Thread: Cutting down a house for firewood?

Hi this is my first new thread post.
My client wants a demolished two bedroom house cut into firewood.
In the past I would just salvage the good stuff and have a sweet bonfire!
I am bummed because chainsaws don't seem to be the best tool for this job.Damn nails,nails dammit
They like recycling or some stubborn reason won't let me set it ablaze except for their fireplace.
My concern is #1 this is time consuming 2 hours of cutting and the truck is half full.If it were logs i'd have it full by then.
#2 use a sawzall or circular saw its mostly 8-10ft 2x4s Ireally want touse my chainsaw but sawzall blades are only a couple dollars
Ive been using wood/metal blades havent tried the other options,whats the fastest way?#3 is this a waste of time? The are paying hourly and asking me to do it.
# 4 The stuff is in a heap ,im wrestling it out of a pile.Im trying to save time leaving the nails in but if I took them out first then maybe I could stack it up,then use my chainsaw?
#5The vibrations from the sawzall is taking a toll on my nerves,maybe need to make a sawhorse type device to hold the lumber securely

Anyone had to do this before? Is this within reason,the wood isnt all that great except what was the interior walls etc.

I turn down work all the time but the HO has a nice tree supply perfect to get my chainsawing fix so I have to do this to keep them happy.

All commennts and suggestions welcome. Does anyone prefer the way 2x4s burn etc. Use it only for kindling ,just pound down the nails and make nice stacks.

Whoever is paying you is nuts, ignorant, addleminded, stoned, and in general out of thier friggin' mind.

Building materials out of an old house "Whoof" like gas on a camp fire. Real hot, real quick, then gone.
Any heat value is in no way equal to the amount of $$$ spent on having you cut the stuff up, or the gas used in your saw. LOL!

But I reckon it takes all types, including those who want a warped over fired stove.

Have you tried a loop of Rapco chain on the saw? They put up with nails quite well, but are spendy.
Depending on payout you expect, it might be worth it.

Have you really talked to these folks about running building materials for heat?
You might be doing them a favor, if they aren't just looking for enough kindling to last 50 years.

Stay safe!
Dingeryote

Just say NO

Thanks for your comment Dingeryote, I am staying safe.
Your insight to my situation is appreciated ,and helps to confirm some of my concerns.

Burning the building material in piles and adding to the pile a bit at a time is my usual method.
They won't have it.One of my colleagues offered to haul it away for free and they declined.

Luckily they have a large brick fireplace so,the warping stove is no problem.I seen one of those before the
tea pot on top would always wobble.Basically they don't want to "waste" anything.And now I am stuck
doing this nonsence.

If Rapco chain rips through the nail imbedded demo lumber it could save alot of time I'm thinking,like to look
into that route.Could be out of my price range and I imagine I won't be sharpening it by hand files.

Originally Posted by Whitespider

Just say NO

This is their expression

Ed I got into this kind of stuff all the time when I first started my business. If you were contemplating doing it I would say run. But since you are already commited,,,,, last time I got into something like this we found that a radial arm saw with carbide teeth will cut through the nail embeded wood. Get the special wrecking blades and you will be fine. My radial arm saw will cut a 8 inch board. Anything larger than that we use an Stihl Abrasive saw with a carbide blade in it. Now I will not let anyone run that saw with that blade but me and I am plain scared of it.

Last one of these I got into left me with 6 piles of 6x6 native beams. I thought I couldn make a few bucks off of it but it diddnt work out. I still have some of that crap around here.

Good luck... Next time run. if we bid a job and it requires wrecking a building it is a 300.00 minimum charge and we will pile it up and they can burn it. Otherwise find someone else.

excavator and a wood chipper.

use the excavator to bust it up run over it a couple time and feed it into a rented wood chipper.
deliver a house of toothpicks to customer.

they should be able to use a shovel to load the furnace / heater

Originally Posted by saltas

excavator and a wood chipper.

use the excavator to bust it up run over it a couple time and feed it into a rented wood chipper.
deliver a house of toothpicks to customer.

they should be able to use a shovel to load the furnace / heater

That sounds like my kind of renovating! haha

NO WAY on the chipper but a tub grinder/hammer mill will do it. tub grinder Hogzilla TC Series

Too bad it is in a pile otherwise while standing it is alot easier to take apart with a chainsaw.

An excavator with a shear would be interesting. Cat Products: Products>Work Tool Attachments>Shears

Originally Posted by Whitespider

Just say NO

agreed........

Originally Posted by psuiewalsh

NO WAY on the chipper but a tub grinder/hammer mill will do it. tub grinder Hogzilla TC Series

Too bad it is in a pile otherwise while standing it is alot easier to take apart with a chainsaw.

An excavator with a shear would be interesting. Cat Products: Products>Work Tool Attachments>Shears

+1

Excavator w/ grapple and a tub grinder.

Well maybe i don't understand your situation... I certainly don't understand what their expression to a "NO" answer would have do do with anything.
It's your time, your equipment and your back. Maybe you've already made an agreement, or a deal, or given your word... and I understand feeling you need to live up to that. I guess my "NO" answer was meant to be used before any handshake. I fella' has to weigh the time and work to the reward, and if you're making 50 a day on something like this when you can be making twice, thrice or more doing another job... well, ya' just gotta' say NO. Business is business; you need to be fair, honest, truthful and polite... but you shouldn't be doing something that costs you time and money because the "NO" answer might hurt someones feelings or make you look as though you're not being "nice"... It is your business.

Originally Posted by Cedar Ed

Hi this is my first new thread post.
My client wants a demolished two bedroom house cut into firewood.
In the past I would just salvage the good stuff and have a sweet bonfire!
I am bummed because chainsaws don't seem to be the best tool for this job.Damn nails,nails dammit
They like recycling or some stubborn reason won't let me set it ablaze except for their fireplace.
My concern is #1 this is time consuming 2 hours of cutting and the truck is half full.If it were logs i'd have it full by then.
#2 use a sawzall or circular saw its mostly 8-10ft 2x4s Ireally want touse my chainsaw but sawzall blades are only a couple dollars
Ive been using wood/metal blades havent tried the other options,whats the fastest way?#3 is this a waste of time? The are paying hourly and asking me to do it.
# 4 The stuff is in a heap ,im wrestling it out of a pile.Im trying to save time leaving the nails in but if I took them out first then maybe I could stack it up,then use my chainsaw?
#5The vibrations from the sawzall is taking a toll on my nerves,maybe need to make a sawhorse type device to hold the lumber securely

Anyone had to do this before? Is this within reason,the wood isnt all that great except what was the interior walls etc.

I turn down work all the time but the HO has a nice tree supply perfect to get my chainsawing fix so I have to do this to keep them happy.

All commennts and suggestions welcome. Does anyone prefer the way 2x4s burn etc. Use it only for kindling ,just pound down the nails and make nice stacks.

Back during the oil crisis I had some friends who all of a sudden had an oil heating bill much higher than their mortgage. The guy quick drug an old wood heater out of his junk and reinstalled it in his house. But, he had no wood, and seeing as how this was a nationwide contrived emergency at the time, all the local seasoned firewood got bought up quick. So, he got some used circular saws and started scrounging pallets, which he had his teenage sons cut up. He also had a near falling down sixty foot long lean to shed at one of his rental properties. He hired me to tear it down and get it into manageable sizes. boards/planks/beams for his sons to finish cutting up. Mostly I used a sledge hammer for the entire teardown, with a little pry bar action here and there.

And that's what he heated with all that winter, scrounged pallets and that shed. The only hard part was stripping the shingles and old tar paper off, but it went quick on the ground. There was a lot of dried wood in that thing!

If it was me, on long boards, just get a chopsaw or a radial arm saw at the pawnshop, throw a new blade on it, and pay attention to where the nails are. You should be able to rip through all that stuff easily.

Originally Posted by zogger

But, he had no wood, and seeing as how this was a nationwide contrived emergency at the time, all the local seasoned firewood got bought up quick.

???? You may want to check your "facts" as the OPEC oil embargo was very much a real event in response to the United States supporting Israel in the 1973 war.

Originally Posted by Guido Salvage

???? You may want to check your "facts" as the OPEC oil embargo was very much a real event in response to the United States supporting Israel in the 1973 war.

You are teaching grampaw to suck eggs. Yes, it was a real event, BUT ALSO YES they had long lines of tankers ANCHORED UP offshore and not going into the refineries or transfer port facilities, just sitting on the stuff as the prices kept rising. That was done on purpose, ie, contrived. Also our "ally" mr dictator shah had a big part in the scam. There was all sorts of tv news copter and plane video of that going on at the time, and a ton of discussion about it.

They certainly wanted to put all the blame on those (insert racist terms) folks overseas, but the fat whiteboys in black suits profited handsomely from it as well.

Similar type blatantly contrived price increases like enron pulled with plant shutdowns, during high demand time, etc.

The scams in the centralized delivery energy market are simply legend (go research what the rural electrification project did to alternative independent means of producing electricity way way back, they killed it off, put us 80 years behind in tech...). So many out there, going all the way back. Every single bit of it, centralized electricity, natural gas, oil and refined oil products, all of it, is just slap full of ongoing scams and manipulations, all designed to separate regular folks from that green stuff in their wallets, and to do it forever and two days.

That's the main reason I am an alternative energy freak and encourage people to get energy independent as much as possible, starting with the easiest and cheapest way, firewood, which is renewable and clean stored solar power. And because it is so good, that is why "the man" uses their bought off puppets in government to try and regulate it out of existence, same as they are doing with natural food and small scale family farms now.

Like I said before, the more you get away from "the man" and his economic and political conjobs, the better off you get. Grifters, the lot of them. I'd call 'em skunks but I don't want to insult any honorable member of the weasel family.