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How do you guys cut/split your wood?


 
G

G Dechaine

TVWBB Pro
I've got a few maple and apple logs in my backyard just screaming to be consumed in the WSM. I've also got a lead on some peach wood that I'd love to try out.

PRoblem is, I don't have access to a band saw or a log splitter or anything that would make preparing this wood possible?

I can rent a chainsaw and buy a hatchet. But I think chainsaws are a no-no due to the chain oil residue???

Any help is appreciated. Thanks.
 
Hatchets are seriously DANGEROUS if your not use to using one ! If your gona split some wood you gotta use a ax and or saw depending on how large the logs are . Just using enough to smoke with you could actualy use a hand saw if it already seasoned . But keep away from a hatchet if you like your fingers and not a dept at using one !

If you got enough for a chain saw you need to buy rent a saw and buy a ax and a sledge and a couple weges IMO but YMMV

We get about 75% of our heat from wood so I split and haul a LOT a wood .
 
I have a small axe that will split well aged logs as long as they don't have knots. The safest way I found to get the sticks into chunks is with my table saw.

If you can split the logs, you may want to try cross cutting them with a bow saw.
 
Thanks guys.

I'll be careful with the hatchet or axe...heard too many stories of people splitting their feet open. Eeesh.
 
It is possible to use a hatchet without cutting off fingers; just have to be smarter than the hatchet. The problem I found with hatchets on logs though, is it takes a long time, and you get a lot more chips while trying to chop off a chunk. I like to use a hand saw to cut sections off a log, then a hatchet to split the sections into chunks.
 
For the price of the rental and insurance on a chain saw, you would probably be better off to just buy a decent recepricating ( sawzall ) with a 9 to 12" pruning blade. Skill makes a blade called " The Ugly " which I use all the time to cut up my smoke wood and prune my trees.
For splitting small chunks I like to use my hatchet as a wedge and strike it with a dead blow hammer.

Tim
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by G Dechaine:
Thanks guys.

I'll be careful with the hatchet or axe...heard too many stories of people splitting their feet open. Eeesh. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

My hobby one a them is wood working so I am very aware of the dos and don'ts of tools others well not so much ! And yes you can open up your leg like a over cooked sausage with a ax if your not careful with one .
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by G Dechaine:
...But I think chainsaws are a no-no due to the chain oil residue??? </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

I realize that bbq might be exotic in Canada, but if you ever come to the southern US, you can easily find someone barbecuing in a wood fired smoker.

For instance, a friend from church has one that she cooks no less than twenty pork butts in at a time, burning nothing but hickory. (The hickory, like any firewood, is cut with a chain saw, and no, there's not enough oil residue left on the wood to matter.)

Cut your logs to short lengths with a saw of some sort and then split into chunks with an axe or sledge/wedge.
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by timothy:
For the price of the rental and insurance on a chain saw, you would probably be better off to just buy a decent recepricating ( sawzall ) with a 9 to 12" pruning blade. Skill makes a blade called " The Ugly " which I use all the time to cut up my smoke wood and prune my trees.
For splitting small chunks I like to use my hatchet as a wedge and strike it with a dead blow hammer.

Tim </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

This is almost exactly what I do. I have a large pruning blade that I use on my cordless sawzall. It's good for limbs and pieces 3-5" across. A chainsaw would be faster, but it also would be dangerous on some smaller pieces.

Once I have the wood in 4-6" long chunks I line up my hatchet with one hand and smack the back of it with a 32oz ball peen hammer. Once the wood is quartered I let it sit outside for 3-4 months to dry.

I used this method to cut up some peach wood from the local orchard. They had just trimmed their trees and had a bunch of pieces that were big enough for smoke wood.
 
Depending on the diameter & length of the logs, you can use any of the following:

-Small logs = bow saw, or reciprocating, or chop-saw. Cut into chunks & don't bother splitting if you don't need to.

-Medium logs (occasional use) = Makita makes a nice electric chain saw. Electrics are great for occasional use, because if a gas saw sits-around for months in between uses (particularly, cheap ones), they like to gum-up and become a royal PITA to start, and you're gonna wish you had bought an electric. Axe or maul to split, or chop 'em into small sections & use hatchet to split.

-Big logs = gotta' have a chain saw to cut, and maul and wedges or hydraulic unit for splitting.

For cutting-up big or medium-big stuff, you should build a "saw-bunk" from some scrap lumber. Essentially, a floor board or two, with "X" or "V"-shaped uprights at uneven intervals - so that you can lay a log into the "trough" created by the aligned uprights, and saw between them, with free-air underneath. (Makes using a power-saw safer, and keeps the blade out of the dirt / scraps, and keeps it sharper longer.)

While you're doing this, be sure to sing "The Lumberjack Song" by the Monty Python group...
icon_smile.gif

Hope this helps
 
As mentioned here- buy an electric chain saw. If you are nervous about oil in the wood, crank up the oil supply to the chain and fill the oil tank with cheap sunflower oil or something. It will lubricate the chain more than well enough.

An axe is not difficult to use if you cut short pieces of wood from the log. I would be more nervous about this process than splitting the pieces with the axe. You will also need some sort of device to place the log on, to keep it in place when using a chain saw, as well as a big piece of a log to place the logs on when you split them with the axe. Without these two items the whole affair becomes dangerous. You cannot use one hand to hold onto the wood and the other one on the tool. That would be very dangerous.
I use around 10m3 of wood every year, I cut it myself. That's several tonnes
icon_smile.gif


I do not know what these items are called in english, but here are a couple of pictures:

http://www.stihl.no/upload/pro...dukte/Z009D026_z.jpg

http://www.google.no/imgres?im...6tbs%3Disch:1&itbs=1

http://www.nesseby.kommune.no/...x560/hoggestabbe.jpg
 
G,I used a compound miter saw to cut my logs into 3-4" lengths,then use a hammer and chisel to split the larger chunks into smaller wedges after they dried.
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by timothy:
For splitting small chunks I like to use my hatchet as a wedge and strike it with a dead blow hammer. Tim </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

I'll have to give that a try.
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by G Dechaine:
I've got a few maple and apple logs in my backyard just screaming to be consumed in the WSM. I've also got a lead on some peach wood that I'd love to try out.

PRoblem is, I don't have access to a band saw or a log splitter or anything that would make preparing this wood possible?

I can rent a chainsaw and buy a hatchet. But I think chainsaws are a no-no due to the chain oil residue???

Any help is appreciated. Thanks. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

So where you at on the logs, G?

If you could've gotten your hands on a chainsaw they would've already been cut up and out of the elements. A little chain saw oil residue never hurt anybody, seriously.

I split into chunks at my convenience, and I think I'll try the hatchet/dead blow hammer method next time. Gotta go to the orchard this week, as a matter of fact.
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Geir Widar:
You will also need some sort of device to place the log on, to keep it in place when using a chain saw, as well as a big piece of a log to place the logs on when you split them with the axe. Without these two items the whole affair becomes dangerous. You cannot use one hand to hold onto the wood and the other one on the tool. That would be very dangerous.
I use around 10m3 of wood every year, I cut it myself. That's several tonnes
icon_smile.gif


I do not know what these items are called in english, but here are a couple of pictures:

http://www.stihl.no/upload/pro...dukte/Z009D026_z.jpg

http://www.google.no/imgres?im...6tbs%3Disch:1&itbs=1

http://www.nesseby.kommune.no/...x560/hoggestabbe.jpg </div></BLOCKQUOTE> Sawbuck.
 
This year I bought a couple of boxes of chunks (cherry and apple). The chunks wound up being too big (they took forever to take light and caused temp spikes), so I needed to split them. They were about 5 or 6 inches square and 4 or so inches deep, with a few even larger.

I tried a table saw but found the irregular size didn't work out very well. I tried a chop saw but it wound up flinging a block of apple 30' across my shop and wrecked the fence on the chop saw. Being as how I'm partial to having all my appendages intact, I decided to try clamping the blocks in a vise and using a sawzall with a coarse blade to slice the blocks cleanly. This has proven to be a safe and reliable method for me and my temps have been holding rock-steady since.
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content"> So where you at on the logs, G? </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

I'm only further in the sense that I have a better plan for attack. I've been busy at work, working every weekend, so haven't had a chance to do anything with the wood.

But I think I might get a bow saw or something then split with a hatchet. They aren't big logs, so that'll work.

I live right in Toronto, so starting up the chainsaw would really annoy the neighbours, and there are a bunch of them.

Anyhow, thanks for all the advice guys. Once I get to it, I'll post pictures of the process. COuld be useful for some of us.
 
G,

Actually how big are the logs because that makes a big difference on how you can do it and the price of what you get to chunk them.
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Phil Perrin:
G,I used a compound miter saw to cut my logs into 3-4" lengths,then use a hammer and chisel to split the larger chunks into smaller wedges after they dried. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

I'll second the miter saw. I have a friend with a vineyard. 5 gnarly vine trunks (about the size of an arm) were cut into very small chunks in about 10 min. No fuss... no worry about knots... no hassel. I didn't like a saws-all since I didn't have a good way to anchor the pieces.
 
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