what do you guys prefer to cut big or small

[injun joe]

when you guys cut wood do you like to cut big rounds or do you try to cut a lot of little 1's

 

[carvinmark]

I cut anything from 3" to whatever I can load, usually max out about 30". 6-10" is my favorite.

 

[mtfallsmikey]

Anywhere from 3" up to 16", but wind up with big rounds as well.

 

[flashpuppy]

We cut into 7' logs and then use a four wheeler, ramps and a cable system to skid them into the truck. I like bigger pieces.

 

[Haywire Haywood]

I like the bigger stuff. Anything over 30" diameter is a pain to deal with (but you won't see me turning it down). I dropped a 24"dbh white oak stem yesterday. Not much of a top left due to storm damage. Couldn't get it all in one load. It kept spitting wedges out so I cut a block out of it and put a 2t bottle jack in there. Worked like a champ.

Ian

 

[AIM]

I cut odd lengths. 30" down to 6". I don't hardly ever split so as the diam gets bigger the lengths get shorter. If I stacked my wood (which I don't) I may not do this but I just throw it in a heap. I like the oddball assortment of sizes also for filling in the edges and end, it seems to help to pack the wood in the OWB.
My wife loads the OWB 1/2 the time and big, long and heavy just isn't cool for her.

 

[K7NUT]

Anything over 30" diameter is a pain to deal with (but you won't see me turning it down).

Ian

I have to agree and since alot of times I cut by myself, I like to get the smaller stuff then. But I'm not afraid of the big one's! My cutting partner and I both got a ton of wood from this downed Pine tree that fell across the road. With out bark, the rounds were 32", thats the big rounds in the foreground, were burning that pine as I speak!

<img src="http://mcallisterdrywall.com/AS/1-31-2009/wood1.JPG">

 

[Ductape]

I'm not sure I want to say I "prefer" big 'uns, but i seem to end up with alot of big stuff. I'm relatively well set up to handle some bigger stuff so I'm always happy to take it. I even have wood burning friends that have given me their "large" because they just don't feel like dealing with it. It sure makes alot of wood out of a handful of rounds !

 

[spike60]

Duc, that piece of plywood looks doomed.:greenchainsaw:

 

[KD57]

I like the bigger stuff, it's more fun to cut.

 

[avalancher]

Big rounds! The biggest load I have ever hauled home was a huge red oak. 10 rounds filled my 16 ft trailer to the max weight. Got em home, winched the rounds upright and noodled em.
I dont know how much firewood that the load yielded, I didnt measure but just threw it in a pile, but it was a bunch!

 

[MJR]

The stove likes the big ones – less bark. The back likes the small ones.

 

[computeruser]

I prefer this,or a hair smaller, for ease of handling

and because you can do this with it

although this size works, too, but requires more handling.

Even the larger stuff can be good, but it is harder to work with and requires specialized equipment to move it

and an intermediate step before it can be lifted onto the splitter

and rendered into a final product.

 

[Ductape]

Duc, that piece of plywood looks doomed.:greenchainsaw:

It was the pre-production prototype............... which ended up looking like this.

 

[Haywire Haywood]

Computeruser, nice setup you have there... Most of the big stuff I've gotten splits easily and if it hesitates, I noodle it half way through. Once the first split is done the rest usually pop in one or two swings. This is red and white oak though. It splits easy anyway. If I had to noodle every round into pieces, I think I'd have to pass. I don't own a hydraulic splitter.

After this storm cleanup is done, the woodlot I have to work in is much smaller stuff, not many over 12". More cutting but less splitting. I guess it evens out except for the fun factor. The 066 will see a lot more shelf time and the 346 will get to warm up a bit.

Ian

 

[Zodiac45]

I'll take whatever I can handle without having too use two people. As you can see by this load it varies.

 

[computeruser]

Computeruser, nice setup you have there... Most of the big stuff I've gotten splits easily and if it hesitates, I noodle it half way through. Once the first split is done the rest usually pop in one or two swings. This is red and white oak though. It splits easy anyway. If I had to noodle every round into pieces, I think I'd have to pass. I don't own a hydraulic splitter.

After this storm cleanup is done, the woodlot I have to work in is much smaller stuff, not many over 12". More cutting but less splitting. I guess it evens out except for the fun factor. The 066 will see a lot more shelf time and the 346 will get to warm up a bit.

Ian

The big equipment is Ed*L's stuff, with the pictures from when we cut up the huge trunk of his 60+" white oak. You can see him smiling from the seat of his bobcat because he's one happy camper - he and the rest of his Bancroft crew have all the toys.

The noodling used to fill up a lot of my time with the knotty, short/stocky suburban trees I tended to get at the time, and while the noodles were a good source of decorative hardwood mulch, the neighbors hated it - protracted periods of WOT on the 075 or 076 - and would have the cops out pretty regularly. Switching to the MegaMaul wedge-on-a-stick thing helped some, but it was still a tedious process on the bigger rounds.

Now, a bunch of 6-15" ash, that's a fun way to spend an hour after work, whether with the splitter

or with the maul.

 

[John D]

I preffer 6-14" rounds,I dont split them,throw them right in the OWB at 24-30" long.The smaller stuff thats not so heavy,sometimes ill leave it up to 4ft long,and throw it right in.
I will take any wood I can get, my homemade SS mount log splitter makes splitting huge rounds that weigh over 1000lbs easy as splitting small pieces.I havent had to noodle anything since i built this splitter.
When I help my brother split for his wood stove,me use the small stuff mostly,only 16-18" long,and smaller rounds,split down to 6" or so. We preffer the 6" rounds there too,so they can go in unsplit,they seem to burn much slower,and longer than split wood.

 

[BlackCatBone]

I tend to like the big stuff for some reason, although last weekend a buddy and I cleaned up a very big 30" pecan tree that was a real pain. I am very familiar with pecan, but this one is crazy. It has got to be the hardest and heaviest wood I've cut. A 10" round about a foot long made the fiskars super slitter bounce several times before I could open a crack. Unreal hardness.

 

[Dok]

Prefer big, but I'll take them all

I prefer big rounds, they fill up the truck faster! I cut everything down to 2-3" and it all eventually makes it home. I'll even take smaller pieces for the Black Lab I'm more picky about the straightness- or lack there of. The oak I cut can have to twisty pieces and I'm starting to leave those behind. They just make the ricks unstable. Same goes from crotches, I'll minimize the size of the crotches and leave'em.
Dok