What am I going to do with this wood?

Yesterday Epicklein22 called me and asked if I wanted some Red Oak and I said yes. He was doing a job near me and needed to get rid of a truckload of wood and I had sweet visions of nice manageable pieces but instead ended up with these monster blocks! Now I ask, what kind of friend would unload a huge pile of wood like this on a unsuspecting guy?
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A really cool guy would do this for a friend! I was just foolin. Im busy and wont be able to work on them for a while but I cant wait! Andy is a great guy and I sure appreciate it.

those are some nice blocks! Can't tell, but is that oak?


Down the page another hurtin' member up north of you needs some wood as well, if ya all guys run into any more extra.

You're lucky...Just noodle em down to manageable sizes and take em home.

I wish we had oak.

ft. churchill said:

I wish we had oak.

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You have fantastic rural areas with beautiful mountains.....

I see a few pieces of shagbark hickory in the mix, think the big rounds are hickory of another type or might even be shagbark after a few moves most of the shaggy is gone.
I also see at least 1 big round of Rock Elm or American elm, difficult to id since the bark is almost gone from it.

No bad firewood in that selection

Certainly looks to be noodle time....:msp_thumbup:

Oh ya it will be noodle time. Ill have to post pics when I start. I dont think it will be for a while though. Im too busy with other projects.

Rookie1 said:

Oh ya it will be noodle time. Ill have to post pics when I start. I dont think it will be for a while though. Im too busy with other projects.

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Funny. I spent the better part of the afternoon yesterday with similar sized red oak rounds. I had the brilliant idea of borrowing a hydro V/H splitter, thinking i could quarter them down faster if i wrestled the rounds to the horizontal splitter and let it have its way with the oak.

Boy did that soak cork. I set out today to finish the job( on my back !!!!!) and realized...i should noodle them, its got to be better then wrestling rounds for another afternoon. Then i remembered "noodle some, wedge the rest of the way) It was light work once i decided to use my head some.

Bottom line...look for natural cracks or weak rings on the huge rounds, noodle about 3 -5 inches down along the faults then reach for the wedges and a sledge to finish the work. A good series of lenghts of wedges is a big help. I cut a few big wedges on the bandsaw and it really went well. All i needed was the trusty MS 360 for the noodle starts.

Best of luck HTH.

A

As far as noodling goes, sometimes you might as well just cut all the way through. If the grain is nice and straight it works fine to make a partial cut and then split, but a lot of times that trunk wood is so narley it is still a mess splitting it. You end up with pieces you can't stack straight. Once you have the wood set in position on its side and have your saw in the cut, why set your saw down, reposition the wood up on end, and then grab another tool, or tools, to finish what you would have already finished with the saw. I know, you get more waste in noodles, but mulch is good for garden shrubs and plants. The noodled pieces stack great. I know I've seen people "noodle", from the end grain a ways, and then split, but that's hard on you and the saw, it's slow, and it's not really noodling. Cut with the grain, and don't cut into the dirt. It's surprising how fast you can cut through a block of wood.

Festus said:

As far as noodling goes, sometimes you might as well just cut all the way through. If the grain is nice and straight it works fine to make a partial cut and then split, but a lot of times that trunk wood is so narley it is still a mess splitting it. You end up with pieces you can't stack straight. Once you have the wood set in position on its side and have your saw in the cut, why set your saw down, reposition the wood up on end, and then grab another tool, or tools, to finish what you would have already finished with the saw. I know, you get more waste in noodles, but mulch is good for garden shrubs and plants. The noodled pieces stack great. I know I've seen people "noodle", from the end grain a ways, and then split, but that's hard on you and the saw, it's slow, and it's not really noodling. Cut with the grain, and don't cut into the dirt. It's surprising how fast you can cut through a block of wood.

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Let the "Noodle Wars" begin....

Partial noodles uses less saw, less mess to clean...er mulch to spread, less oil, mix and leaves more firewood...and quite honestly its faster on a straight grained oak like the OP has. If there is nasty knots all bets are off but knots suck no matter what and thought out in advance most can be "worked around".

And the "stack better" argument.....the fire dont know how pretty the wood was in the stack, heck i say just pile it up somewhere let it season and burn it.

One more thing, as usual the rounds that got left cut side down are filled with mud on the cut side. I don't have to go all the way through to the dirt (and the resharpened chain) .

angelo c said:

Let the "Noodle Wars" begin....

Partial noodles uses less saw, less mess to clean...er mulch to spread, less oil, mix and leaves more firewood...and quite honestly its faster on a straight grained oak like the OP has. If there is nasty knots all bets are off but knots suck no matter what and thought out in advance most can be "worked around".

And the "stack better" argument.....the fire dont know how pretty the wood was in the stack, heck i say just pile it up somewhere let it season and burn it.

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Only need to noodle half way through the round, perhaps a tad more if it is a big one. Any more and you're just playing with it...:biggrin:

I don't see anything that needs anything but an eight pound splitting maul

Most should pop with an ax!

MNGuns said:

Only need to noodle half way through the round, perhaps a tad more if it is a big one. Any more and you're just playing with it...:biggrin:

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You sound like my wife...

Invite those kid over from the wood splitting contest thread looks like they could use some more practice!

jcl said:

Invite those kid over from the wood splitting contest thread looks like they could use some more practice!

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How about we skip the kids and invite the announcer girl instead...:msp_sleep:

Careful - looks like you have some steel or iron in the one log.

buzz sawyer said:

Careful - looks like you have some steel or iron in the one log.

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It's clean, oak blues very easily. The bar was getting a little pinched, so that's what I attribute the coloring to. The 066 ripped right through all the cuts.

Rookie1 said:

Yesterday Epicklein22 called me and asked if I wanted some Red Oak and I said yes. He was doing a job near me and needed to get rid of a truckload of wood and I had sweet visions of nice manageable pieces but instead ended up with these monster blocks! Now I ask, what kind of friend would unload a huge pile of wood like this on a unsuspecting guy?
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A really cool guy would do this for a friend! I was just foolin. Im busy and wont be able to work on them for a while but I cant wait! Andy is a great guy and I sure appreciate it.

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Ross, you helped me out big time on this job. Those red oak rounds are close to 48" in diameter. 6 of them stuffed my F-450 dump. They are all straight and shouldn't be too hard to split once he noodles them into manageable pieces. That 044, 056 and 076 should all have some fun on those chunks.

Ross and I met on here and it's been really helpful and fun getting to know each other. He's a hell of a mechanic and always willing to help if asked. Great guy to have on your side!