splitting wedge sharpness

[Hasufel]

There should really be no reason that your are needing splitting wedges on a regular basis unless you are feeding super long splits into an outdoor boiler.

That's actually a very good point. I hardly ever use mine anymore thanks to changes in my equipment and technique. My Fiskars can handle rounds that my old maul just bounced off of, and I learned to nibble away at the edge of larger rounds that don't split easily down the center. I sometimes use a wedge on a gnarly round but, now that I have a surplus of wood, it's easier to just pass on a difficult round and move on to the next.

 

[CentralVAWoodHeat]

That's actually a very good point. I hardly ever use mine anymore thanks to changes in my equipment and technique. My Fiskars can handle rounds that my old maul just bounced off of, and I learned to nibble away at the edge of larger rounds that don't split easily down the center. I sometimes use a wedge on a gnarly round but, now that I have a surplus of wood, it's easier to just pass on a difficult round and move on to the next.

Thanks! Also, splitting wedges are extremely dangerous to use. The amount of metal shards that fly everywhere when you are pounding them in with a sledge is really disconcerting.

 

[Vikestand]

I use wedges all the time still. To say there is no need is silly. I split by hand some rounds in the woods that are too heavy to lift on my trailer. I'm not a little guy, 6' 225, so these rounds are fairly significant. Plus on my brothers and i's place south of here we have 70 acres. No splitter. So it's all by hand. Nothing but oaks and elms.

 

[heavy hammer]

I love using my wedges. When you come across three to four plus foot oak I don't care what you have if splitting by hand a wedge is almost always needed. Just depends on the animal your taking on.

 

[barmstrong2]

I have four splitting wedges that I never use. Every year there are about 3-5 rounds that cannot be reasonably split by hand. I pile them up and, every five years or so, toss them on a hydraulic splitter that my neighbor has. If I didn't do this, I would simply throw them back in the woods to rot.

There should really be no reason that your are needing splitting wedges on a regular basis unless you are feeding super long splits into an outdoor boiler.

I've graduated to the school of Work Smart from Work Hard. I split most of my wood by hand. If it won't split with reasonable ease with a maul, I'll use the wedge. If it still wants to be stubborn (pronounced ELM) it gets thrown into the hydro pile for the end.

 

[Hasufel]

I love using my wedges. When you come across three to four plus foot oak I don't care what you have if splitting by hand a wedge is almost always needed. Just depends on the animal your taking on.

I defer to guys like you & @Vikestand on big league stuff! But for the more "normal" 18"-24" hardwoods around here, I've found I can do without wedges almost entirely. I split 100% by hand--including some ornery stuff like hickory--and used to use a wedge automatically to make the first split on the bigger rounds, but changed once I realized I had better/easier options...

 

[jetsam]

I've had the same set of splitting wedges for 30 years- they're old fashioned steel ones.

I have sharpened two of them once in 30 years - recently- because I paid a tree service to drop a truckload of red oak, and one of those giant trees is making me wish for some nice easy elm to split. It is amazing (and the wood is beautiful inside, I have never seen such a gnarly oak).

I put a sharp edge on both of them, and it did make it easier to start them in on the really dense/gnarly rounds.

For normal use, I'd say that a sharp wedge works exactly the same as a blunt one.

 

[Jags]

So would you recommend that I blunt the tip even more?

No. There is a point of dimishing return. Point being that you want the wedge to follow the natural grain not bite in.

 

[wdb]

First post. I registered just to respond to this thread. I recently had an ancient oak die from a lightning strike. The base is 4 to 5 feet across, and judging on what I've split so far the tree lived a hard life. It is one gnarly old piece. Anyway I have but one wedge (of 4) that will come anywhere near starting a crack in the big rounds and it is an ancient thing, possibly as old as the tree. It's rolled over on top with big hunks missing. My newer ones all have the 'problem' discussed here, namely their initial angle is too steep. I have been searching for a replacement narrow angle wedge and not finding one. Instead I found this site and all of you fine folks.

Apologies for waking an oldish thread but the exchange was illuminating. Thank you all. In the morning I will get to work with the grinder.

 

[Hasufel]

First post. I registered just to respond to this thread. I recently had an ancient oak die from a lightning strike. The base is 4 to 5 feet across, and judging on what I've split so far the tree lived a hard life. It is one gnarly old piece. Anyway I have but one wedge (of 4) that will come anywhere near starting a crack in the big rounds and it is an ancient thing, possibly as old as the tree. It's rolled over on top with big hunks missing. My newer ones all have the 'problem' discussed here, namely their initial angle is too steep. I have been searching for a replacement narrow angle wedge and not finding one. Instead I found this site and all of you fine folks.

Apologies for waking an oldish thread but the exchange was illuminating. Thank you all. In the morning I will get to work with the grinder.

I ended up having to "wedge & sledge" some particularly dense oak...not as big as yours but tough stuff nevertheless. The grenades I mentioned in post #8 worked well for the most part. I used two but a third probably would have helped. Those particular grenades have a fairly small point that really helped them dig in initially. A couple of times, however, they actually started bouncing out because of how ornery these rounds were. In those cases I had better luck using them along the side of the round rather than the face; sometimes that was the only way I could make any progress. I have more traditional wedges, too, but they don't work well for starting a split, only for enlarging one that the grenades started. I also noodled some rounds but I think I could have split them once I had settled on a good technique.

 

[Jeffm1]

How sharp should the tip be? Should the tip be ground to the same angle as the body of the wedge? How does anybody know for sure what the ideal angles are?

Sharp enough so it will stick in and stay before you start swinging away. No need to overthink it.

 

[Jeffm1]

That's actually a very good point. I hardly ever use mine anymore thanks to changes in my equipment and technique. My Fiskars can handle rounds that my old maul just bounced off of, and I learned to nibble away at the edge of larger rounds that don't split easily down the center. I sometimes use a wedge on a gnarly round but, now that I have a surplus of wood, it's easier to just pass on a difficult round and move on to the next.

Fiskars are awesome

 

[Tar12]

I haven't touched a wedge to split a tough round since I discovered what H.P. and full chisel chain will do.So much faster and easier on the body.

 

[wdb]

Grinding helped but I will have to do still more to before it will match the 'skinny' one and not simply bounce out.

To the fellow who said "get a bigger hammer" I admired your muscle, please do stop by with that 20 pounder and I promise you plenty of chance to use it.

Does anyone have experience with a Stihl twisted wedge?

https://www.stihlusa.com/products/chain-saws/wedges/tswedge/