I run a homemade splitter with a four inch two inch rod cylinder. 28GPM two stage pump valve set at 2800PSI. I buck all my wood up a head of splitting time. Only split locust and hedge. Trailers hold three to four full cord. Crew is three guys two over sixty one almost sixty. Have a skid loader with bucket on site to push up the bucked pile closer to the splitter as we go. Splitter has a log lift. Trailer is backed up to the out feed of the splitter and we load and stack from the splitter into the trailer. We can do a three to four cord trailer in a eight to ten hour day and that includes two to three hours travel, set up, tear down, breaks and lunch time. I feel pretty good at the end of the day when I am backing in 1/5 of my years woods supply into the shed. We aren't breaking any speed records but the grass isn't growing under our feet either.
Time required to split a cord
- Thread starter neverbilly
- Start date
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Ashful
Minister of Fire
If it wouldn't be too much trouble, I'd really appreciate getting some data from your rig:
1. Port and line sizes on cylinder. If you don't know, you can estimate NPT fittings by measuring OD and subtracting 1/4".
2. Port and line sizes on suction line from reservoir to pump.
3. Your full round-trip cycle time, 24" down + 24" up.
Thanks!
This splitter was put together probably twenty years ago. The cylinder had 3/4 NPT ports added to it when it was new. The valve is a detent return with all four ports 3/4 NPT. Suction to pump is one inch. Suction strainer in tank is a Zinga 53 GPM surplus center part number 9-7290-200. Return filter is a Zinga 70 GPM surplus center part number 9-4543. I have never timed the complete stroke time of the cylinder. The splitter is buried in a shed twenty miles from the home place and probably won't be out again running until summer. When I put this set up together I thought about a custom built over sized rod cylinder to speed up the return but the cost was too much. This splitter will work two guys pretty hard to keep up with it. If you watch how you split I don't find the need for a huge dia cylinder. I have 6.5 inch with a five inch rod on my processor and it takes a lot of oil to make it move fast. I actually feed it with two pumps and two valves.
Ashful
Minister of Fire
Agreed, 100%. With regard to force, I find the 4" cylinder is the sweet spot, able to split everything I've ever put to it. I really don't understand the marketing behind 5" and 6" cylinders for one-way wedges, it's just a waste of time and resources.
Did you custom that cylinder to get 3/4" ports on a 4" bore? I've been thinking of drilling and re-welding my own, but there's a lot of opportunity to screw that up.
The cylinder was new with 1/2 inch ports and I just took it apart , cut the 1/2 port off drilled the barrel out and welded on sch 80 3/4 inch pipe nipples on to the cylinder. Back then I didn't even have a tig or mig welder I just stick welded them with 7018 DC rod. Put the cylinder back together with the seals that were in the new cylinder and its never leaked in almost twenty years. I have welded on a lot of hyd cylinders over the years out on the farm and at my off the farm job.
Ashful
Minister of Fire
I think you've convinced me to give it a try. I've disassembled and rebuilt smaller (front end loader) cylinders before, and although I'm no artist with it, I have and use a MIG for lots of implement and trailer repair projects.
Of course, in my case it's more than just the cylinder. I also need to weld a larger bung into the reservoir (Huskee, reservoir is axle), upgrade all of the lines, and the SC valve.
Some days I am no artist either but I can make it work. I am a self taught welder started when I was a kid. Tested out of two welding classes I needed for collage years ago. I just got around mig and tig in about 2002 before that it was stick or gas welding. I have done a ton of sliver soldering in the refrigeration world. Last place I worked before I took early retirement we had a machinist that was a artist when it came to running a tig welder. His welds like like a robot had welded it. He grew up in a machine shop and knew how to build and repair things.
Ashful
Minister of Fire
Same here. Started on stick around age 12, dad's big old 1960's Lincoln AC225 "buzz box", with a copper-wound transformer so heavy I could barely move the thing around the garage by myself. I helped my high school tech and metal class instructors teach the rest of the class how to weld. Switched to flux-core wire welding in my 20's, and then MIG in my 40's.
But I only average one big fabrication project per year, which means my skills are just starting to approach the brag-worthy point about the time the project is finished. By the following year, I feel like I've lost a lot of what I had learned on the prior project(s). Two steps forward, one step back.
I'm not too worried about a leak, I think I'm good enough for that, but I do worry about distorting the cylinder or potential blow-thru. I guess I could manage both by just cutting down the existing port, and welding my new one to that rather than going all the way down to the cylinder and trying to saddle a new port right to the cylinder wall.
Sawset
Minister of Fire
I bet that was fun and memorable. Back home there was a 52 chevy bel Air that I could tinker with. When I took a power/machinery course in college, the other guys struggled, but I'd had that carburetor apart, every pc, and head off and disassembled every pc, 100 times. My dad bought a Lincoln ac225 in 1962. I used it a few times, but I just wasn't old enough. Last year I bought one almost exactly the same.
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Isaac Carlson
Minister of Fire
I converted my splitter to electric last year. 3hp motor and what I believe is an 11gpm pump on a 4x24 cylinder. I also made a slip on 4 way. I can do a face cord in 15 minutes by myself and a full cord in 45 minutes. It's easier and a little faster with a second person and the splitter will keep a stacker very busy. I have not timed it since the conversion.
I have been thinking of going to a smaller cylinder for faster times, because I don't want to overload the motor by going to a bigger pump. It costs pennies to run with near zero maintenance. I have a 100 foot cord on it and that's about the limit for a 3hp motor if you will be putting a load on it.
As for welding on hydraulic cylinders, it's not as hard as it sounds if you are a decent welder.
I have been thinking of going to a smaller cylinder for faster times, because I don't want to overload the motor by going to a bigger pump. It costs pennies to run with near zero maintenance. I have a 100 foot cord on it and that's about the limit for a 3hp motor if you will be putting a load on it.
As for welding on hydraulic cylinders, it's not as hard as it sounds if you are a decent welder.
