Originally Posted By: Dwight
I quit lumber jacking years ago, but in the 1980s I was cutting/splitting 15-20 cords each year. A lot of the wood we burned was cottonwood and elm. Both are crappy woods for a fire place, but work fine for a wood burning furnace.

I built myself a hydraulic splitter. The Cylinder was 7"x30" with a 3.5" shaft. I put a 2 stage hydraulic pump with a 16HP gas motor on it. That splitter would have popped your logs into submission without even going to the second stage! 30 years later the splitter is still on the job though it is now on its 4th or 5th owner. I believe it had a maximum of around 50 tons of splitting force in the second stage. It was just the ticket for splitting 30� diameter x 24 " long logs right through the center.

Did I mention that I also built a thermostatically controlled forced air wood burning furnace that was the sole source of heat for our house for many years? During really cold weather (-10 thru -20F) it needed to be filled with wood once a day. During milder periods it would run up to four days without attention.


Dwight

You're retired, pond is pretty much done for fishing...why not come on down and we can build one together? ;\)

Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after. ~ Henry David Thoreau

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