I already know everybody says its cheaper to buy one than piece one together. I'm fortunate in my job as purchasing agent for a mining company I have a lot of connections. I started out with an old cylinder sent to our hydraulic repair company to be rebuilt. Well it was beyond repair, sat out in the weather for too long. So he calls and asks what it was going to be for , I tell him a splitter. He calls back and said he had one on the way no charge. I ended up with a new cylinder with a 30" barrel around 5" in diameter. So I'm thinking a 16 GPM two stage pump. Next I sent a couple of old pto pumps from equipment we no longer have, to trade for one I could use. He sent me a brand new Bailey 16 GPM two stage pump. This pump is rated at 3000 PSI at 3600RPM. Well I already got a control valve when we switched all our grease trucks from hydraulic to air operated. The one thing major component I'll have to buy is a motor. The metal will be no problem as I get everything from our suppliers at a big discount or for nothing. Hoses are no problem either, I have a hose machine 30' from my office. Whats everybodys take on a motor. Looking at the specs on the pump it call for a 8 HP. Anything I'm missing. I can weld everything up myself. I'd like to find some plans on the hydraulic circuit. I have a background in electronics, and I'm certified mine electrician, it's easier for me to see how to put it together from a diagram or schematic. Any help would be appreciated from someone who's done this before.
Home built splitter.
- Thread starter RazrRebel
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it is nice to work with a place with connections. I design big rigs and am contemplating designing a splitter. Also am in the works of designing and skinning maching for a friend who is a trapper. The base for my woodburner will also be fabricated in house.
get an old tractor and use the PTO Shaft from it. That way you can set a cart up and load it up. Disconnect the splitter and drag it to the wood shed. Or lay out the spitter on top of the wood hauling cart. All in one unit.
get an old tractor and use the PTO Shaft from it. That way you can set a cart up and load it up. Disconnect the splitter and drag it to the wood shed. Or lay out the spitter on top of the wood hauling cart. All in one unit.
Probably horizontal, I'll be pulling it behind my Polaris Ranger. I was thinking about a piece of 8" square tubing welded up for a hyd. tank, with a set of rear spindles from a front drive car on it for the wheels. The hydraulic circuit is what I need the help with. I know I'll need a filter base, was wondering if I'm missing something.
SolarAndWood
Minister of Fire
I'd be thinking about a multi way wedge to take advantage of that 5" cylinder. A 16 gpm pump isn't going to be super fast with a cylinder that big and the fewer times you touch a round the better.
"Jags, Aisle 3, paging Jags, Aisle 3 for customer assistence."
What's the max flow rating through that? (This will probably be the determining factor of how big a pump you can run. Port sizes on the cylinder and hose size will also play a role but the valve will be in play 100% of the time the machine is running and will likely be the source of the most fluid friction/heat unless the hoses are woefully undersized.)
Think bigger.
Speed! On a 5"x30" cylinder, 16GPM will not be a fast cycle time unless it has an oversize rod. The bigger the rod, the faster the return stroke would be, improving cycle time, but with the typical 2" cylinder rod, it's going to cycle every 18 seconds on a 16 GPM pump. That's ok (on par with some of the slowest commercially sold units) if you are only processing BIG wood with it, but your not going to make any time with the smaller (under 18") rounds. 22 GPM would give you a 13 second cycle time which would be AWESOME on a 5" cylinder. 3000 psi and 22 GPM would yield a 30 ton machine that can handle 30" long rounds with a 13 second (theoretical, reality is likey closer to 15) cycle. You would need a 13 HP motor (or thereabouts, roughy 350-400cc) to power that pump.
http://internationalhydraulicsus.com/logsplitter-speed-calculator/
My Iron & Oak runs similar times and it's plenty fast for a one-man operation. If you have help, the splitter is never fast enough.
(Depends on the help I guess, .... 
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