splitting 22" rounds of sugar maple

Well, yesterday was the day, and holy cow did they split nicely. I had my brother in law over, and he did the heavy lifting (I offered to help lift them, but he insisted it was just easier to lift by himself). We split the 22 (one was actually 24") rounds EASIER than 12-14" white birch! The yellow birch and maple were definitly the easiest to split, white birch, cherry and shagbark hickory, respectivly. We hade a good day yesterday, split and stacked almost 4 cords for the 09/10 season. Heading back into the woods in march for the rest of next years stash... with the exception of today. I thought I was done for the year, but my father in law informed me this morning that there is a 18" cherry that the farmer that rents his land is going o knock down and push into the woods at the end of the week to lear that area for corn next year... so I'll be going out today after work to remove it for him.

Watch this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNP7QWQ_o0w

only difference is you'd do it from the cut portion of the round, not the side as these guys are.

just cut it in half with a chainsaw make it lighter and easier to handle, if a maul or wedges don't do it for you.

With those big rounds I like to make 2x4s out of them. I split it in half and then split the half in the half again so I have a slab and a round piece. I split the slab into 2x4 type pieces and I use those for building my ends. Those pieces can also be jam packed into the stove, almost like throwing in a solid brick of a log. I had a Butt end of an Oak that I got 37 splits from. Just about killed myself getting it up onto the splitter but youth prevails and I will remember that when my back starts aching in a few years

Top-down splitting seems illogical. It's the inverse of the common wisdom when splitting crotches and rounds with knots. When splitting a Y, you split bottom-down (up?)