how do you cut up pallets?
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firefighterjake
Minister of Fire
ecc_33 said:
Not sure how they would do in a wood burning gassifier . . . but in a stove with secondary burn that still gets mighty hot the nails just drop down into the ash pan or are scooped out with the ash . . . which is why it's generally not a good idea to throw this ash on to the driveway . . . some folks screen out the metal . . . I always just made sure I dumped it into the woods away from any place tires might travel.
HJsimpson
Burning Hunk
I bring them home from work because ours are 36" X 96" or 120" that we recieve our sheet meatl on. The runners are 4 X 4 oak and the slats are 1" by 8" and all oak which is the only oak i have. I use a sawzall to cut between the slats and runners usually only 3 nails per end then chop saw to cut to length with a junk blade and a lot of smoke lol. Takes a little time but sure makes some nice small hot fires.
I use a Sawzall with blades designed to cut metal. A short (4") blade to start with, and a long (10") blade to finish the center of the pallet.
Start by cutting "between" the slats and the stringers on the outer sides of the pallet, on both the top and bottom of the pallet. What you are doing is sawing through the nails that hold the slats to the outer stringers. Do not disassemble the pallet yet. Next cut the slats into three pieces. This will be one cut to the left of the center stringer, and one cut to the right of the center stringer. You should end up with 3 pieces of equal length. Now you can pull out the end stringers and remove all of the outer cut slats. Flip the pallet over at this point, and cut the remaining slats from the other side into thirds.
You will be left with the center stringer with short pieces of what is left of the slats attached, kind of like a fish spine. Using a 10" long blade, cut the slats free from the center stringer by cutting "between" the slat and the stringer (cutting the nails themselves). What you will have at this point is a pile of foot long slats, three full length stringers that need to be cut into thirds, and NO nails sticking out of anywhere.
I burn pallets in a chimnea. Cutting up the pallets in this manner allows me to pack storage bins so full of pallet wood that they are too heavy to lift.
Hope this helps.
-Gary
Start by cutting "between" the slats and the stringers on the outer sides of the pallet, on both the top and bottom of the pallet. What you are doing is sawing through the nails that hold the slats to the outer stringers. Do not disassemble the pallet yet. Next cut the slats into three pieces. This will be one cut to the left of the center stringer, and one cut to the right of the center stringer. You should end up with 3 pieces of equal length. Now you can pull out the end stringers and remove all of the outer cut slats. Flip the pallet over at this point, and cut the remaining slats from the other side into thirds.
You will be left with the center stringer with short pieces of what is left of the slats attached, kind of like a fish spine. Using a 10" long blade, cut the slats free from the center stringer by cutting "between" the slat and the stringer (cutting the nails themselves). What you will have at this point is a pile of foot long slats, three full length stringers that need to be cut into thirds, and NO nails sticking out of anywhere.
I burn pallets in a chimnea. Cutting up the pallets in this manner allows me to pack storage bins so full of pallet wood that they are too heavy to lift.
Hope this helps.
-Gary
HJsimpson said:
I used to use those too!
I used to work at a place that would get usually about 4-5 pallets a week like that. they are AMAZING. sometimes there's 4x4 sides on it too.
They would order whatever they needed to complete the customers order in a single shipment (so for every 1 customer order, there would be 1 shipment incl pallet)
Now I work at a place that manufactures heat exchangers, so they get these big long 20' crates that vary in size from 1'x1' to 4'x4', usually all 1"x6x8" hardwood plus some other random wood holding it together.
I definitely prefer the sheet metal pallets though. Those things are excellent. Ours were usually 4' wide though, not 3'.
I also like pipe shipments, because the companies that load the truckers usually use 4x4s to hold the pipe in place. Then the truckers don't want the wood, so they toss it off the truck before they leave. I scoop those right up
starting next week I'll be loading up the truck + trailer with wood and taking it home. Probably somewhere around 5-10 loads it will take. Obviously many pictures will be taken, and a thread will follow
greythorn3
Minister of Fire
well im swapping out my non cat blaze king for a cat blaze king princess, so will be burning pallet wood in it, guess we will have to see if the cat will be ruined or not, looks decent now, but it is used so who knows.
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