Scrounging Firewood (and other stuff)

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H-Ranch private road maintenance crew on duty 24/7. This fell on the road sometime last night, not enough to block traffic, but did have to veer just a bit to get around it. Someone may have tossed a few branches into the woods, but I cleaned up the rest of it this morning. And then I cut enough of the trunk that was down to get a trailer load.
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All my aperture sights are plastic and have a little red or green dot in the middle of them 😜.
I painted my front sight with white nail polish. 50yrs ago I don't think they had fiber optic sights but I put them on a GP100 and took a nice 8pt with it at 35yrds. They are the cats meow imho
 
OK, back to "Firewood" stuff. After an eclipse break, I installed the new Lovejoy coupling (with spider this time - lol) and put the gauge on a Tee coming from the pressure side of the pump. Fired it up. The cylinder moves back and forth easily, so I don't think I have an air lock at the gauge. The gauge is reading 'zero' when the splitter is running. I extend the cylinder all the way and hold it buried in the plate and the gauge reads 400 psi. I retract the cylinder and hold the valve in the retract position and I again only get a reading of 400 psi.
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I can't believe I installed the gauge at the wrong place. It seems obvious. Then again, I DO make a mistake now and then - lol. I'm guessing the pump is shot. Thoughts?
The gauge is installed right. The pump does not make pressure, it makes flow. Pressure is the resistance to flow. Ie one of 4 things is happening, the pressure relief is set way too low, the cylinder is bypassing, the pump is bypassing internally, or the valve is bypassing. 2 of the 4 are easy to test. I linked a decent video to test the cylinder already. Only requires 2 plugs/caps to test. The pressure relief is the easiest to test. It's on the valve, hiding under the plug next to the return line. Pop the plug out and see if the spring is broken or ball/ seat is messed up. You can also shim it (the spring)to see if it increases pressure before it hits relief. The pump needs a flow meter hooked up to it. They are kinda expensive for casual use. But a hydro shop can test it. Likewise with the valve, I'm not certain how to properly test it, but in this case they are cheap enough to toss a new one on.
I'd start with the cylinder, then relief, then pump.
 
The gauge is installed right. The pump does not make pressure, it makes flow. Pressure is the resistance to flow. I
one of 4 things is happening,
1) the pressure relief is set way too low,
2) the cylinder is bypassing,
3) the pump is bypassing internally, or
4) the valve is bypassing.
2 of the 4 are easy to test. I linked a decent video to test the cylinder already. Only requires 2 plugs/caps to test. The pressure relief is the easiest to test. It's on the valve, hiding under the plug next to the return line. Pop the plug out and see if the spring is broken or ball/ seat is messed up. You can also shim it (the spring)to see if it increases pressure before it hits relief. The pump needs a flow meter hooked up to it. They are kinda expensive for casual use. But a hydro shop can test it. Likewise with the valve, I'm not certain how to properly test it, but in this case they are cheap enough to toss a new one on.
I'd start with the cylinder, then relief, then pump.
Capped off the cylinder as suggested. Started it up and put the control valve in the 'retract' position. Cylinder did NOT move. Cylinder OK? One down.
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H-Ranch private road maintenance crew on duty 24/7. This fell on the road sometime last night, not enough to block traffic, but did have to veer just a bit to get around it. Someone may have tossed a few branches into the woods, but I cleaned up the rest of it this morning. And then I cut enough of the trunk that was down to get a trailer load.
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Anything to get out of work.:innocent:
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Capped off the cylinder as suggested. Started it up and put the control valve in the 'retract' position. Cylinder did NOT move. Cylinder OK? One down.
View attachment 1169574
ok, that's good. Cylinder isn't the issue. Move onto the relief valve and check that out.
 
The only removable piece on the control valve was this plug. Underneath is a screw. Is it a set screw like a carb? Must count turns? Is a spring underneath?
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And I understand your comment about pump flow but shouldn't I still see a pressure? When you put a regulator onto a cylinder and open the cylinder valve, you get the pressure of the tank despite not having an exit valve (no flow) opened.
 
I was amazed, when I pulled the top cover off , it looked like everything was new, and all original, piston and cylinder mint not sure if this is going to the sausage factory lol , I have couple other XS 266’s to grab if I want, my nice 288 headed there ,
She's perty for sure, but those dang rubber AV mounts and that front tensioner :baba:.
Just ran a couple tanks thru the mmws 562, pulled a 24 like a dream in mulberry, guess the chain was done okay ;).
 
I painted my front sight with white nail polish. 50yrs ago I don't think they had fiber optic sights but I put them on a GP100 and took a nice 8pt with it at 35yrds. They are the cats meow imho
What's important is that it works for you :).
Sounds like a good shot!
I enjoy the dots as I can keep both eyes open. I can still do quite well with open sights, just that it's not as easy to see/focus both close and far these days, so I shoot more instinctively. The good thing is that's where I do well, not so much with too much distance, even for longer shots I don't take much time with them normally.
 
Picked up a bed of cherry with the kids
View attachment 1169586
Local cemetery gave me permission to go through their blow down / brush pile whenever I want. They have a lot of curly maple in there. If only I had a saw mill
Nice load.
Don't you worry about hitting the back window.
 
The only removable piece on the control valve was this plug. Underneath is a screw. Is it a set screw like a carb? Must count turns? Is a spring underneath?
View attachment 1169587
And I understand your comment about pump flow but shouldn't I still see a pressure? When you put a regulator onto a cylinder and open the cylinder valve, you get the pressure of the tank despite not having an exit valve (no flow) opened.
Should be under the screw, yes count to get a rough idea of where it's set.
No, you can have lots of flow and zero pressure, given there is little or no restriction in the system. Just running the pump on my splitter there is near zero pressure on the gauge. Start cycling the cylinder and there is a slight spike in pressure then it even out at a much lower pressure. The spike is from getting the cylinder to move initially. (Greatest resistance is to get something stopped moving.) Then without any other outside forces the pressure will remain steady as long as the resistance to glow remains the same. Splitting a price of wood, you would see normal travel pressure till it hits the wood, then a pressure spike then the pressure even out again. (Depending on type of wood, knots etc in the wood.) Flow remains the same regardless of pressure up i
Until you hit relief setting, which does not bleed off pressure, it diverts fluid flow to return. This remove the resistance allowing pressure to go down.
This is all just for a fixed displacement pump,like used on a splitter. With axial piston pumps it is possible to have pressure and basically zero flow, but for all intensive purposes in normal systems flow is constant and pressure only changes with the work (resistance) placed on the system.
 
She's perty for sure, but those dang rubber AV mounts and that front tensioner :baba:.
Just ran a couple tanks thru the mmws 562, pulled a 24 like a dream in mulberry, guess the chain was done okay ;).
I knew that side tensioner would get you going , lol 😆 , my XS 576 smooth, sometimes I don’t even know I’m cutting lol 😆
 
OK, now what?? The spring looks intact and the ball bearing in good shape.
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Man I'm glad I'm not doing surgery on someone or defusing a bomb. "Cut the red wire........ but first..". :laugh:
Everything looks OK from the picture. Go ahead and put it back together. Now here's where some trial and error is going to start.
If you can screw the set screw down in father then you took it out, set it one full turn in then close everything up and see what it reliefs at. (Extend cylinder fully and hold it there. Note the pressure.) If it increases, great. Keep going till you get it set to relief at whatever the reccomended pressure is.
 
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