Would you want a dimensional 'french-fries' wedge on your processor?

[KiwiBro]

Many still only use star wedges, presumably because of the loads required to force wood through the honey-comb/french-fry wedges.

I would have thought that the extra horsepower needed would be well worth it and far cheaper than checking for, catching and taking off the conveyor, the big splits done with the usual star shaped wedges so they could be split again to a size the customers can accept.

Does anyone have experience with both types of wedges on processors and any opinions on which they prefer and why?

Thanks.

 

[Curlycherry1]

The problem even with star wedges is the small pieces they generate. Put a 12" log through a 6 way wedge on a splitter like a Timberwolf processor and you get some pieces that are sized right, but you also get a lot of slivers and trash that is unsalable. That has to be sorted out and disposed of.

My brother uses a 4 way and once in a while a 6 way on his processor. What he has recently done is added not one but two small splitters right near the main splitter so that the helper that is in charge of loading logs on the deck can split the big pieces that need a second split. So the helper stands there over the trough and pulls the big pieces from the 6-way out that were missed and quickly whacks them once and sends them on their way. The small splitters have lightening fast cycle times.

Here you can see his first iteration where he had one splitter set over the trough, now he has two and he says his productivity with a helper is way, way up. The main thing is that he now only gets about a cubic yard of trash per day vs 5-6 if he used the 6-way exclusively.

You can see the trash that is generated under the 6-way wedge. That amount of trash was generated in about 30 minutes of me running the processor. Without the smaller splitter, that area would have been filled up to the screed bars in less than 30 minutes. He can now run well over an hour before that has to be cleaned out.

 

[woodman6666]

You think you make trash with a 6 way star, try a french fry head you will give 15-20% of your wood away.

 

[blackdogon57]

have a look at the built-rite processors design. They have both a four way and a six way that mounted vertically with hydraulic controls. You can switch wedges by moving the wedges up and down depending on the size of the wood. for really small stuff you can move the wedged right out of the way and split in two.

 

[Curlycherry1]

My brother's model shown above has been able to run both 4 way and 6 way wedges. He stopped using it and just puts what wedge will work well for the particular logs he is working with. He can swap them out in about 3-4 minutes. It also has the feature to fly the 4 way or the 6 way up and split singles. The beam the wedge is on (the tall silver piece) is a splitting wedge.

 

[KiwiBro]

You think you make trash with a 6 way star, try a french fry head you will give 15-20% of your wood away.

And that is perfectly fine by me provided the processor is far more profitable than it is wasteful compared to repeated handling and splitting with a two way wedge.

Additionally, if the end product is more consistently acceptable to the market then that's a nice bonus too. Here, we'll get complaints if splits are too wide or too small. I'm thinking a no-brainer process (if we had a processor with a choice of two french fry wedges set up at optimum sizes for two different ranges of log diameters and a grill or tumbler at the top of the conveyor) would be best, if affordable.

 

[KiwiBro]

have a look at the built-rite processors design. They have both a four way and a six way that mounted vertically with hydraulic controls. You can switch wedges by moving the wedges up and down depending on the size of the wood. for really small stuff you can move the wedged right out of the way and split in two.

Thanks. That offers a degree of flexibility, which would be especially useful when the logs can't be graded by diameter to any great extent before feeding the splitter. From what I've read circular saws are far cheaper and less hassle than harvester bars, over the life of the processor.

But I'm suffering from a distinct lack of talk-time with experienced processor users to get a real handle on how the two compare in the real world, which, funnily enough, tends to differ somewhat from the marketing/testimonial world.

 

[CentaurG2]

The more flutes you have on a wedge the more debris you will get. A fixed box wedge on a large processor will waste about 1 cord for every 5 produced. Crooked wood or wood that has a lot of knots tends to form mulch rather than uniform pieces. The debris becomes a problem when you are pushing 4 or 5 cords an hour as it really begins to pile up. You can send it up with the split wood into the pile but it hampers drying. If you sort it out, you can chip it and resell as woodchips or send it to a biomass plant if you have one handy. Worst part of a fix box wedge is getting something stuck in it. Once it’s stuck fast (as in 58 tons will not push it out) getting it unstuck is both time consuming and very dangerous.

Circular blades with carbide teeth will cut a long time provided you don’t hit any metal. The metal easily chips the carbide and once half or so of the teeth are chipped, you begin to lose blade speed and power in the cut. Replacing the teeth requires a little bit of silver soldering. Not too hard but kind of a pain and not cheap. Sawdust from the blade can be used or sold as it does not have bar oil in it.

You would really need to split and sell some serious firewood to justify a large processer with a circular blade and the support equipment to run it.

 

[KiwiBro]

The more flutes you have on a wedge the more debris you will get. A fixed box wedge on a large processor will waste about 1 cord for every 5 produced. Crooked wood or wood that has a lot of knots tends to form mulch rather than uniform pieces. The debris becomes a problem when you are pushing 4 or 5 cords an hour as it really begins to pile up. You can send it up with the split wood into the pile but it hampers drying. If you sort it out, you can chip it and resell as woodchips or send it to a biomass plant if you have one handy. Worst part of a fix box wedge is getting something stuck in it. Once it’s stuck fast (as in 58 tons will not push it out) getting it unstuck is both time consuming and very dangerous.

Circular blades with carbide teeth will cut a long time provided you don’t hit any metal. The metal easily chips the carbide and once half or so of the teeth are chipped, you begin to lose blade speed and power in the cut. Replacing the teeth requires a little bit of silver soldering. Not too hard but kind of a pain and not cheap. Sawdust from the blade can be used or sold as it does not have bar oil in it.

You would really need to split and sell some serious firewood to justify a large processer with a circular blade and the support equipment to run it.

Thanks for this info'.
I can see how cutting cross grain on knotted/crooked logs would create more waste, not to mention put more strain on everything.
but I'm mindful of not writing it off as "waste" as there are downstream uses for it that could still more than cover the costs of removing this from the firewood stream.

To my mind, there does appear to be two distinct genre's of processors based on the type of wood one expects to feed it with; straight grained pecker pole downgrade logs day in, day out, or a serious mix of woods (I'm thinking urban tree service cast-offs and the like) some of which could be big, ugly monsters, and the diameters are changing almost every second log unless graded well before they hit the feed table.

The more I think about it, the more I do like the flexibility of the built-rite wedge setup.

Can wedges be reversed so you could try pushing stuck material back out the way it went in? I'd imagine trying to clear a wedge of stuck material given the forces involved would certainly be a challenge.

I do like the idea of some wedge edges being forward of others, so that the loads on the ram are actually lower, without one massive spike in pressure as all the wedge edges fight back at the same time.

 

[CentaurG2]

There are many different designs of wedges and splitting chambers. So far, I have never seen a commercially available “do all” processor. Most processors are designed for telephone pole type wood and split fastest with minimal waste with this wood. Most sellers of processer logs simply chip or tub grind anything else as processor owners don’t want to deal with it. Waste of diesel and time trying to feed a crooked log across a live deck and down a straight processor tray.

The fixed wedges that I have seen are securely bolted into the splitting chamber and act just like a die. Once a piece of wood enters the chamber and hits the box flutes, it can only go forward and it takes a considerable amount of force to push it through. Enter knots or twists and you start having problems. With adjustable star wedges, hard to split wood will simply push off to either side of the wedge flutes as the wood has some room. Tree salvage wood just plain stinks. It is usually, to big, rotten or full of metal and cement and it all belongs in a tub grinder. Unless you are doing the removals yourself, all of the gravy wood is usually long spoken for.

Best introductory ”do all” machine that I have seen in action is the double vertical powersplit. Good combo of features and minimal support equipment needed. You still need to cut your wood with a chainsaw but if you are dealing with salvage, crooked or junk wood, you will need to anyway.

 

[KiwiBro]

Best introductory ”do all” machine that I have seen in action is the double vertical powersplit. Good combo of features and minimal support equipment needed. You still need to cut your wood with a chainsaw but if you are dealing with salvage, crooked or junk wood, you will need to anyway.

Thanks. That's got me thinking. Why doesn't supersplit do a vertical design? It seems like the big issue I'd have with their current models is the extra manhandling of big rounds, but it looks like a vertical splitter would be less effort. Or perhaps a flywheel driven (fast, efficient) 2-way on one post for the easy stuff and hydraulic 4 way on the other would cover just about all angles, be cheap to run and reasonably productive?
I like the foot operated ram idea so both hands can be kept working the rounds. I've seen an Aussie one that uses a knee operated ram for the same reason.

Power Split say 10 face cords per hour but that doesn't seem right. Does anyone know how many full cords these could average per hour with varying sized rounds with two operators (hmmm, there's 16 units of labour on the splitter per day without including bucking) in the real world?

Thanks.

But then it comes down to what would be the most efficient way to buck varying grades and sizes of logs to keep the splitter fed? I've a thread along those lines already going.

Also, does it bug anyone else that most of these manufacturers never put pricing on their sites? I can understand why they don't but it sure is a PITA.

 

[CentaurG2]

There is no easy way to deal with firewood. All machines are a tradeoff of advantages vs costs. The largest advantage of a powersplit is that you bring it to the wood. The more times you handle the wood, the more it costs. Unfortunately, the self propel hydraulic drive motors considerably increase its costs. Last price I think I remember seeing on the big one with all the bells and whistles was over $20K. They are probably more now since steel and oils have increased considerably since then. Most of the larger machines are hand built, market prices of materials vary and thus they usually don’t provide pricing until you ask.

Way too many variables for a real time production number on any splitter or processor. The real question is how many cords a day do you need to produce to make a profit? I know a few one man operations that do alright with firewood but they usually have some other employment that gives them a guaranteed check on Friday and health bennies. Firewood pays for beer or fun or toys.

Lots of different ways to buck firewood but a tractor with front forks or skidsteer or a log truck will make your life a lot easier. I have seen old yard trucks with older loaders go for cheap money around here. CUTs and skidsteers really hold their value but would be much easier to sell if you decide to bail. You need to experiment and find out what works best for your operation.