Work Done 2025

[NickW]

It's frustrating N. As people get older they are "set in their ways" and any kind of change upsets them. Its hard for your neighbor too because he is realizing how weak he is getting and still wants to be in control. I would back away and share with him that if he needs any help in other aspects of life---you are there...Just back off for awhile and "do by no doing" and see what happens--leave it up to life at this time.and have a good cup of coffee put your feet up and just relax and do what you need to do in your own home. Heck bring a bowl of chili over or something--he will like that and not feel so so alone....I am on your side because I understand "both sides" being "old myself", and waiting for my life to change and what a drag it is to think about it...As one gets older one loses their close friends as they age and this is depressing to say the least especially when you start to review your past and know what a wonderful part of your life they were and just hang back and do what you need to do with your own affairs and do by no doing and see what happens...clancey

Thanks Clancey! That's where I'm at. Keep helping, be supportive, go along with what he wants to do. The roof is coming along and I ran to the dump for him today and helped for awhile. Now he's shingling again and will let me know when he needs more up later. I will stay outside and make sure I can hear him hammering and go check up if it stops for too long. He is really good about taking breaks and hydrating.

 

[thewoodlands]

I moved another face cord (almost) from an area that we had firewood leftover a few years ago, the majority of it is ash.

 

[clancey]

That green tree backdrop is pretty--cloudy day and everything looks so "neat", and pretty-you need a cup of coffee too...clancey

 

[Turbo89]

Had a nice night tonight, so I chopped some of my remaining ash pile with the X27, then stacked it on a pallet after work.

 

[NickW]

Attacked some more of the tree tangle today until weather hit. Roofing project across the road is in a holding pattern for now. House is shingled with ridge vents on, garage is partially shingled and tarped.

 

[Whitenuckler]

Attacked some more of the tree tangle today until weather hit. Roofing project across the road is in a holding pattern for now. House is shingled with ridge vents on, garage is partially shingled and tarped.

He's in pretty good shape. My back and knee's couldn't take it. When I got mine down last year, it was by a team of 20 something year olds. Some of them were not too smart though. I went into my garage to have a look and saw they installed the ridge vent and forgot to cut out the board. I said that does not look right. Anyway, I had a good contactor, he even got another contractor in to do torchdown around my masonry chimney which was appreciated. Can't see the old lead flashing anymore. I hope your friend gets it done soon before the really hot weather arrives.

 

[Turbo89]

Chip drop finally came through, this morning I bucked it up before the rain came. Some big ash and oak (biggest about 32” across). Some rot on a little of the ash, but probably 1-1/2 -2 cords of wood here split and stacked.

 

[Toasty-Yote]

I found a big, dead red elm in my father's woods. Bonus for it being on a trail that I can take my car so it's not a lot of work loading the rounds into the hatchback. It has been fun to buck up. Splitting is a mixed bag. Some rounds pop right open like cherry and others do the sticky spaghetti thing with most somewhere in between. As you can see in the pic of my woodpile, a lot of pieces took some heavy hits with the Fiskars and still would not separate. Last pic is a cheese cutting board I got out of a large chunk of buckthorn that has been dead and lying on its side for at least three years. No bark but no rot in the middle either. I am optimistic that it won't crack significantly since it has been dead for so long. Along with bucking branches, file under my questionable uses for a compound miter saw.

 

[Whitenuckler]

I found a big, dead red elm in my father's woods. Bonus for it being on a trail that I can take my car so it's not a lot of work loading the rounds into the hatchback. It has been fun to buck up. Splitting is a mixed bag. Some rounds pop right open like cherry and others do the sticky spaghetti thing with most somewhere in between. As you can see in the pic of my woodpile, a lot of pieces took some heavy hits with the Fiskars and still would not separate. Last pic is a cheese cutting board I got out of a large chunk of buckthorn that has been dead and lying on its side for at least three years. No bark but no rot in the middle either. I am optimistic that it won't crack significantly since it has been dead for so long. Along with bucking branches, file under my questionable uses for a compound miter saw.

Nice work. I think if you had put the cutting board oil on after cutting that board you should be good to go. That will seal it.

 

[Turbo89]

Did a bunch of odds and ends today, painted the shop walls, hung some cabinets and puts organized some stuff. I ended up splitting 5 of those big rounds in quarters so I can load them on the splitter. The ash cracked right open with 3 splitting mauls and a 10lb sledge… the oak less so.

 

[Slimdusty]

Work done? Not so much besides the usual chores. Summer arrived this weekend, mid 90’s and low humidity, too hot to enjoy cutting and splitting, but good wood drying weather.

 

[thewoodlands]

About the only outside work I did today was mowing some trails.

 

[NickW]

Burning brush and some rotten logs tonight.

There's a chickadee nest in a dead standing birch that we've worked around and left some brush for cover until the young fledge. I think they are out now because the adults keep coming back with bugs but don't go in anymore, then they fly off with the bug. They're not scared, just looking around. I did some research and chickadee's from hatching to fledging is only 14-18 days! Who knew!?!? Apparently the young leave the nest and the adults still care for them for a few weeks, searching all over to feed their scattered young until they learn to fend for themselves.

 

[Toasty-Yote]

Trusty Subaru loading out a big (for me) dead ash that I dropped a few days ago. This was a very fun project. Two things I noticed were ash is incredibly easy to split and it seemed to have an almost spicy scent which I did not expect. Second pic is where I stopped today when I had run through my three Dewalt batteries.

 

[NickW]

So took our first trip to the local township brush pile to drop a trailer load of hardwood brush so I don't have to burn it. We've been back to clearing the pole shed site and tornado tangle. Scrounged a pretty good bit of oak and a little birch. Only supposed to take stuff under 3" there. Apparently 3" means 12" to some folks. The missus was cursing me in her head because we have a lot of wood down here, but it was OAK!

 

[NickW]

Been finding oak seedlings and saplings as we've been clearing. We've been marking them and working around them. After unloading the oak & birch from the brush heap we transplanted the seedlings and the smaller sapling. The larger sapling is going to a different area so I need to wait yet.

 

[qwee]

I went to the recycle center and sawed up 1.5 cords but she only charged me for a cord ($40). I was surprised there wasn't much wood in the big pile to choose from. This time of year, the tree services are usually dumping a lot of wood off. I look for fruit wood, oak, ash, hard maple, and locust mainly. After that, I look for elm and other medium density woods.

All I could find in quantity was elm. So. I filled the trailer with mostly elm. I found a few pieces of cherry, pine, sycamore, and others. Last week, I obtained about a cord of red oak and Bradford pear (I already split it). Bradford pear is dense. The oak was a little punky here and there - but it's oak. In the picture you can see 2 odd pieces of ash, cherry (top of pile), sycamore (whitish by cherry), siberian elm (brown center), and that piece in the middle (with 2 branch cuts is probably soft maple?). Bonus point - find the plum round.

 

[Whitenuckler]

I went to the recycle center and sawed up1.5 cords but she only charged me for a cord ($40). I was surprised there wasn't much wood in the big pile to choose from. This time of year, the tree services are usually dumping a lot of wood off. I look for fruit wood, oak, ash, hard maple, and locust mainly. After that, I look for elm and other medium density woods.

All I could find in quantity was elm. So. I filled the trailer with mostly elm. I found a few pieces of cherry, pine, sycamore, and others. Last week, I obtained about a cord of red oak and Bradford pear (I already split it). Bradford pear is dense. The oak was a little punky here and there - but it's oak. In the picture you can see 2 odd pieces of ash, cherry (top of pile), sycamore (whitish by cherry), siberian elm (brown center), and that piece in the middle (with 2 branch cuts is probably soft maple).
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That one piece looks like it would be hard to split by hand ! Maybe they kept the easy ones or did you saw that from a larger piece?
Good thing you have splitters

 

[qwee]

Ya, I have a splitter. I'm definitely not taking those weird pieces or that sycamore if I don't have a splitter. Ya, alot of leftovers from others who don't want the hard splitting pieces or shorts. I just can't leave the ash even if it's odd shaped.

Answer - the plum round is between 2 elm rounds - it is in front by the rail (it has that piece of elm on top of it). The bark is smooth in places (a fruit wood tell sign).

 

[Turbo89]

Nice score!

 

[NickW]

Today's tangle... We've already untangled a bunch.

 

[Whitenuckler]

Today's tangle... We've already untangled a bunch.

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That's hard work as you need to be extra careful. We could still use you up here even though it's been a few years nice
the hurricane Fiona came through. Hang ups can be very dangerous.

 

[Turbo89]

I finishing bucking up that log drop load today, and quartered some of the big pieces. That fired up the splitter, split and stacked about 2 face cords of ash and maple. That just about finished my ash stack, probably another cord of maple, and 1-1/2cords of oak to go, then I’ll be caught up… and back on the hunt. I might noodle some of the oak pieces up to make them easier to split.

Not too bad, after putting in a full day of work.

 

[qwee]

I grabbed a new used splitter (made in 2010) yesterday and ran some dry Siberian Elm through it today.
The machine: Iron & Oaks e/z split 15 ton. It has no cradles/tables so I'm using a child's school desk to slide wood chunks onto. It weighs 250lbs but rolls really easy. So, it is simple to move around and also to load on a trailer. It only goes horizontal - and only has an 18" opening (I cut 16").

The Performance: Says 8 second cycle time but feels a little slower. How did it do in that old dry elm? It managed. It isn't powerful, and on knotty pieces it works its way through slowly.

The verdict: So far, I like it. It seems Iron & Oak/Brave splitters are well made. It has a vertical shaft motor (Briggs). I'm hoping a vertical shaft Honda lawnmower engine is a straight swap (if I ever need another motor). I guess I'm going to sell the Dirty Hands 22-ton. That big splitter is hard to move around by hand. And I don't go vertical very much either.

 

[Whitenuckler]

I grabbed a new used splitter (made in 2010) yesterday and ran some dry Siberian Elm through it today.
The machine: Iron & Oaks e/z split 15 ton. It has no cradles/tables so I'm using a child's school desk to slide wood chunks onto. It weighs 250lbs but rolls really easy. So, it is simple to move around and also to load on a trailer. It only goes horizontal - and only has an 18" opening (I cut 16").

The Performance: Says 8 second cycle time but feels a little slower. How did it do in that old dry elm? It managed. It isn't powerful, and on knotty pieces it works its way through slowly.

The verdict: So far, I like it. It seems Iron & Oak/Brave splitters are well made. It has a vertical shaft motor (Briggs). I'm hoping a vertical shaft Honda lawnmower engine is a straight swap (if I ever need another motor). I guess I'm going to sell the Dirty Hands 22-ton. That big splitter is hard to move around by hand. And I don't go vertical very much either.
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View attachment 339270

Looks pretty heavy duty and clean