Splitting by hand

  • Active since 1995, Hearth.com is THE place on the internet for free information and advice about wood stoves, pellet stoves and other energy saving equipment.

    We strive to provide opinions, articles, discussions and history related to Hearth Products and in a more general sense, energy issues.

    We promote the EFFICIENT, RESPONSIBLE, CLEAN and SAFE use of all fuels, whether renewable or fossil.
Status
Not open for further replies.
P

phaywood

New Member
Feb 4, 2014
15
Indiana
I had purchased a rick of split wood last month and I've burned everything except a few rounds that were in the pile. I figured I'd try and split them by hand (I had an old rusty axe in the barn). I had never split wood before but it went smooth. Then I had a few logs that I had stacked in the Fall so I decided to cut a couple of those with the chainsaw and split those. After an hour I had almost a whole rick split! I couldn't believe it went so quickly! I had planned to purchase a log splitter (or at least rent one) in the spring, but now I'm not sure its necessary. I enjoy the exercise and it actually seemed faster than splitting by machine. Is that true?

So I'm wondering how big of rounds I can expect to split by hand. Most of those today were only 8-10" at the largest. I'll also invest in a new axe; everyone here seems to rave about the Fiskar X27. Should I get anything else? A Maul? Wedges? I'm just excited that it actually worked.
 
Yeah, it goes pretty quick if you have some easy-splitting wood. If the rounds are big, you may be able to work around the outside and whittle 'em down that way.
A good arsenal for starters would be a 6# and/or 8# maul, a sledge and some wedges.
 
The biggest I split so far was 54 inches across. I split every thing by hand. Then if I can't split it the saw will. I use a 10 pound maul and when needed 2 wedges. Nothing more than that . I have the next 3 years split and stacked. I split just a little over 4 cord in a week and stacked.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Ralphie Boy
You can split any size round by hand with an X27. Your ancestors accomplished such tasks with axes that were not nearly as good as those produced by Fiskars. With a large round, you should start by splitting from the outside and then gradually whacking it until you get a nice square in the middle for further subdivision. The value of a power splitter has to do with the quantity of wood you are splitting. When I had a large maple tree (40" in diameter at the base) to cut into rounds, I split it by hand for the daily exercise. When my son had the equivalent of 6 cords or so of oak, maple, and cherry to split, I bought a small Harbor Freight electric splitter. Good decision. We did not need anything more powerful, since the diameters of the trees were fairly small.
 
  • Like
Reactions: NoStove
phaywood said:
So I'm wondering how big of rounds I can expect to split by hand.
Click to expand...

The answer is, "it depends."
2012-12-27_11-29-15_789.jpg
 
Last edited by a moderator:
  • Like
Reactions: Driles85 and NoStove
I like splitting by hand which is good since i dont have a splitter. Just more of a sense of accomplishment looking at a cord of freshly split wood you did by hand.
And swinging an axe always gave me time to contemplate the world and clear my head. It's good for the soul.
 
  • Like
Reactions: JASFARMER, Berner, Rebelduckman and 6 others
phaywood said:
So I'm wondering how big of rounds I can expect to split by hand
Click to expand...

Anything I can't split by hand get chainsawed. Having split by hand my entire life I can assure you that while there is some relationship between the diameter of a round and it's difficulty to split, it is not as correlative as you might think.
 
  • Like
Reactions: bob burke
I had some big rounds last year i couldnt lift or split. I discovered if you score the face of the round about 2 inches down in the middle and then use a wedge and sledge hammer it split like a dream (least beech did) and then once i had them in half i could split with a maul easily and I really get a nice chunk of wood in each split that way.
 
  • Like
Reactions: ailanthus
getting-started-early.jpg
Hi guys, just joined the forum as there is some good info here delivered with humor! (we recently moved to Norway,from New Zealand, and are using wood for heating)

I agree about splitting by hand, much better all round. They sell loads of little splitting machines here, but there's nowhere near the satisfaction in my view.

Easy to work around any size round, just make sure they are not too thick. We cut at a foot here and managed the 70 year old Ash (above) easily. I recon on a good day I could beat a splitter too! Esp. using my 'tyre on a log' to stop the logs falling all over the place on chopping.

Never needed a wedge myself but then most of 'our' trees here are babies compared to the ones some of the guys on here chop. This Ash was my biggest ever!
 
  • Like
Reactions: Drvn4wood, Senatormofo, Macpolski and 2 others
HackBerry said:
After swinging a maul for a while you might find your shirts fit a little tighter in the upper back and you have to take up a notch in the belt.
Click to expand...


How much splitting are you doing? I split a lot of wood (10+ cord per year) and by my gorilla math I split 20-25 hours per year which is nowhere near enough to effect my waistline.
 
toasty said:
getting-started-early.jpg
Hi guys, just joined the forum as there is some good info here delivered with humor! (we recently moved to Norway,from New Zealand, and are using wood for heating)

I agree about splitting by hand, much better all round. They sell loads of little splitting machines here, but there's nowhere near the satisfaction in my view.

Easy to work around any size round, just make sure they are not too thick. We cut at a foot here and managed the 70 year old Ash (above) easily. I recon on a good day I could beat a splitter too! Esp. using my 'tyre on a log' to stop the logs falling all over the place on chopping.

Never needed a wedge myself but then most of 'our' trees here are babies compared to the ones some of the guys on here chop. This Ash was my biggest ever!
Click to expand...

Hey good technique! Don't let that blade get too far below your hands and you'll never hit your feet, have to use those knees though. What kind of stove you using in Norway?
 
I split mostly by hand, too. I just got a Pow R Kraft 4 ton splitter yesterday to help deal with some very curvy, full of crotches, plum wood. The wood is made worse by the fact that the guy who cut it down made many diagonal cuts instead of perpendicular to the grain of the branch, like a normal person would.

Previously I've been splitting large douglas fir rounds. Often if they're over around 24" and/or have a few knots in them, I'll use a maul and wedge instead of the Fiskars. The Fiskars does very well on easier to split rounds, though, and I highly recommend it. The Fiskars does not do well on rounds where the grain of the wood isn't very straight. For example, knots, crotches or pieces near the stump where the top and bottom of the round are different size.
 
I tried the old car tire on the ground trick for the first time today. I took down an ash in the yard - maybe 15" DBH - and split the rounds right inside the tire. Of course it's ash so it was easy splitting for the most part - but that tire made the job a whole lot easier. Bout the hardest part was yanking the splits from the biggest rounds out of the tire when I was done.
Gotta get a piece of plywood for underneath it too - that Fiskars goes right through and keeps on going - tire or no tire.
 
  • Like
Reactions: toasty
BEConklin said:
I tried the old car tire on the ground trick for the first time today. I took down an ash in the yard - maybe 15" DBH - and split the rounds right inside the tire. Of course it's ash so it was easy splitting for the most part - but that tire made the job a whole lot easier. Bout the hardest part was yanking the splits from the biggest rounds out of the tire when I was done.
Gotta get a piece of plywood for underneath it too - that Fiskars goes right through and keeps on going - tire or no tire.
Click to expand...

I recently started using a tire, too. Got a 19" rim tire from Discount Tire. They have a bin outside the shop that they leave tires in, the manager told me they don't lock it and feel free to come by after they're closed and grab one. For some reason they don't want people going through it during business hours. Anyway, I bolted my tired to a large round I use for splitting. I found without the bolts, the tire slid all over the place and fell off the stump a few times. The tire is a great idea.
 
  • Like
Reactions: toasty
jatoxico said:
Hey good technique! Don't let that blade get too far below your hands and you'll never hit your feet, have to use those knees though. What kind of stove you using in Norway?
Click to expand...

*laughing* I told him that he should stick to the kindling! It's probably not a 'proper' serious stove compared to what you guys need but it's a Danish one, the TT22S from TermaTech, let me see if I can find the pic.... yup, here. It weighs in at 460lbs and within an hour all the living space is up to 26 degrees... at least the open window means the fire gets plenty of air!
TT22S-wood-stove-from-Termatech-in-Denmark.jpg


p.s. I also had to gasp at the 10 cords in 25 hours... move over superman!
 
Tom Wallace said:
The Fiskars does not do well on rounds where the grain of the wood isn't very straight. For example, knots, crotches or pieces near the stump where the top and bottom of the round are different size.
Click to expand...

That is the trouble with splitting by hand, you really do need straight grain. Can be impossible to split much off anything near a sizable side branch. On the bright side I now have a few oddments of stumps stacked out of sight along the edge of the stream on my bottom plot, that will eventually rot down providing food for the bugs that the birds like... :)
 
I hate splitting wood by hand. I MUCH prefer using an axe. :p;lol


I find it easy to split quite FAST with my X27. But the reality is it is getting to be too much for me lately.

I will be buying a hydraulic this spring though as my tennis elbow is getting to be too painful. :(
Will be a whole new ball game for me with a splitter.
 
toasty said:
*laughing* I told him that he should stick to the kindling! It's probably not a 'proper' serious stove compared to what you guys need but it's a Danish one, the TT22S from TermaTech, let me see if I can find the pic.... yup, here. It weighs in at 460lbs and within an hour all the living space is up to 26 degrees... at least the open window means the fire gets plenty of air!
TT22S-wood-stove-from-Termatech-in-Denmark.jpg


p.s. I also had to gasp at the 10 cords in 25 hours... move over superman!
Click to expand...
That's a nice looking set up.
 
  • Like
Reactions: toasty
CenterTree said:
I hate splitting wood by hand. I MUCH prefer using an axe. :p;lol


I find it easy to split quite FAST with my X27. But the reality is it is getting to be too much for me lately.

I will be buying a hydraulic this spring though as my tennis elbow is getting to be too painful. :(
Will be a whole new ball game for me with a splitter.
Click to expand...

I liked my X27 but also found it hurt my elbow. Got A PA80 from stihl which I like better, and no more elbow pain. My fiskers seemed to like to twist at the end.
 
Bigg_Redd said:
Rilly? It's truly not some amazing achievement. How long does it take you to split a cord?
Click to expand...
I guess I'm underestimating the size of your trees etc and comparing it to my own efforts managing woodland here in Norway. All my wood comes from management, i.e taking out 'sisters' next to large trees, taking out small stuff to open up the canopy, keeping pathways clear etc. And it's nearly always on a damn slope!

I never just get to chop, chop, chop for any length of time. I usually go into the woods, drop the trees, drag them back to the truck. Cut and split and fill the truck. I read that a cord is about 3 and a half cubic meters, let me do the math, how big is the truck bed..... shoot that means that it takes me half a day to do a little over 1/4 of a chord!

Now you see why at first glance it seems like a herculean task! I googled it and of course you are right, in much differing circumstances than my own it's possible but boy, I bet you sleep after that lot!
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Similar threads

nola mike
How to split this devil wood?
Replies
12
Views
789
The Wood Shed
blades
blades
P
Two Year Old Eastern Hophornbeam
Replies
4
Views
1K
The Wood Shed
snojetter
snojetter
Dajolu
How to Keep Oak Rounds from rotting
Replies
19
Views
1K
The Wood Shed
Caw
Caw
D
Free scrounge but should I take it?
Replies
16
Views
2K
The Wood Shed
sneefy
sneefy
T
Prunus Avium or Betula Lenta?
Replies
9
Views
943
The Wood Shed
Toasty-Yote
T
Top Bottom
Back