Scrounging Firewood (and other stuff)

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That's quite a haul Mikey517! 'Scrounging' definitely has different categories! Some of you guys are able to take advantage of big wood opportunities. I am much more of a 'small wood' scrounger: would have to buy trucks, trailers, and tractors to compete!

All good - glad to see someone getting good use of the wood.

Philbert


You bring up a good point. There something out there to meet everyone's need.
 
That's quite a haul Mikey517! 'Scrounging' definitely has different categories! Some of you guys are able to take advantage of big wood opportunities. I am much more of a 'small wood' scrounger: would have to buy trucks, trailers, and tractors to compete!

All good - glad to see someone getting good use of the wood.

Philbert

With all apologies to Tennessee Williams & Blanche DuBois, "I have always depended on the kindness of strangers", or, in this case my friend Jim. He has set me up with some big wood in the past. I started helping him as a way to "pay" him back - he never asked for any kind of payment; if I'm free and he calls, I go. The day after these photos, he called and asked if I could help him split 2 cords of apple. He had promised it to a local eatery that smokes all his own meats. Took us a couple of hours to split, load and deliver, but it was fun.

I do still scrounge on my own, and get lucky sometimes. Like this cherry tree that another friend has sitting by his house for me. He no longer burns wood.
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I'm working on this in my spare time.
Sorry to post all these photos....
 
Thanks to you all that left me nice comments on my post!

Today was another pretty nice day, so I got started splitting this load of firewood,

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This splitter is a real BEAST!

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Knots, crotches or anything else, dry or green, it doesn't matter! It goes right through the 4 way,

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It took me just about 2 hours, to get the whole load all split! And it made a pretty good sized pile too.

This pict shows why I would never again buy another splitter with a "foot" on the end of the beam to split against! The picts shows how this splitter pushed the splits right off the end, I didn't have to touch any of them!

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Well, in a few days I guess i'll head out and see if I can get another load!

SR
 
What species is that tree? My neighbor has the same species that's 27" dbh and dead standing for 5 years. He's having it removed and I can have it if I want.

My big score happened Thursday. On my way home from work I noticed another neighbor had a decent pile of Hedge and I was a little jealous. That night he came over and offered me all of the hedge that "needed to be split". I gave him the key to my truck and that night I came home to a truck full of Hedge sitting in my drive. Then he mentioned that his MIL had a tree down in her yard and the tree was laying at the curb. It was some kind of Oak, the lightest Oak I have ever seen. There is more of the tree standing, and I'm going to take a mini-x over tomorrow and pull it down. The mini is a half mile away and the tree is between here and there.
 
What species is that tree? My neighbor has the same species that's 27" dbh and dead standing for 5 years. He's having it removed and I can have it if I want.

My big score happened Thursday. On my way home from work I noticed another neighbor had a decent pile of Hedge and I was a little jealous. That night he came over and offered me all of the hedge that "needed to be split". I gave him the key to my truck and that night I came home to a truck full of Hedge sitting in my drive. Then he mentioned that his MIL had a tree down in her yard and the tree was laying at the curb. It was some kind of Oak, the lightest Oak I have ever seen. There is more of the tree standing, and I'm going to take a mini-x over tomorrow and pull it down. The mini is a half mile away and the tree is between here and there.
Honestly I have no idea. It was already down on the side of the highway where the state has been cutting . It's still there too. Guess it's too big for the chipper. Quite a shame to see such a large old healthy tree cut down for nothing.
 
It was a really nice sunny day today...so I was back on my firewood scrounging adventure. First thing I did was get the winch ready to pull some tree's,

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Then me and my helper, got started limbing the tornado damaged trees, and skidding them out,

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Soon we were getting quite a few of them out,

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So my helper cut some brush out of the way, so I could back the tractor up and get it into place to pick the sticks up and lift them over the wagon. With them up in the air, it's pretty easy to cut them into firewood lengths.

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AND, finally we had a full wagon load, so I backed up the tractor and hooked up the wagon to the hitch on the skid winch! Boy, that hitch sure is handy, and with it easily adjustable, it will hook to any wagon or trailor.

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So, I pulled the load closer to the house and put it in place, ready for the splitter! Maybe i'll get started on that job, tomorrow??

SR
 
Thanks to you all that left me nice comments on my post!

This splitter is a real BEAST!

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This pict shows why I would never again buy another splitter with a "foot" on the end of the beam to split against! The picts shows how this splitter pushed the splits right off the end, I didn't have to touch any of them!

standard.jpg


Well, in a few days I guess i'll head out and see if I can get another load!

SR

Nice pile of wood and sure does look like a great splitter!

There a pluses and minuses to both varieties of splitter and I went with the end boot that will tilt-up, as I often get very large rounds that are back breakers to hoist onto the splitter beam. I'll take some photos to show more of my method when I crank it up soon. Small wood is still pretty easy to deal with using my boot variety splitter, as I take small wood right off the pile and once it's four way split and sitting in the side basket, I simply push it downhill away from me directly onto my pickup truck to move a load en masse wherever I want in the yard. Large wood, I tilt the splitter up 90 degrees, roll the big rounds over to the boot or move the splitter to where they sit if really big, and save my back.
 
Slim pickens today , hard pressed to get a load outta this stuff .

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And

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Even though them tall straight ones were mighty tempting LOL

Not my property but sometimes a fella would like to get a hold of the ones that do this .

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But the first rule of scrounging is not to pass up on free wood or kindling ;)

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I gave this load of wood and kindling to a retired couple I know on a fixed income .
 
The second load I scrounged today was brought to you by fine German engineering , Stihl and LiquiMoly .

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If you guy's have never heard of LiquiMoly I can tell you that it's a great product and they got some of the best juggs going , I pour my bar lube into the empties , perfect for pouring , the product is even Harley Approved !!!
 
Nice pile of wood and sure does look like a great splitter!

There a pluses and minuses to both varieties of splitter and I went with the end boot that will tilt-up, as I often get very large rounds that are back breakers to hoist onto the splitter beam. I'll take some photos to show more of my method when I crank it up soon. Small wood is still pretty easy to deal with using my boot variety splitter, as I take small wood right off the pile and once it's four way split and sitting in the side basket, I simply push it downhill away from me directly onto my pickup truck to move a load en masse wherever I want in the yard. Large wood, I tilt the splitter up 90 degrees, roll the big rounds over to the boot or move the splitter to where they sit if really big, and save my back.

Large rounds are no problem at all, I can lower the beam to the ground and roll them right up on it. That is, if I don't want to use the loader/grabble to load them...

I also have a splitter with a "foot" on the end, I think this Timberwolf just about made it obsolete! lol

SR
 
It's amazing what some people will throw away as trash isn't it? Here's an old pic from a couple years ago, but this is what awaited me when i cruised up to my favorite scrounging spot. Hundreds of pounds of free oak. I want to say it was white oak due to the white interior, but an expert i ain't. All i know is it was enough oak to turn my leaf springs upside down. I replaced them a few months later due to the negative arch they had developed. Lol.
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Come to think of it, i think it was scarlett oak.
 
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