Northern Electric Splitter

[karl]

I lucked out today. I hope. I was driving home from Florida and stopped to get something to eat and at the end of the exit was a Northern Tool store. We don't have one locally. I have been eyeing their 5 ton electric splitter for 299.00. I was torn between it and the 4 ton one that Harbor Freight has for 299.00. Harbor Freight is a local store so I don't have to pay shipping. It was winning out because I didn't want to pay 100.00 shipping for the Northern one. Anyway, Northern had one in stock and sold it to me 279.00

I plan to do a better report on how it works tomorrow. I would like to show some pic of what it will split but I don't have anyway to host the pics. Maybe someone can help me out with that.

I opened the box when I got home and assembled it. It took me longer to find the right size sockets than it took me to put it together. If I had read the assembly instructions first, that would have just added 5 mins to a 5min job. If you have trouble putting it together then you shouldn't be playing with matches.

It was dark here when I put it together but you know guys are with new toys. I walked around back and grabbed a couple of pieces of wood and carried to the driveway where I have light. These pieces really aren't much of a test. They were 6 to 8 inches in diameter of very well seasoned oak. It popped them before the wedge even went halfway through.

One thing I noticed was that the rammed didn't want to retract all the way when I was done. There is a rubber pad on the bottom of the pusher. This is where it rides on the housing. I could here it kinda squeaking as it returned. I'm going to run it a few times and see if it clears up. If it doesn't, I'm sure a little bit of vasuline on the pad will do the trick. I was suprised at how quiet this thing is. A cordess drill might just be louder.

Tomorrow, I'm going to do some splitting and take some pics and maybe even a video or two. All the wood I have right now was cut last spring. So even though it's in rounds, it's pretty well seasoned or atleast it has gone through some freeze thaw cycles to soften it for splitting.

I'll keep you guys posted.


Karl

 

[karl]

I got the splitter out in daylight and used it. First, I took it back to where my wood pile is and put a piece of wood on it and it wouldn't split it at all. I had a two extension cord run. Wheeled it back to the house and tried it one one extension cord. It worked. I'm pretty impressed with the little thing. I have never used a splitter before so maybe you guys can tell me how good it is from the pictures and videos. I don't know what type of wood I am splitting. I hope someone from here can identify it for me. It appears to be a hardwood. It was cut down last spring and has been laying in my yard since then. It's definately still wet. I put a piece of wood I just split into the splitter sideways to help push a short piece of wood along and water squirted out of it as soon as the ram started pushing it. The wood has been through the freeze and thaw cycles of the winter though.

Attached are some pictures of wood I split. Also the Youtube links of the video are here as well. It did jam up on some of the pieces I split today. I guess I split about a 1/3 of a cord and had four or five pieces jam. Usually I could rotate them 90 degrees and then they would split. A few just wouldn't go. This thing does not like knots.

Also, one of the pieces I split on the video went right through the first time, but when I tried to split one of the halves of it into quarters it jammed and need to be rotated.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zItQD-8QDts
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0Co22jfCJM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TYa918ma_Y8



Anyway, tell me what you think of it and what type of wood it is.


Karl

 

[Gooserider]

I need to find out why my YouTube setup isn't working right, couldn't get the videos to load - however it seemed to be giving problems on other videos on the site so it wasn't your stuff...

At any rate, I'd guess either Oak or Maple on the round in the picture. Does it have a smell when you split it? I am finding that even after sitting all winter, my red oak rounds are still very strongly scented and colored when I split them. Maple has an odor as well, but it's much gentler, and just sort of generally "woody" Oak (at least red oak) has a very strong odor that I can only call "oaky" but it's hard to miss even from a few feet away.

Gooserider

 

[karl]

Theres not much smell to them but they do have a redish tint on the ends, kinda like the water in them is leeching out something red.

Here are few better pics

 

[DiscoInferno]

Wow, those really pop apart, don't they! The bark and the easy splitting makes me think ash, although I don't know about the red color. My ash has always been pure white. Or maybe poplar? Does not look like any oak or maple I've seen. If you burn some and it smells sort of like vanilla, it's ash. If it smells terrible, it might be poplar.

 

[karl]

I don't know what it is but I have some pine too. Size for size this stuff is alot heavier.

So what do you think of the splitter. Is it a toy?

 

[Jags]

I think that you have maple in your videos. The clear white color and the bark sure looks that way to me anyhow. Got some ready to be split, just much larger in size (46").

 

[rdrcr56]

Looks like ash to me, put some elm on it if you really want to see what it can do.

 

[My_3_Girls]

I'm going with Ash also - too rough/striated to be any maple I'm familiar with.

 

[carpniels]

The way it splits reminds me of ash too. I cut up an entire tree and there was nothing easier than splitting these large rounds (30"+). I did it with one or 2 blows with an 8# maul. Much easier than the cherry I have been splitting.

Carpniels