyeball or actually measure each log, you can (theoretically) divide it up into equal pieces that are close enough to your target length, without leaving odd-ball shaped pieces behind. That was always my goal when I cut delivered loads, but it rarely worked out very well.

Good luck, velvet. No better way to spend a cold spring in the Adirondacks than cutting firewood, IMO.

Yeah, thanks Eric-too bad it's going to get covered in snow tonight.

The pile will look a lot bigger with a foot of snow on it.

I used to like to get tri-axle loads dumped at the end of my driveway in the middle of the winter when I lived in Old Forge. The plow guy would come by after I was all done and in the process of plowing the snow out of my driveway, shove most of the sawdust and other other crap back out of the way. And I didn't have to worry about raking it all up until the following spring. Of course, it took the snow and ice under the sawdust forever to melt. That's always a good excuse for putting it off.

What I did with my log pile for the most part was to VERY carefully climb around near and on it, cutting rounds off any logs that were sticking out or easy to get at. Always went up first without the saw and made sure I could get good footing on logs that weren't going anyplace, planned where the cut off peices were going to fall, etc. This would let me get the logs down to a size that was reasonable to yank off the pile and finish cutting.

My usual routine was to cut one tank of gas worth of rounds, haul them over to the splitting area and split them, then go back for another tanks worth - it kept the area reasonably free of clutter.

I used a mix of the "partial cut and roll the log" method, and a "timber jack" - essentially a cant hook with a stand, grab the log about in the middle, roll it back and up onto the stand, found it worked pretty well.

I have to get my load for this year, and may have a deal - The next door neighbor claims to have a buddy with a tree service that will bring a tri-axle of what I'm guessing are probably "yard trees" that he's taken down, for $35.00 :exclaim: Mostly swamp maple and other less than ideal wood, but at that price you can't complain! If that doesn't work, I can find several places that will get me a load for about $300-350, or at least that was the rate last year.

Gooserider

Another thing that works pretty well for handling logs is an old pair of ice tongs. They allow you to straddle the log and lift one end straight up. That's handy for lots of things, including lifting the log so you can put something underneath one end and get it up off the ground. It's also nice for grabbing big blocks that have fallen into a place that's not easy (or safe) to reach into.

I'm like you, Goose--I always go after the low-hanging fruit first.

I envy some of the folks that can scrounge, and I'm sure we could here as well, but the only vehicle we have is the GF's minivan. It can't safely carry enough wood per load to be really worth while, not to mention what it would do to the interior, plus she is using it most of the time to go to work... I'm already blowing a good bunch of the money we save on the gas bill by getting PPE, and other processing stuff, which isn't bad, but we certainly can't justify trying to get a vehicle to scrounge with. (or trying to set the minivan up with a trailer, which really wouldn't allow us to carry that much safely)

Thus I cut some off our property every year, either thinning out the scrappy stuff or some of the old half rotted maples, and get the rest of a load of log length.

Gooserider

Would it pay to spray down the logs with a garden hose in an attempt to remove some of the dirt? Not much is on it, but some.

velvetfoot said:

Would it pay to spray down the logs with a garden hose in an attempt to remove some of the dirt? Not much is on it, but some.

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It probably wouldn't hurt, but I don't know that it would make that much difference. From what I've seen a lot of the dirt is splashed up from rain, and as such I'd wonder if you'd get as much splashed up from the hose as you'd wash off...

My impression is that a small amount of dirt won't make a big difference in how sharp the chain stays. What the "avoid dirt" folks are more concerned about are the logs that got dropped in the squishy stuff and end up looking like they were cement coated... Even then I don't think the usual response is to hose the log down, it's more like "try to scrape the worst off".

I continue to be amazed at how sharp these "Power Care" generic chains I got from Home Despot are staying. I've got one chain on the saw now that has had seven or eight tanks of gas through it, and it's STILL cutting like it was when new (which is better than the Oregon chain ever did!) This is without filing, or doing anything else to the chain, and despite several minor groundings! I keep looking at it thinking I ought to swap it out, but it keeps throwing big chips and cutting well, so why mess with it?

Gooserider

You'd think that washing would work, but it doesn't.

EatenByLimestone said:

Goose,

When you do get around to sharpening them, let us know if it's been heat treated to the point a file skates off it without actually filing. It would be interesting to know if the future of chains will be the same as handsaws.

Matt

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Will keep you posted, but won't be filing them - I got one of those cheapo $40 chain sharpening machines from HF this winter - :coolsmile: Figure at the price if it lasts for half a dozen sharpenings it will have paid for itself, plus I can use it to take the rakers down as well if I need to. (the local shops don't, all they do is hit the cutters...)

Gooserider

Status Report: No pictures yet but pile is very nearly all split.
There will be some lessons learned for sure.
-One could be that while big, high piles of splits may look impressive, it takes a finite amount of effort to throw all that wood-perhaps splitting a quantity and then stacking periodically would be better, but I'm still not sure how I'm going to stack it so, I guess that's that.
-Another might be to somehow locate the splitter as close to the rounds as possible.
-A third might be to cut up some rounds, then split, then stack.