How many of you are running Eastonmade wood splitters?

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I've looked at them real hard. The 12-22 with box wedge would be the proper fit for my business model. Will the production time increase enough over my current setup to offset the cost..? Hmmmm.

I have looked at them and have even talked to the owner on the phone. They seem expensive and look nice but seem to produce a lot of trash with the box design form watching the videos of them running. The box wedge design looks good for my needs but it's not just a matter of production. It looks like you would need additional equipment for them to be productive witch ads to the cost of running one. I would need a skid steer to move and handle bigger rounds and a wood conveyor and separator to load a trailer and move to a stacking area. Then could I keep up with one and handle how much wood it would produce. Also can I get and market that much wood. I'm sure I will not be going that big any time soon.
 
I have looked at them and have even talked to the owner on the phone. They seem expensive and look nice but seem to produce a lot of trash with the box design form watching the videos of them running. The box wedge design looks good for my needs but it's not just a matter of production. It looks like you would need additional equipment for them to be productive witch ads to the cost of running one. I would need a skid steer to move and handle bigger rounds and a wood conveyor and separator to load a trailer and move to a stacking area. Then could I keep up with one and handle how much wood it would produce. Also can I get and market that much wood. I'm sure I will not be going that big any time soon.

I've talked to them as well and seen a machine run local. Thing I see with all of em is like you said they produce a fair bit of trash. Once you load a round you get what you get out the other end. Running a Super Split I get near zero trash. I can split around anything knotty or foul and feed it to the boiler rather than tater mash it and make a big mess.

Another consideration, if you dont run the box wedge a lot of wood produced is what I would sell as boiler wood. If that is your market great. If you do bundle wood or home owner grade there is going to be a fair bit of re-split.

Yet to see a do all end all splitter made that wasnt near $100k (Multitek)
 
I've talked to them as well and seen a machine run local. Thing I see with all of em is like you said they produce a fair bit of trash. Once you load a round you get what you get out the other end. Running a Super Split I get near zero trash. I can split around anything knotty or foul and feed it to the boiler rather than tater mash it and make a big mess.

Another consideration, if you dont run the box wedge a lot of wood produced is what I would sell as boiler wood. If that is your market great. If you do bundle wood or home owner grade there is going to be a fair bit of re-split.

Yet to see a do all end all splitter made that wasnt near $100k (Multitek)


I get my wood from a tree guy that takes down yard trees and some come with hidden metal from all kinds of things that have been nail to them then have grown over. Many are large trees that are grown out in the open so there not strait poles, there loaded with forks and knotty wood. The black streaks in the wood are a dead give away there is metal in them somewhere. Might be an issue with a box wedge. I can work around it with a conventional splitter. You would need more equipment and more room to store that much wood. I'm gonna stay small and more efficient and less overhead.
 
I have been thinking about these as well. In November my buddy and I purchased a used TW-6 with the 4 and 6 way wedges. It does a nice job and is far faster than the huskie splitters we had before, but still kind of a pain. We haven’t really been selling firewood for quite a few years but as we get older it looks to be a better option for a side business. That and being a full time arborist and doing that as a side is getting to be a bit much. The area I live tends to have a lot of people who are under the assumption that nice uniform pieces burn better. Hence the reason we’re considering a box wedge. Obtaining wood to keep a splitter like this busy is no problem for me. Getting the nice easy stuff is.
It’s just something I’ve been thinking about but hopefully I can gain some insight from you guys.
 
Not to beat a dead horse but most guys on here know that we run a power split so my view is going to be slanted. We ran a TW-5 for years , then switched to the power split. There is no comparison. The Eastomades look like great, well built machines, sounds like the owner is a great guy. But there is no comparison between the machines. You control the size of each piece, there is little to no trash. Every issue that was brought up in the above posts is solvable with the power split. We sell firewood commercially, the only processor I have seen that produces sellable wood is the Multi-tek with the bundle wood 16 way boxwedge, like said above, 100 grand. For most homeowners or small firewood sellers, the Eastonmade is a great machine. To scale up your operation to the next level and not spend 100 grand, the power split is your only answer I think. It all depends on how serious you are and what you are trying to accomplish. We have multiple employees that we try to keep working through the winter by processing firewood so for us, the power split makes sense. With our operation and business model, a splitter like the Eastonmade would not work but that is just my situation. Some of these companies have come out with some really neat, big splitters. Brute Force has a splitter like an Eastonmade with a conveyor on it. Different strokes for different folks.
 
Not to beat a dead horse but most guys on here know that we run a power split so my view is going to be slanted. We ran a TW-5 for years , then switched to the power split. There is no comparison. The Eastomades look like great, well built machines, sounds like the owner is a great guy. But there is no comparison between the machines. You control the size of each piece, there is little to no trash. Every issue that was brought up in the above posts is solvable with the power split. We sell firewood commercially, the only processor I have seen that produces sellable wood is the Multi-tek with the bundle wood 16 way boxwedge, like said above, 100 grand. For most homeowners or small firewood sellers, the Eastonmade is a great machine. To scale up your operation to the next level and not spend 100 grand, the power split is your only answer I think. It all depends on how serious you are and what you are trying to accomplish. We have multiple employees that we try to keep working through the winter by processing firewood so for us, the power split makes sense. With our operation and business model, a splitter like the Eastonmade would not work but that is just my situation. Some of these companies have come out with some really neat, big splitters. Brute Force has a splitter like an Eastonmade with a conveyor on it. Different strokes for different folks.


There are definitely many factors that go into what your trying to accomplish. Labor hours, final product, material your working with, and what your market or needs are, to the other support equipment you may need. The type of splitter is just one piece of the puzzle.
 
I have the 12-22, I own the box wedge, 6 way and 4 way. I primarily use the 4 way wedge because I like that I can control the size of the splits much easier then say with the 6 way or the box wedge. It might also have to do with the quality of the wood I'm starting off with, Generally yard trees. If you had a uniform sized tree to start with I can see using the 6 way wedge more often and producing a huge amount of splits in a very short time. I find if you don't have really large clean wood the box wedge does tend to produce a fair amount of "Waste" I don't sell firewood so it doesn't bother me.

Great machine and a great company standing behind its product.
 
Like kevinlar, I have the same gear. Same experiences. Its a good machine. I also have a SplitFire220 which I have not used since getting the 12-22. There is a bit of trash produced. I take most of it and bag it up and give it with each cord sold. It makes great fire starter. Nothing wasted.
 
I see Andrew just announced that he is buying his Dads's business, Bells Firewood Processors, and changing the name to Eastonmade and going to start making firewood processors now under the Eastonmade name.
 
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