YOUVE GOT TO BE KIDDING

http://cgi.ebay.com/THE-STICKLER-VE...ryZ57111QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

seem like a death trap to me look on you tube and you can see them in action

LOL
Ja, they were all the rage back in the 70's. I had a former neighbor that used one on his tractor PTO. I tried it out and went back to splitting with an axe.

I can remember when they were advertised on TV. Back then I use to split by hand but I'm pretty good at spotting a possible clusterF so I passed on the stickler.

I guess they don't call it "The Stickler" for nothing.

No they aren't kidding... This is a recurring item that pops up as a thread here every 3-6 months (use the search to find the previous iterations)

Yes, it does work

Yes, it is highly dangerous!

Yes, we usually see the thread rapidly degenerate into rude remarks about the conjectured injuries incurred by the fact that it is usually mounted at a height suitable for backing into, or using ones legs to push the logs onto it...

It gets old...

Gooserider

Not to mention the redicilous price $220.

Hey, they need it to pay for all the lawyers that defend them in injury suit litigation.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YH5Yd-9ymtk

In action

I can hand-split a lot faster than that thing. For all the bending and moving of rounds it doesn't seem any easier than hand splitting, either.

The hands-free BobCat version at least looks safe to use.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eugC6YXK9fQ

That'll be in the next Saw movie...

Well I saw the video Big Red posted and on that page they had the 'HyCrack' version too. Have to admit they came a long way since I first saw them mounted to the hubs of car. Anyway the last 2 videos I saw where the stickler had a metal plate to rest the log on...well that's not half bad. Not for me cause you can't work keeping your back straight and you're up and down all the time but all in all it's been improved.

My main criticism is that you'd be crazy to wear gloves using the stickler and I MUST wear gloves if I'm handling wood.

I think its funny that they advertise it as the best all around method of splitting. I would be curious to see a conparison of injurys per year compared to hand splitting and hydrolic splitting.

No data at all on "stickler" injuries, and just guessing on the other stuff, but I would expect that hydraulic injuries would be fewer in number, but possibly more severe than hand splitting... I know that I've never had a serious injury doing either sort of splitting, but I've probably had a lot more of the <SWEAR MIGHTILY> sort of injuries from hand splitting...

Trying to break it down by class -

Wood moving related - should be about the same - you have to move the wood no matter how you split it...

Flying splits - again about the same, except that I find they are much more predictable on the hydraulic splitter - straight out from the sides of the wedge, 99.9% of the time. As long as you can stay out of that area, minimal injury risk.

No flying wedges on hydraulic.

The wedge on a hydraulic travels in a very restricted and predictable path - if you get a body part in the way it will do MAJOR damage (we've had some recent cases here...) but it is probably much easier to keep the body parts out of the way...

With hand splitting you have some level of concern with mis-strikes, bounces, and other problems w/ heavy pointy things...

The other issue is RSI type injuries - I know I got doctor's orders to switch from hand splitting to using a splitter, because my elbow was going out on me - hydraulic splitters tend to avoid a good bit of that entire class of injury...

Gooserider

I think he was talking about the "Stickler" vs hand splitting and hydraulic splitting combined.