Catersplitter Build Thread

[Kevin in Ohio]

Weather has been bad here and it's either been snow covered or too wet to do anything. They're calling for more rain tonight so I decided to knock a couple of trees that I had ready to try the splitter on. It's ash so it'll be soup but wanted to see how the winch and swing would work.

I'm chunking about double normal size as I just want it to dry a little more

Makes for some nice wood and doesn't take long to do.

Moved to the other tree and I'm really happy with the swing lock. Smooth as silk and easy to use. The winch works really well too and the bigger buttons on the remote make it better than before.

Makes such a big difference in fatigue not having to wrestle stuff around. I can level the whole splitter up with the stabilizers too.

Here you can see it. Notice the wheel is off the ground to the left. A big plus is I can easily work up the bigger stuff by myself which is a huge plus to me and why I went this way.

Started to rain but got it all loaded. It was "only" one load. LOL

Probably just over a cord. We have another tree top do yet which has a couple loads but with the rain it'll be a while as it's in a fencerow.

 

[Sandhill Crane]

That is a nice splitter.

 

[Kevin in Ohio]

https://photos.imageevent.com/kevininohio/woodsplitter/20230809_104821.mp4
Here is a video of the splitter going through the paces. This was dead ash so it's butter.

 

[Bill G]

You did a hell of a job on it, a hell of a job!!!!!

 

[Oldtoolsnewproblems]

wow I hate seeing this while i'm in the middle of a splitter build myself. now that I've seen how it can be done nothing will ever stack up.

but seriosly thanks for the good idea, I have one of those baby truck bed cranes from HF on my yard trailer, will definitly put a post on my splitter that it can drop into for convenience with the big rounds.

 

[Kevin in Ohio]

You did a hell of a job on it, a hell of a job!!!!!

Thanks. It does make it a LOT easier and don't feel beat up after running it.

 

[Kevin in Ohio]

wow I hate seeing this while i'm in the middle of a splitter build myself. now that I've seen how it can be done nothing will ever stack up.

but seriosly thanks for the good idea, I have one of those baby truck bed cranes from HF on my yard trailer, will definitly put a post on my splitter that it can drop into for convenience with the big rounds.

If you put a winch on it, having the remote makes it tons nicer. Any winch can be converted to a remote and they are on Ebay. Make sure to get one with 2 remotes as they tend to die pretty quick. I can't find a quality one and have gone through 3 so far. Sometimes it's just the remote and other times it's the switch box. With the remote, you can drag them in if needed. That is why I put outriggers on mine to keep it from pulling around and be stable when lifting. I generally back down the trunk where the tree fell on ones that are hard to roll due to size. Some of the cheap winches get weak as well. I bought 2 HF ones to start and one went weak. When/if the current one dies, I have a Warn waiting.

 

[Oldtoolsnewproblems]

very nice, i was thinking i might put a pendant on mine. I was wondering about the outriggers. they sure are cool but I couldn't figure out why you thought they were worth the added complexity and expense. Factoring in all the leverage from that winching, that makes total sense. mine is going to have mechanical outriggers that take weight off the tires but might not fully lift it, just enough to stop it from bobbling about on the rubber as mine is likely to end out a little light for the size of wood i'm splitting with it since teh power plant isn't part of the splitter.

 

[Kevin in Ohio]

very nice, i was thinking i might put a pendant on mine. I was wondering about the outriggers. they sure are cool but I couldn't figure out why you thought they were worth the added complexity and expense. Factoring in all the leverage from that winching, that makes total sense. mine is going to have mechanical outriggers that take weight off the tires but might not fully lift it, just enough to stop it from bobbling about on the rubber as mine is likely to end out a little light for the size of wood i'm splitting with it since teh power plant isn't part of the splitter.

Another reason for them is leveling. This comes into play with the boom. If your leaning hard it makes the boom want to "home" downhill and makes it hard to swing. Can make it bad if weight is coming towards you. This will show what I mean.

If you always split on flat ground, it would be as much of an issue. We split where the tree lays and have some rolling ground so wanted all the situations covered.

 

[Oldtoolsnewproblems]

totally makes sense, I have that issue with the boom on my trailer all the time, but loading/unloading its not the worst thing to jsut deal with, jealous of your friction lock tho, mine just has a pin for every 45 degrees. when i first saw you adding the cable to the boom I htought it would be like a powered tag line to pull the load side to side with a permanently mounted top anchor. That might be what I do, in part because the winch biggest use may be to drag rounds to the splitter, I'm almost definitely adding a powered lift table.
levelling is not much of an issue for me, I always split in the same place in my dirt drive which is pretty level. I get my firewood delivered as llogs by the grapple load, so not much moving around to work, but with the sawdust snow drifts that build up I'd rather drag logs to the splitter than move it around all the time.