Fiskars fun on a dreary day

[Steve NW WI]

Yesterday I got outside for a bit after a few days of 90°, torrential downpours, lightning, etc. I've got a bunch of those 4x4s from work to turn into campfire wood, so that's what I went after.

2 seconds into my first cut, things got ugly:

How a doubled up 2x4 got in there without me noticing is "somebody"s fault. I ever figure out who that guy is, I'll give him a piece of my mind! A quick chain swap and it was business as usual. Pretty quick I had this load ready to take to the stack:

To get good airflow with square pieces of wood, I split about 1/3 of it, and mix it into the stack. Normally I do this with the big splitter, 5-6 chunks at a stroke, but I was about outta gas. I grabbed the trusty Fiskars, and found that splitting on the trailer deck was much better than on the ground or a low stump. I very soon realized that my nice treated deck wouldn't stand this abuse long, so I went and found a "cutting board":

It's not really long lasting either. That knotty pine takes a hard swing to shear through the knots instead of just slivering off a corner. I've got an old 3x12 bridge plank I saved when I redid the trailer last year that I'm gonna cut down into cutting board 2.0. We will see how that stands up tomorrow.

It didn't take long to make a bunch of kindling. Most all the split pieces stayed on the trailer, which made it even easier on me. Bending down all the time is becoming one of my least favorite activities.

That was as far as I got before I got rained out again. I'll finish up stacking that load and get a couple more pics tomorrow. I've got probably another cord to process after this load yet, may get more from work later this week or next as well.

I've also got plans drawn up for a bucking jig I'm gonna start building tomorrow, mostly out of these 4x4s, but I'll make that another post. (See the bending over comment above - if I'm gonna do a lot of this, it might as well be easy to do!)

 

[ShaneLogs]

Nice pictures Steve! Was that a Oregon chain that you hit that steel with ?

 

[Laird]

I wish I'd get rained out sometime soon!:msp_unsure:

 

[zogger]

Why split? just criss cross # stack them leaving small gaps between all the pieces for air flow.

I like running the fiskars as much as anyone, but uniform size stuff like you got there, cut to size and stack, that's it. You can always scrounge up a cord of little branches for kindling if you need it.

 

[Steve NW WI]

Rattensmattenfratten! Had a reply all typed up yesterday before work, pics uploaded, hit the reply button, and AS puked on me. Lets try again, shall we?

Shane - Hang around kid, you're learning! That's 72LGX. That's mainly what I use, although I do keep some Carlton semi chisel around, and a couple loops of Stihl RSC. I'd have more of the Stihl chain, but the extra cost ain't worth it to me (Much like their saws!!!)

Laird - I'd send some if I knew how. It's not as wet here as it has been places a bit north and west of me, but I've dumped over 5" out of the gauge in the last week. Forecast shows at least 30% chance all weekend too...

Zogger - perfectly flat stuff stays wet where it's stacked flat on flat. Even a "flat" split edge is rough enough to break that contact. Criss-cross stacking still leaves it flat on flat. This works, doesn't take a lot of work, and makes kindling at the same time. I'm gonna continue with it, unless I come up with a better way.

On to yesterday. I got me a new splitting board, well new only in purpose. It started life as a white oak creosote treated bridge plank, retired from that and spent 20 years as a sideboard on my wood hauler before I rebuilt it last year, and just hung around waiting for a new purpose till yesterday. It's getting a bit soft, but by the time I'm that old, I bet I'm much softer:

Splitting with the grain going perpendicular to the Fiskars resulted in some damage, next time I'll try splitting with the grain lined up to the split to see if it's better:

Here's the end result. There was most of the left half cord there before Wed., I added the top row or two to finish the left side off, and all of the right side the last two days.

All in all, I've got about $30 in truck, saw, and tractor fuel, and a couple hours of my time into this cord of 98% pine.

I'm going in to work early tomorrow so I don't have to stay late, and taking the wood hauler to bring more home. This weekend I'll get my bucking stand built and try it out on another cord or better.

 

[Iska3]

Looks good Steve. You're right about the flat stacking wood. Never gave it another thought until you wrote about it. Years ago I goofed the same way and paid for it later. One of my first jobs as a teen was stacking the lumber from box cars so I should have known better. This wood will come in handy for sure.

 

[zogger]

Rattensmattenfratten! Had a reply all typed up yesterday before work, pics uploaded, hit the reply button, and AS puked on me. Lets try again, shall we?

Shane - Hang around kid, you're learning! That's 72LGX. That's mainly what I use, although I do keep some Carlton semi chisel around, and a couple loops of Stihl RSC. I'd have more of the Stihl chain, but the extra cost ain't worth it to me (Much like their saws!!!)

Laird - I'd send some if I knew how. It's not as wet here as it has been places a bit north and west of me, but I've dumped over 5" out of the gauge in the last week. Forecast shows at least 30% chance all weekend too...

Zogger - perfectly flat stuff stays wet where it's stacked flat on flat. Even a "flat" split edge is rough enough to break that contact. Criss-cross stacking still leaves it flat on flat. This works, doesn't take a lot of work, and makes kindling at the same time. I'm gonna continue with it, unless I come up with a better way.

On to yesterday. I got me a new splitting board, well new only in purpose. It started life as a white oak creosote treated bridge plank, retired from that and spent 20 years as a sideboard on my wood hauler before I rebuilt it last year, and just hung around waiting for a new purpose till yesterday. It's getting a bit soft, but by the time I'm that old, I bet I'm much softer:



Splitting with the grain going perpendicular to the Fiskars resulted in some damage, next time I'll try splitting with the grain lined up to the split to see if it's better:



Here's the end result. There was most of the left half cord there before Wed., I added the top row or two to finish the left side off, and all of the right side the last two days.



All in all, I've got about $30 in truck, saw, and tractor fuel, and a couple hours of my time into this cord of 98% pine.

I'm going in to work early tomorrow so I don't have to stay late, and taking the wood hauler to bring more home. This weekend I'll get my bucking stand built and try it out on another cord or better.

--Ah! Hadn't thought of that, but ya, I can see where it would sit in wet like that. Well, carry on then, good job!

 

[SPDRMNKY]

Splitting with the grain going perpendicular to the Fiskars resulted in some damage, next time I'll try splitting with the grain lined up to the split to see if it's better:

not to dampen your experimental spirit, but I'm gonna guess that splitting with the grain lined up will soon split your cuttin' board.

maybe save ya' some raffengaffenstappelflap...?

 

[Steve NW WI]

Well I do have about 4 16' planks to use up. Should last me a while.

 

[ShaneLogs]

Nice stacks Steve! Looks like some fun to me. My old man also uses those Oregon chains and swears by them! I prefer the Stihl chains on my Stihl saws though, LOL. I like how your stacks are perfectly square though. Makes them look nice. I am still learning though, LOL.

 

[SPDRMNKY]

Well I do have about 4 16' planks to use up. Should last me a while.

don't mind me, I'm just jealous of all that small dia stuff to split...good lookin' stacks!!

 

[Steve NW WI]

don't mind me, I'm just jealous of all that small dia stuff to split...good lookin' stacks!!

Thanks! Eat your heart out, here's more for me to do...

Start of the day today. The stack on the ground was from the last load I got, it was just a little fella, 25 cu ft.:

This is the best way to load for easy unloading, but it takes quite a bit of strapping to keep from losing any (with my luck through a cop's windshield) on the race home from work:

All stacked up. I'd have loved to just process this stuff off the truck, but I gotta haul some stuff (including some 2x6s needed for the saw station) today, so off it comes. 112 cu ft of solid wood there now, meaning I had 85+ on the old girl on the way home.

Some of the better stuff I saved for building my saw station and a regular sawbuck:

Anything with nails is now relegated to the junk pile. One day soon I'll take an old chain to it and have a bonfire:

 

[Steve NW WI]

Some smaller 1/2 round landscape "timbers" I saved out. Lots of color (the stack of box elder in the back ground is pretty light colored wood for comparison. They've got a lot of splits down em, but they might be useful down the road for something. I'm also concerned they might be treated, and I don't want to be selling anything treated. What do you guys think? If nothing else, just to be safe, they'll be used to stack wood on.

The 2 trash bags are full of the "wood condoms" a lot of this comes wrapped in. It's needed to keep the moisture in the wood from rusting the steel the wood comes with, but it's a pain in my butt. At least I've got a big trash can that I need to have a huge party just to fill on a normal week, so disposal isn't a problem.

Whaddya think these are? Fairly light weight for their size, no real aroma to em. Treated?

I'm off to donate some money to the Paul Menard gets to keep racing fund. Hope to have a saw station build thread up tonight.

 

[Dan_IN_MN]

Looks good Steve! You'll have to let me know when I can come over and give you a hand! If you're bring in a few trees or something like that! Something that will fill a few hours and make the trip worth it.

I think I'll go out and get another load (just got the truck unloaded of the last load) of wood being we've got this cool day with a nice breeze! The bugs aren't out!

Dan

 

[DSS]

Around here, those landscape timbers are nearly always hemlock. I don't think yours are treated, too light of a color.

It's amazing what people throw away.

 

[ShaneLogs]

Awesome Steve! Keep up the good work!