One of my buddy's favorite lines is, " I'm very well educated, I spent over 8 years in high school"
Looks like that was from the 70's. I don't think he's swinging like he used to. Everything has it's place and it's nice to be in a place where we are still allowed, for now anyway, to choose. I still swing a maul occasionally but when you get to the tough stuff the Hydraulics come in.
I got some wavy grain beech(knot free) that I'll sit back and laugh at anybody try to split with ANY maul, axe. Dang hard to get a wedge started in it without a starter slice with a saw. Just bounces out even with baby taps.
Only done some beech here, and ya it can suck. As soon as the bark loosens she'll bust. Or you can slice the bark off first.
IF you can see the twist, bring your edge in parallel with that angle. That helps a lot.
I know some stuff busts better green, but basically I just stack up rounds and wait for cracks and loose bark. Costs me nothing to wait until that point, and pays by making it loads easier to split. We don't get that wicked frozen solid below zero temps here, so can't do the frozen wood splitting trick.
Up north, sure, did that, down here, nope, let 'er dry a little first. Some stuff it doesn't matter, straight red oak and ash...anytime. Starts easy gets easier for the most part, within reason.
The worst here, worse than beech, are the real large sweetgums. Not so much twisted as they are *stringy* You get a bust, but it sticks together. I wait a long time on them bad boys, but then they will bust, too, then slice a few strings.
I have some, takes me three wait periods to finish busting them up. Bust some off the outside until it sucks..stop then, back on the pile. Wait a few months do it again, that works for most of them. If it gets to the third drying period, they either bust or then I noodle, but really, I noodle very few rounds except when first felled, I'll noodle the crotches then.
I am quite patient and I hate having to bust azz just to bust wood. No need, and I ain't letting no chunk of cellulose and lignin beat me neither. It's easy, or I wait until it gets easy (well, doable), one or the other.
When I went from normal to "good" with hand busting was way back when those huge waves of dutch elm disease hit, and you could get as much of the big stuff as you wanted for free. There was cubic miles of the stuff all over. All you wanted, some huge, plenty just "big". Learned on that stuff, anything else I have found since then is loads easier.
Back then I all hand cut for my own wood, either a large crosscut or bow saw. That was a lot harder than splitting it. If you stayed sharp and didn't push it, it cut OK, but the least bit pushing it, was like sawing freeking rocks.
