Wedge design

[NELOG]

I was wondering if anyone has tried making unusual wedges for their log splitters. It seems that some of the manufacturers have interesting "box" type wedges for making uniform wood. Has anyone attempted something like this or anything else beyond the typical two or four-way wedge? What's worked? Pictures would be great. Thanks a lot

 

[jp hallman]

I've seen just about every shape you'd want to try. One(like a box) might work for a while in softwood, and then comes along that one tough knot. The styles made on professional processors of today didn't "just happen". The only area I can think of would be a "floating" wedge that would give slightly when encountering a large knot. This way, in theory, the knife would follow the limb and split instead of shattering the wood. Besides that, I see no room for improvement.

 

[Newfie]

Those box wedges are nice for packaged firewood if you don't mind making two piles. One pile of nice firewood and another big one of useless splinters and crap.

 

[NELOG]

I can imagine that you do get a lot of bad splinters and junk pieces. Are you refering to a specific model that you have used? I know that on my conventional Iron and Oak wedge I still get a considerable amount of minced pieces of wood. Maybe you have the same experience with your regular wedge. I wonder how the amount of waste compares. Additionally, with enough hydraulic pressure and a strong enough weld-job, I can't imagine that knots would actually stop a piece of wood from being split. I know with a 5 inch piston I can crosscut most types of wood, which is essentially what you're doing with a knot. Has anyone had a good experience with these wedges? Thanks

 

[Patrick62]

How about something different?

This has worked well for me:

I can rotate and go again to get a 6 way split.

-pat

 

[Newfie]

I can imagine that you do get a lot of bad splinters and junk pieces. Are you refering to a specific model that you have used? I know that on my conventional Iron and Oak wedge I still get a considerable amount of minced pieces of wood. Maybe you have the same experience with your regular wedge. I wonder how the amount of waste compares. Additionally, with enough hydraulic pressure and a strong enough weld-job, I can't imagine that knots would actually stop a piece of wood from being split. I know with a 5 inch piston I can crosscut most types of wood, which is essentially what you're doing with a knot. Has anyone had a good experience with these wedges? Thanks

My experience was with the Timberwolf (TW-7?) with the box wedge. A regular 2 way wedge will create some debris but this thing was crazy. In 7 or 8 cycles it would create enough debris to exceed what a classic style wedge would create for a cord's worth of splitting. It created a lot of stuff that was way too small to be firewood and on the large size to be effective kindling.

 

[jp hallman]

I can imagine that you do get a lot of bad splinters and junk pieces. Are you refering to a specific model that you have used? I know that on my conventional Iron and Oak wedge I still get a considerable amount of minced pieces of wood. Maybe you have the same experience with your regular wedge. I wonder how the amount of waste compares. Additionally, with enough hydraulic pressure and a strong enough weld-job, I can't imagine that knots would actually stop a piece of wood from being split. I know with a 5 inch piston I can crosscut most types of wood, which is essentially what you're doing with a knot. Has anyone had a good experience with these wedges? Thanks

I didn't mean to imply a knot would stall the splitter. The knot goes all to hell along with the rest of the piece being split. I have to clean a pile of debris daily as it is. If the splitter "knew" to allow the wedge to follow the grain next to knots, wood splitting would be much more clean and efficient. I've made a few prototypes, some work OK, but not quite yet what I'm looking for.

 

[Firewoodster]

Splitter

That is a GREAT looking splitter P62