So how many of you are total scroungers but DON'T have splitters?

[tickbitty]

I have been noticing some trees down in BIG rounds in nearby neighborhood yards, some that I know are available for the taking (I asked when I saw the tree down in one case), but since I don't have a splitter, I know I couldn't handle these big rounds. They are from like a two foot or 18" trunk and are all bucked up into maybe 18" to 2' rounds. Do all of you who get a major amount of your wood by scrounging have splitters, or do some of you have some other way to get these BIG logs home to hand split?

Just curious. I'm new to this.

 

[smokinj]

If you have a good saw you can noodle them in half or even quarters.

 

[Smokey Bear]

Split them in 1/2 on site with wedges

 

[wood spliter]

If I can't split it I break out the slaedge and wedge. No splitter but myself

 

[Yota1]

noddle into quarters or more, and take home to split bu hand. looking the get a splitter though..............

 

[ckarotka]

Roll them up a ramp. No splitter here. Did almost 4 cord June July august by hand. Just finished a silver maple that was 40". I try to split about 30-45Min a day just before dark. No rush here.

 

[tickbitty]

We are slow splitters, and a lot of the big stuff from our maple taken down last winter is still back there in rounds, so I can't imagine expecting some neighbor to wait around while we ineptly tried to hand split. Now, rolling up the ramps, that's a maybe can do! Noodling also a maybe. I can't work the saw yet very well though. We need practice at a lot of this stuff! Just was wondering whether a splitter is inevitable. But I guess it's not, and that's good! Might as well go through one full season without, then figure out what we need!

 

[ckarotka]

Try splitting the bigger rounds by the edges first, then the middle. Someone else posted a pic like this once so I tried to reproduce what I saw.

 

[mdfer]

I don't have a splitter and will not be buying wood this season. I also do not have a wedge so
it's all by saw & axe. Just like the picture above I work off the edges of the bigger pieces.
There are some I have not been able to split, I have a small stack of those and if someone
begs for free wood that's what I give away, there is not much I haven't been able to get done by hand.

Now I am on the look out for a splitter but funds are tight so it has to be the right deal.

Later on!

 

[okotoks guy]

I've found that with most rounds, I can generally tell if it's worth it to start swinging
the Fiskars.There are some I don't even bother hitting and just noodle them before
I waste a dozen hits and end up noodling anyways.
I think if you cut a LOT of wood(as in primary source of heat)or have an injury then
it's worth it to invest in a splitter.However,for guys like me who only go through 3-4
cords of scrounged wood in a year,then hand splitting is the way to go.I actually enjoy
splitting wood.I'd rather split wood than go to the gym.

 

[formula_pilot]

I split 5 cords of hardwood and 1 1/2 of pine/hemlock by hand this spring/early summer. When blessed with straight grained rounds, a guy can hand split faster than using a hydraulic splitter and its fun! The problem is with the tough, stringy stuff- one round can take 15x as long, and so much effort, makes me wonder why I am doing this at all. I have learned to noodle sooner, rather than struggling with tough stuff- also found that most of the tough rounds can be partially noodled, then they split pretty easy if the axe/maul is aimed right at the kerf- it takes less time than noodling all the way through.

 

[BucksCoBernie]

I use a hand truck and load them up on the trailer. I dont split anything on site. Let the hand truck do the work. Once i loaded up big rounds or cherry, about the same size you mentioned in the OP, and I just backed the trailer up to them (they were on a small hillside) and rolled them onto the trailer. I left them sideways so I just pushed them off of the trailer when i got home. I never lift anything if I dont have to.

 

[SolarAndWood]

A trailer with a low deck is your friend. Lay the round on its side with one of the cut surfaces against the back of the trailer, then dead lift and flip into the trailer. If they are round, I also use the roll/slide up the ramp method. If they were in a neighbor's yard, I would probably use a hand cart.

 

[Wood Duck]

I scrounge all my wood and do not own a splitter. I don't plan to buy one either. Big rounds I either heave into the trunk of my car or split onsite. Mostly I take them home to split if I can move them. I don't think a splitter is necessary, and I don't think it would help at the pickup site anyhow - it seems a lot more likely that I'd break out the maul than tow my splitter to someone's front yard. I like splitting big rounds. Some can be hard to get started, but after the first split or two, they are no more difficult than small rounds.. Chip away at the edges if you can't split them through the middle.

 

[billb3]

I only work my own plot, but I'll roll the big ones and if that doesn't work I bring out the wedges.
I can't swing an axe cuz my back can't take tugging an axe that didn't successfully split.
I've gotten pretty good at moving right along with wedges. I have a couple short and long handled mauls with different weight heads and can work standing up or on my knees. Then just toss splits into a cart or the tractor's bucket.
Or if I'm splitting with the wedges I'll split just most of the way through and pick up a bundle (like some cooks slice an onion) and peel it off and stack.

 

[zzr7ky]

I went years without a splitter. Sledge & Wedge is still my primary way to get rounds into trucl/trailer if they're big. On 2'-3'+ across rounds I lay them down and pop them into a more manageable wieght. Of course we're leaving Poplar and Elm because there's easy to get Ash right now.

Then they get introduced to the splitter.

I do concede that yard or fence row trees are knotty and can be a lot more trouble, but that's where noodling comes in.

ATB,
Mike

 

[basswidow]

I scrounge 100% for 2 years now. I do NOT own a splitter. For rounds too large to lift, I use a sledge and wedge to get them into a size I can lift into my truck. I make a pile back by my shed. I split by hand alot, but if I get a mother load (enough to justify a splitter rental) I go rent a splitter for $ 60. If you rent it on sat morning - you turn it in on monday and it's still only $ 60. I can grind out 4 cords split in a day by myself. Now I wish I had a splitter and I could do my wood more leisurely. It would be nice to have on site to split as you load.

 

[FLINT]

I am a 100% scrounger and my splitter is me plus a maul or fiskars super splitter.

if the rounds are too big to pick up, just half or quarter them (or whatever it takes) and load them that way.

Don't monkey around trying to lift too much - thats a real good way to mess up your back real bad - or get a hernia - either way its definitely not worth it.

this is especially true if you haven't cut any wood in a while.

 

[Bspring]

No splitter for us. My neighbor has one but I have never used it. I asked him about it one day and was told that a man under 50 should not need one. I guess if I ever get one I will have to keep it hidden because according to him I have several years to go before I am allowed to use one. No problem, I like to do it by hand.

 

[madrone]

No splitter. Sledge, wedges, couple of mauls. I have resorted to noodling more than once. I have some monster pine rounds with knots all over that I'll be attacking after they dry out a little. I've had good luck with the "slabs around the outside" approach for tough rounds, but I often try to split in half with the wedges first just to see if it'll go.

 

[ChrisNJ]

No splitter here either, was out splitting with my maul this morning before work, great way to get up some sweat. I do have some big oak rounds with lots of knots I am not looking forward to splitting, but I love splitting the Locust.

 

[Slow1]

No splitter here other than the fiskars

Larger rounds are generally easier as a whole than some of the smaller ones in my opinion - unless of course you get a knot in there. Sure there are more hits involved in the first few pieces but you get a lot more wood out of the piece for your work! I did some logs last winter that the base of the trees were around 30" (barely able to get cut with my saw working from both sides). It was something else to split that oak - took the edges off like in the picture above, then made planks - tried for 3-4" each, then broke those into rectangles. Each of those big rounds more than filled my wheelbarrow which was quite nice. And having most of the pieces being nice rectangles for stacking was a great bonus too.

That was also the stack of wood where I finally learned to split the rounds where they landed after cutting. No more of the "cut, move to a pile, then split somewhere else" routine.

As to scrounging larger rounds - I have gone onsite with my fiskars and split on site to get them loaded. Did one pickup recently where I had a deadline to get the wood moved and had help loading the truck. I went there and was splitting like a madman to half or quarter pieces while a couple buddies (who don't split wood but are nice enough to help load) loaded pieces they could lift. That was quite a site for the homeowner I'm sure.

 

[gzecc]

The biggist knarliest wood will be last to be taken by the smartest scroungers. First to go are the <10" straight grain rounds, then the larger straight grain. I won't take the big twisted stuff. If it ends up in my yard from free drop offs, I will nibble at them with noodling, and edge splitting. Sometimes it ends up as a chopping block.

 

[madrone]

Sometimes it ends up as a chopping block.

Ha! I just swapped out my old knotty chopping block for one that was worse. Old one was finally tenderized enough to split.

 

[Slow1]

Sometimes it ends up as a chopping block.

Ha! I just swapped out my old knotty chopping block for one that was worse. Old one was finally tenderized enough to split.

I have a few too many chopping blocks at the moment.... a few are going to have to go this fall one way or another